Q&A: Cobb school board Chairman David Chastain on school safety, CRT, taxes, test scores and more

Oct. 6—MARIETTA — In a wide-ranging interview that touched on school names, accreditation, board policies and more, the Marietta Daily Journal sat down with Cobb County Board of Education Chairman David Chastain, an incumbent Republican seeking reelection on November 8.

Chastain is running for a third term in Post 4, the most competitive of the three school board seats on the ballot this year. The election, in which he faces Democrat Catherine Pozniak, is expected to determine whether Republicans maintain their four-member majority on the school board.

The MDJ published a Q&A with Pozniak last Saturday.

Chastain, 65, was born in Atlanta. When he was in elementary school, his family moved to Marietta. He graduated from Wheeler High School in 1975 and earned a bachelor's in real estate and urban economics.

For 25 years, Chastain has worked for Lockheed Martin. He is involved in estimating and proposal work to support Lockheed aircraft built at the Marietta plant.

Chastain has been married to his wife, Lori, for 40 years. They live in north Cobb, in the Kell High School cluster. He has three adult children and four grandchildren.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

MDJ: Why should voters reelect you?

David Chastain: I think it's best to build success on success. When I first was elected, I started January 2015, and one of the first things that we did as a board back then was hire Chris Ragsdale.

We've seen a lot of positive results over the course of that time. We've seen test scores improve, we've seen a lot of innovations within the district, before and during COVID, that have helped with the overall success of our students. The most basic metrics that people use, when it comes to SAT scores, ACT scores, graduation rates and that sort of thing, continues to trend upward. So by most metrics, Cobb County is ranking among the (best) school districts, not only in the state, but in the nation. We just want to build on our success and keep growing and making improvements where needed.

Q: You and the other Republicans voted to allow armed security guards who are not police in Cobb schools. Why was that the right call?

A: Well, remember, we have our own police department with between 65 and 70 officers. But as Chris Ragsdale has pointed out in public statements, our police department, along with almost every police department in the United States, is hurting for personnel.

Not only are we hurting for personnel, we're hurting for qualified personnel. And when we talk about hiring a police officer, a man or woman, we're talking about hiring somebody with some experience, not somebody who's coming fresh into the profession. So that limits the universe of prospective cops.

And then when we hire them, that person is going to have all of the requisite equipment and support that an officer would have ... not to mention the training and what it costs to certify them and that sort of thing.

Remember, we're just adopting a policy that was already on the books with the state to be able to use non-teaching employees, where they're qualified, where they've been tested, where they have been approved by our police chief, to have the ability to carry a weapon, as is seen fit. And that helps us to beef up the security in our schools.

I believe we have four other counties right now in Georgia that are already operating with this policy. ... Chris Ragsdale has made a point that teachers are supposed to teach, teachers are not going to be carrying guns in the Cobb County School District.

The thing I like to remind people is if you take the population for Cobb County School District, just the student population, and if you rank that among all the municipalities in the state of Georgia, our student population makes us I think the seventh or eighth largest city. ... That's quite a population to be responsible for during most of the day. So I am supportive of the additional measures that have been taken to improve the security and the safety for all our students and employees.

Q: We know the superintendent has said there are certain things he can't talk about for reasons of security, but can you offer any more details — who are these people? And where? Will they be uniformed?

A: I don't have that information. That's part of the operation of the district that falls under the superintendent. I'm sure this is a work in progress.

Q: What grade would you give Chris Ragsdale on the job he's doing as superintendent?

A: I'd give him an A. He was working for the district way before he became superintendent. He was involved in technology and the IT infrastructure, involved in operations. What makes him different as a superintendent is the fact that he looks at things from an operations standpoint and not strictly from an academic standpoint. The majority of your superintendents, you're going to find out they are people who start out in the classroom and rose up through academics as a teacher and learned other skills as they came on board.

Chris was always the operations guy. His mother was a school teacher, so it's not like he's not aware of what goes on in the classroom. But for what we have had to deal with over the last several years, politically, operationally, dealing with various levels of government trying to tell him how to do his job.

Q: Some people try to use the fact that he was not a teacher to criticize him, but you would argue that's gives him a different perspective.

A: Who do you want managing Truist Park ... Do you want a baseball player? Or do you want someone that understands how to pull resources together for the park? That's what an operations person does. And that's what I think Mr. Ragsdale's done well.

Q: What did you make of the grand jury report investigating CCSD's procurement, and should the district adopt any of the changes the grand jury recommended?

A: I really don't know what all was involved in the grand jury report. I mean, it was a report, but the premise was on the Cognia report, and the Cognia report was retracted by Cognia itself.

Q: But the grand jury report itself does not mention Cognia.

A: No, it does not. But we believe that they were related.

As I understand it, grand juries from time to time look into the school district and that sort of thing. But most of what was brought up I believe was operational.

I feel like the superintendent and the board, the way things are set up for us to do the procurement and purchasing the way we do has been working. So I really have no criticisms of the current procurement process, nor do I have any support for whatever the grand jury came up with.

Q: Some of your critics have said that you should be more accessible. How would you respond to that?

A: I guess the question is, what are we talking about? I'm fairly accessible. When people send me emails or have reached out to me in my role as a board member, I'm very responsive.

If someone organizes an email campaign where all of a sudden my email box is filled with 50 to 100 emails that are pretty much copied and pasted, and I don't respond to them, I'm not going to. Especially if I'm one of multiple people that are sent the email.

There are ... a lot of detractors out there, they can say things and make accusations, but I can't respond to all of it. I'm accessible. So it just depends if it has to do with the things that are on the fringe, and people are upset that I'm not responding to their opinions that are sent to me. Once they've sent me their opinion, and I know where they're coming from, I don't really feel a need to respond.

Q: You voted to ban critical race theory and The 1619 Project from being taught in the schools. Why did you support that?

A: Both of those topics are still controversial ... These are subjects that we hadn't had to address before.

Now from an academic standpoint, The 1619 Project is still being challenged in the academic community by true historians. It has not been accepted as being historically accurate.

Likewise, with the CRT, the whole critical race theory thing, is still being debated in the academic community, depending on which side you fall on. But it's not factual. It takes a handful of facts, maybe, and then creates a theory.

But having grown up during the civil rights era ... when I grew up in Atlanta, I remember seeing bathrooms that were for "coloreds only." ... So now we're coming back into this time in the 21st century, where we're hinting at the fact that because someone is one color or the other, they should somehow be perceived differently? What place does that have in our schools?

So we as a board, the majority, sent messages, basically, to the superintendent — this is the sort of thing that right now we do not need to include in our curricula, we don't want to see it in our curricula. And let's remember, the mission of the Cobb County School District, when it comes to curriculum, is to align all of our curricula with state standards.

Here's the question. When parents, guardians have a child that goes through K-12, and marches across that stage at commencement to commence a journey ... what do those parents want that child to walk across the stage with? A perception of, "I have self-awareness, I know my strengths and weaknesses, I know where I might excel, I know where I will be challenged, but I have enough in my toolbox where I can take on any task that I choose with the opportunity of success."

Now, do you want that child to walk across the stage with some sort of inkling in the back of their mind that, because of something that I had no control over, whether it was a special need, a limited disability, my color or my ethnic background, do you want them to walk across the stage with (the idea that) "I may never be able to achieve, because it's something I could not control." That's my question.

Q: CCSD recently underwent a botched accreditation review by its accrediting agency, Cognia. Should the district remain with Cognia?

A: That's a board decision that we have not discussed. Cognia, under its different names, up until this one report, the relationship had been good.

But the special report was a result of some disgruntled board members who basically were saying, "We can't work within the system we've been given, so we want to file a complaint." And Cognia took the bait.

I also like to remind people ... we have one job that the statutes tell us to do. Elected school board members' No. 1 responsibility is to maintain board accreditation, district accreditation. That's our job. All the other stuff sounds great, but that's our job. And so everybody on the board, I think, was supposed to understand that and know it. The only reason we had a special review is because three people signed a letter that said, "Please come in and review the district, because we haven't figured out how to advance policy."

Q: And the fact of the matter is Cognia's kind of the only game in town.

A: Right.

Q: So given how messy all of that was, how do you avoid it in the future?

A: It did raise questions, and I'm not saying they don't have questions. But as a board we haven't really had that discussion. Right now, (with) our high schools, we have dual accreditation.

Some people say, "Well, you really weren't threatened." But what people need to understand is that when you start playing around with this sort of thing, if our high schools were to lose accreditation, that means that the HOPE scholarship is in jeopardy for our graduates, the ability to apply and get into other colleges and universities is in jeopardy. So accreditation becomes a very, very big deal. And just to throw around with it and use it as a threat, to me it was uncalled for.

The legislature has now gotten involved with this, and I'm sure there'll be more discussions in the next session. But right now, I think we just need to go forward with what we've got, and then see what happens next.

Q: Do you support any of the legislation?

A: I have not gotten down in the weeds to be able to dissect them. ... Usually, for me personally anyway, as these things move through the legislature, because they take on different shapes and forms and all, I don't usually get into the details until it really gets close and could affect us. But anyway, the legislature is going to be reviewing it again, I'm sure.

Q: The board voted to maintain the millage rate this year, which due to booming property values led to a tax increase. Should the board consider rolling it back next year?

A: Right now I have a hard time — I need to have a whole lot more information. Some of us can remember 2008. And the fact that when we're talking about the millage rate, you're affecting a balanced budget, which affects the ability to finance all the resources that we're expected to deliver to our students and to support our educators.

A rising tide lifts all boats, and it goes the other way. And I'm not a big fan of taxes, and definitely not tax increases.

By maintaining the millage rate, if your housing value goes up, yes, you're gonna be paying more taxes.

But interest rates are going up. Interest rates have an impact of bringing down housing values. A lot of people don't shop the retail price of a car, they shop, "What's my monthly payment going to be?" and "What percentage of my income?" That's what's happening in the housing market. And it's almost like it moves like a glacier sometimes, you don't really see it until you do.

And that's what happened to us in 2006, we could see the beginnings of the housing crash. But it wasn't happening here in Georgia, it was happening in other parts of the country. And then all of a sudden, we really felt it around 2008. When I ran for school board in 2014, we were still coming out of it, so that was six years after the fact.

So the answer to your question is right now, I would not want to mess with the millage rate, because there's so many things that are unknown right now, whether it has to do with who's elected, and who's affecting the federal tax code, with what's happening with supply and demand here in Cobb County.

Q: There's been some talk in the campaign about the senior tax exemption. You're on record supporting it. Would you support any revisions? For instance, some people have said maybe it should only be for someone who's lived in and paid taxes in Cobb for a while. Or, should there be any means testing to say, if your house is worth $5 million, maybe you shouldn't get it?

A: Right now I wouldn't review it, because now I think you're opening up opportunities to where you'd be showing favoritism toward one class over another. Somebody moves into Cobb County, whatever Cobb County has to offer in the way of services in exchange for the taxes being paid, they get.

But let's also remember though, and I was talking to a group of seniors not long ago, is that yes, they may be getting the senior exemption, but they're spending their money here in Cobb County, and they're helping with the special-purpose local-option sales tax for infrastructure, which also helps affect the quality and the reputation of our school district.

So right now, I would not play with it. Again, there's different ways you can look at it. And now that I'm 65, people move into this area, if they moved from someplace up north, they were investing in children's education there when they were paying their taxes, which in some other parts of the country are very high.

But right now, I wouldn't want to mess with it. Thinking long-term, we'll see changes in the population, we'll probably see changes in the student population. And depending on how the growth goes, what kind of housing we get in the county will affect how things look. So right now, I'm going to leave it alone.

Q: There was a group of students who think that Wheeler High should be renamed because it's named for a Confederate general. There was a committee set up, the committee was later done away with. Why not consider changing the name?

A: We have not discussed it as a board. ... But the original committee, the idea was to take every school name in the county and basically evaluate it. When the board had the discussion, I don't think everybody understood what was being proposed, and so later it was rescinded. The Wheeler discussion might take place in the future, I don't know. But a handful of students does not necessarily represent the Wheeler population. You've got alums, you've got people that have been here for a long time. So we'll wait and deal with that when it comes.

Q: As a graduate of Wheeler, how do you personally feel about the name?

A: Well, we might have the discussion in the future. ... But I used to travel to Alabama when I was in sales, and I used to drive past, I believe Alabama has a Joseph Wheeler State Park. And I don't know how many miles that is from the Wernher von Braun Civic Center in Huntsville. People in Huntsville don't seem to have a problem with naming buildings and areas after a Nazi.

Joseph Wheeler was part of a movement at the time, along with a lot of other folks. And by the way, I've been criticized because I've talked about the War for Southern Independence. The Civil War was not a civil war. You're aware of that right?

Q: It was uncivil.

A: It was uncivil, but technically, and this is one of the things I learned from a living historian out at Kennesaw Mountain Park one time — a civil war is when two different groups are trying to take over the same government. And that's why it was never called the Civil War. I believe the official records are called the War of Southern Secession, I forget, but ... the Civil War, it's just what we've called it.

Now, back to Joseph Wheeler. When I was there, I mean, I knew it was a Confederate general, I never gave it a whole lot of thought, most people that I've talked to, we never really gave it a whole lot of thought. But Joseph Wheeler, to me, is an example of someone that, the war was lost, he laid down his arms. And then he signed up and became a general in the United States Army.

And this has been mentioned in public comment. ... But Joseph Wheeler is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Is our school named after a Confederate general, or a U.S. general, or a former U.S. congressman?

But in this day and age with all of the schisms happening in our society, at what point do we have redemption? Where's the repentance? Where's forgiveness?

Now I'm not gonna speak to Joseph Wheeler's character. But to me, what makes the discussion difficult. ...

And the question is, who should have that discussion? Who gets to decide? Who gets to put a person's character and legacy on trial? ... And again, I didn't know the hearts and minds of the people, things have been said in public, I don't have all the facts. But I just know that for a lot of people, they graduated from the Joseph Wheeler High School.

So the answer there is that it's, to me, a very complicated discussion. And I think that a handful of students — and I respect them. But I'm also concerned that this is another one of those things that I think was coordinated by adults, and not necessarily initiated by the students themselves. But I don't know that for a fact.

Q: We see headlines about teachers being demoralized, leaving the profession. What should be done to encourage them to stay?

A: Well I think, what was our (annual) retention rate this week? ... 93% or 95% of our teachers came back.

We're doing the best we can from a financial standpoint.

I also like to caution people ... they'll see some video and report about something that's happening in a school someplace else in the country, and not take the time to realize that just because it's happening someplace else, doesn't mean it's happening around the corner from you.

I think we have to understand, like any business, some people enter into something and in the first three to five years, they figure out "this isn't for me." And so you're going to have some of that.

But I will tell you that I have been pleased, that on several occasions, I've had retired teachers come up to me and talk about how much they miss it.

So the demoralized part, I'm not sure where that is. I'm not saying it can't happen at the school level or something. And that's where personnel policies and good managers need to be aware of that sort of thing and monitor it. But I think here in Cobb for the most part, I think we're doing fairly well.

Q: Your opponent, one thing she talked about a lot was, she thinks the district should reexamine its reading programs. Do you agree?

A: One of the things that has been of concern to me, to a lot of the people in our area, and to the state legislature, is dyslexia. ... So I would like for us to examine how we teach reading and what we do best.

We didn't hear a whole lot about dyslexia, and some of these other things early on, I think, because by emphasizing phonics, and how to sound out words and that sort of thing, which is what you do with dyslexic students, we didn't see it as much. Then we went to whole language, and I won't go into the whole history of teaching reading, but I believe that's something that's kind of ongoing.

The state legislature, either last year or the year before, passed some legislation that opens the door for us to try and do more to deal with dyslexia.

I have read books on dyslexia, I've talked to parents who have students in our schools who are dyslexic, I have talked with parents who took their kids out of our schools, because they could afford to put them in remediation at one of (the) schools that specializes in that. Roughly 15% of the population could be diagnosed as dyslexic. If we've got 107,000 students, that means we probably have 15,000 students that need some sort of special reading support. And that's been a football that's gone back and forth through the years.

And so in the early grades, if a teacher can start seeing some things that indicate that there needs to be some reading help, then that can be applied.

Now the other thing to remember is the school district can't do diagnosis. And so, parents will usually have to go to an outside source to get someone to come up with the diagnosis of dyslexia.

So anyway, hopefully those things are improving. One of the best curriculums for dyslexia is the Orton-Gillingham method. But I understand it's usually fairly expensive. ... And so we leave that to the people involved in curriculum to figure out what's best.

But yeah, we can always be improving reading skills.

So back to your original question, I'm not going to say that her comments aren't valid, but I know that we are trying to address them as a district.

Q: Some have alleged that you and the other GOP board members are shutting out the Democrats from having a say on the board, such as the policy that requires four votes to get an item on the agenda.

A: Is that true? Have you checked it out to find out if that's true?

Q: Yeah, we reported on it.

A: That's not true. You don't have to have three (additional) votes to get something on the agenda. You need three (additional) votes to override the chair and the superintendent's decision about the agenda item. It's considered the chair's agenda.

So what happens is, if a board member wants to put something on the agenda that we're not sure it really fits in or isn't appropriate, then in agenda prep we say, "OK, we're not going to do that."

Or we go back and tell them that we don't want to do this now, or this will be covered in a report later on down the road. And then the idea is OK, but if you really want it on there, you go get three other people to support you, and you can override the chair. Most of what gets on the agenda that has been recommended from other people, has not required the three votes.

Q: So you don't have any problem with the way it works now?

A: Well, it may be that the policy can be written more clearly, because people keep repeating the same thing. But if one of our Democrat colleagues has something that would be appropriate to put on the agenda, we're going to do it.

The board meeting is for the superintendent to report monthly to the board on the activities of the district. And for us to have some sort of back and forth. When a board member wants to put something on the agenda, it should be related to policy, or it should be related to something specific.

School board meetings are not for having just public discussions. In fact, remember, the board meeting is not a public meeting. This is the first thing they teach us in when we're being trained by the Georgia School Board Association. It is a meeting being held in public.

And so the board meeting is supposed to be like any other business meeting. The superintendent has things to bring to the board that needs approval, that we need to be informed about, and that sort of thing. Primarily, the board meeting (is) for the superintendent to report to his bosses. And then the bosses might have something they want to say, but it's supposed to be related to the operation of the district. And then there'll be reports and things that we ask the superintendent to bring on a timely basis.

Q: Since we're on the topic of board meetings, it used to be that the work session and the voting meeting were not on the same day. Do you think it would maybe lower the temperature some, or you could get more public buy-in, if it was still that way? Do you think the process is too fast?

A: No. I mean, we put the agenda out there, but remember, it's the board meeting. It's not a public meeting. People can stream it, people can watch it, it's recorded. We're very transparent when it comes to the meeting. But the board chair and the superintendent, we set the agenda, it gets put out there.

Traditionally, and remember this was before social media, this was before emails ... how could individual constituents communicate with the board? You had your public comment.

Now in a lot of districts, from what I'm told, public comment should be about what is on the agenda.

We should hear people talking about what's on the agenda. But what has happened over the last number of years ... we have 30 minutes of public comment, and half the time the speakers aren't even commenting on what's on the agenda. They can come and say whatever they want, we've been a free speech zone, we don't throw anybody out. It's not an interaction, as I've read in my statements.

There is a physical cost to holding these meetings. You've got all of your support people that you don't see. And those of us that work, it's, it's easier for me personally, and for others, we have one day, we're gonna get through the work session, we're gonna get through the agenda, we're gonna have our executive session ... then we're gonna come back and have our voting session.

What used to happen was you have a work session, then you come back in two weeks and you have your voting session. And what ended up happening? ... You had more discussion, because half the time people didn't remember what was said during the work session. So I think it works best for everybody involved, that's involved in the actual meetings, in the discussion, in the policy, to have it all in one day.

Q: The superintendent got rid of the No Place for Hate program. Was that a good move?

A: I was aware of the program, don't know all the details about it. But he made a decision based on the information he had. And so I support him in that.

I don't think that was in every school. I mean, certain schools take it on. And the other thing about a program is that you might have a program that in years past had one flavor to it, and then all of a sudden things progress in a certain way. And maybe certain characteristics have been brought in that weren't there.

Q: Every year school systems trumpet how well they're doing on test scores, while at the same time saying you can't compare the present year against the previous year because the test has been revised. How can school districts be held accountable for their scores?

A: Well, you look at the trends, and COVID kind of threw everybody for a loop. And so in the case of the last Milestone test, I think what we did emphasize is we didn't compare years over years because of what we went through. So we just said, OK, it's a horse race. And today, all these horses that have done so well in the past are gonna be racing in mud, with fog, and maybe the rain beating down. And so that horse that did so well on turf, when the sun was shining, is having a hard time. So what we're gonna do is say, this is today's race. And this is who came in first, second and third.

And so I think the way the Milestones were presented this last time was fair. But we really do want to get back on track to where we can show the trends and not have these little outliers.

Q: Why do you think the Cobb school board has gotten so polarized?

A: I think some people run for school board and don't understand the actual mission. When I ran in 2014, for the first time ... I remember a lady (said) "What is your agenda?" And I said, "I hate to disappoint you, but I don't have one." She goes, "What?" And I said, "the role of the school board is to represent the community on the board that hires the superintendent, that helps our schools. For me to make promises about what I'm going to do if elected when I really haven't sat at the table yet, I can't do that."

And honest to god, what I was concerned about was getting on a board and helping maintain and improve the civility on the board. But other people run for school board and get on the board for different reasons.

I would advise anyone if they're going to go into any sort of elected position where they're going to be voting, the first thing you need to do is count the number of votes you need to pass policy. If you've got three Democrats, and you want to move policy forward, if you want to get a vote, you're going to have to get someone who doesn't necessarily align with your party to vote with you. And Dale Carnegie wrote a book many years ago called "How to Win Friends and Influence People." And you don't go right on the board, in the case of (Leroy) Tre' Hutchins, Tre' Hutchins signed that letter to Cognia before he'd ever really been on the board. He was complaining about board business before he'd even been on the board.

So he aligned himself with the two other Democrats and said, let's bring in this investigation of the Cobb County School District. From a political standpoint, that does not help your vote.

But if you ever go back and look at the record, you're going to find that there are a lot of votes where we have voted together. ... But unfortunately, unless that's pointed out to people on a regular basis, they forget.

Q: Anything else you want to touch on that we didn't ask you about?

A: It's sad that things in Cobb County have gotten this way when it comes to electing board members. But I'm just very thankful for the quality of the people we have actually serving in the classroom and working.

I always joke, I feel like being elected to the school board has allowed me to hang out with the cool kids. Because we have some very bright people, we have a lot of people with graduate degrees teaching in our schools, in the classroom, and then helping administer, working at the cabinet level. These are very talented, very smart people. And that's what I want people to focus on when they focus on the school district, is all these wonderful people that have made a career that have made it their life's choice to be involved in educating our students and doing what's best for them. The school board, we're not what it's about, but we are part of what makes it all happen.