Ken Falkenstein
Ken Falkenstein was a candidate for an at-large seat on the Virginia Beach City Public Schools school board in Virginia. Falkenstein was defeated in the by-district general election on November 8, 2016.
Falkenstein participated in Ballotpedia's 2016 school board candidate survey. Click here to read his responses.
Biography
Falkenstein works as a civil litigation attorney in private practice. He previously served as the associate city attorney for Virginia Beach City. Falkenstein has experience working on the staff of three different politicians. He also served as a Russian liguist in the United States Army. Falkenstein has a bachelor's degree in secondary education from Old Dominion University. He also has a juris doctor from George Mason University.[1]
Elections
2016
Five of the 11 seats on the Virginia Beach City Public Schools school board were up for general election on November 8, 2016. In the Kempsville District, incumbent Dan Edwards ran unopposed and won re-election to his seat. Rose Hall District incumbent Joel McDonald also won re-election by defeating Stephen Johnston. Trenace Riggs defeated Eric Wray to win the open seat in the Centerville District. Incumbent Beverly Anderson and Victoria Manning defeated Kristine Caalim, Ken Falkenstein, and Frances Knight Thompson for the two at-large seats up for election.[2]
Results
| Virginia Beach City Public Schools, At-Large General Election, 4-year terms, 2016 |
||
|---|---|---|
| Candidate | Vote % | Votes |
 Victoria Manning |
27.51% | 62,669 |
| Beverly Anderson Incumbent |
25.85% | 58,882 |
| Ken Falkenstein | 19.20% | 43,740 |
| Frances Knight Thompson | 17.71% | 40,345 |
| Kristine Caalim | 9.04% | 20,588 |
| Write-in votes | 0.68% | 1,559 |
| Total Votes | 227,783 | |
| Source: Virginia Department of Elections, "2016 November General Official Results," accessed November 30, 2016 | ||
Funding
Falkenstein reported $7,074.34 in contributions and $7,048.55 in expenditures to the Virginia Department of Elections, which left his campaign with $25.79 on hand as of October 17, 2016.[3]
Campaign themes
2016
Ballotpedia survey responses
Ken Falkenstein participated in Ballotpedia's 2016 survey of school board candidates. In response to the question "What do you hope to achieve if elected to the school board?" the candidate stated on October 10, 2016:
| “ | I am the only dad in this race with kids in the Virginia Beach school system. There are none on the current school board. I am also the only attorney in the race. I want our kids to get a world-class education that prepares them for the demands of the real world and to compete in a global economy. The policies of the current school board do not accomplish these objectives. I also want to bring my firsthand experience as a special-needs dad to the board to ensure that all kids with special needs get the full range of services to which they are legally entitled. I am running to change the direction of the school board, which is currently under the control of the teacher's union (VBEA). The current board has eliminated instructional days from the school calendar, increased class sizes, approved budgets that allocate too much money to administration and not enough into classrooms, implemented a confusing and ineffective grading scheme in our elementary schools, and empowered the superintendent to eliminate student accountability from the middle school and high school grading systems. I will work to reverse these bad policies and restore excellence and accountability to our schools. The current school board is a rubber stamp for the administration. The incumbents seeking reelection have never - not one single time - ever voted against anything the superintendent wanted, including eliminating student accountability from the grading system and holding make-up instructional days on Saturdays rather than on teacher work-days. And they actually brag about having "only" five failing schools. The administration works for the school board, which has a duty to lead. I will represent the people and not the unelected bureaucrats in order to save our failing schools and restore excellence and accountability to our school system.[4][5] | ” |
Ranking the issues
The candidate was asked to rank the following issues based on how they should be prioritized by the school board, with 1 being the most important and 7 being the least important. Each ranking could only be used once.
| Education policy |
|---|
 |
Click here to learn more about education policy in Virginia. |
| Education on the ballot |
| Issue importance ranking | |
|---|---|
| Candidate's ranking | Issue |
| Closing the achievement gap | |
| Improving post-secondary readiness | |
| Improving education for special needs students | |
| Balancing or maintaining the district's budget | |
| Expanding school choice options | |
| Improving relations with teachers | |
| Expanding arts education | |
| “ | My top priority would be to stop the current school board and superintendent from removing student accountability from the middle and high school grading system. I would also restore the confusing elementary school grading system to "A B C" with comments from teachers explaining the basis for those grades. As the father of a child with Down syndrome and autism, I would bring my firsthand experience as a special needs dad to the school board to ensure that all kids with special needs get the full range of services to which they are legally entitled and that families with special needs are treated with respect. I would also work to save our five failing schools from the soft bigotry of low expectations instead of bragging that we "only" have five failing schools, as the current school board and superintendent do.[5] | ” |
| —Ken Falkenstein (October 10, 2016) | ||
Positions on the issues
The candidate was asked to answer nine questions from Ballotpedia regarding significant issues in education and the school district. The questions are highlighted in blue and followed by the candidate's responses. Some questions provided multiple choices, which are noted after those questions. The candidate was also provided space to elaborate on their answers to the multiple choice questions.
| Should new charter schools be approved in your district? (Not all school boards are empowered to approve charter schools. In those cases, the candidate was directed to answer the question as if the school board were able to do so.) |
|---|
| Yes. We have a very successful charter school at Green Run High School, and I support the creation of additional charter schools as a means for parents and the community to have more control over our kids' education. |
| Which statement best describes the ideal relationship between the state government and the school board? The state should always defer to school board decisions, defer to school board decisions in most cases, be involved in the district routinely or only intervene in severe cases of misconduct or mismanagement. |
| The state should defer to school board decisions in most cases. The primary function of the state is to redistribute state funds to ensure that students throughout the state receive a quality education regardless of the economic condition of any individual locality. The state should not be in the business of micromanaging local schools and should be very deferential to local school boards. |
| Are standardized tests an accurate metric of student achievement? |
| No. This is not a question that can be answered with a simple "yes" or "no." There is a place for standardized tests because we do need a way to determine whether our students have been educated up to standards, and we need a means of accounting for disparate grading systems between school systems and even between schools and teachers. However, standardized tests in and of themselves are not an accurate metric of student achievement because not all students deal with the pressure of taking such tests equally. Standardized test scores are only valid and meaningful when looked at in context with other metrics of each individual student's performance, such as class grades and teacher and parent feedback. |
| What is your stance on the Common Core State Standards Initiative? |
| I oppose Common Core. Virginia has not adopted Common Core, and I would vehemently oppose any effort to adopt it. Education is a local responsibility, and Common Core is a federal one-size-fits-all intrusion. |
| How should the district handle underperforming teachers? Terminate their contract before any damage is done to students, offer additional training options, put them on a probationary period while they seek to improve or set up a mentorship program for the underperforming teacher with a more experienced teacher in the district? |
| Offer additional training options. Put them on a probationary period while they seek to improve. Set up a mentorship program for the underperforming teacher with a more experienced teacher in the district. One of the primary responsibilities of school principals is to monitor teachers to ensure that they are effective in teaching our kids. If a teacher is underperforming, the principal must determine the cause of the underperformance and give that teacher support to improve. If a teacher continues to underperform after being given resources and a fair opportunity to improve, that teacher should then be terminated. Under no circumstances should there be a "tenure" system in which teachers have an entitlement to their job regardless of performance. I also believe in positive reinforcement and would support a merit pay system that provides financial bonuses and incentives for teachers who exceed standards, and I will fight the teacher's union's opposition to such a pay system. |
| Should teachers receive merit pay? |
| Yes. We do not have a merit pay system in Virginia Beach, in large part due to opposition by the teacher's union (VBEA). I believe that teachers should be given financial incentives to motivate and inspire excellence in their students and that those who succeed in doing so should be rewarded. |
| Should the state give money to private schools through a voucher system or scholarship program? |
| Yes. I do support a voucher system to expand school choices for parents, particularly those in urban and rural areas where the public schools consistently underperform. The voucher system must not give preference to or discriminate against any school based on religion. I also believe the public schools should provide opportunities for home-schooled kids to participate in sports and other organized extracurricular activities. |
| How should expulsion be used in the district? |
| Expulsion is a last resort and should seldom be employed. Virginia Beach has adopted a reform school approach that I support that sends kids with persistent disciplinary problems to school in a structured environment to facilitate both education and behavior correction. This system also serves to remove such kids from the other schools, thereby eliminating distractions to the other students'd education. Expulsion should be utilized only for those kids whose problems are so severe that they cannot be controlled and educated at the Renaissance Academy. |
| What's the most important factor for success in the classroom: student-teacher ratio, the curriculum, teachers, parent involvement or school administration? |
| Teachers Parents play a vital role in their kids' education, but unfortunately not all parents are as engaged as they ought to be. Teachers have a responsibility to work with each individual student to make sure that he or she reaches his or her potential in that class regardless of their individual situations at home. The school administration has a responsibility to ensure that teachers have all of the resources and support necessary to achieve that mission. |
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Ken Falkenstein Virginia Beach City Public Schools. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Ken Falkenstein School Board, "About Ken Falkenstein," accessed October 28, 2016
- ↑ The Virginian-Pilot, "11 people file to run for Virginia Beach School Board," June 15, 2016
- ↑ Virginia Department of Elections, "Campaign Finance Reports," accessed October 18, 2016
- ↑ Ballotpedia School Board Candidate Survey, 2016, "Ken Falkenstein's responses," October 10, 2016
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
