Marshall Tuck and his quest to restore schools
Superintendent of Public School Instruction candidate Marshall Tuck faults California’s 2,500 page Education Code for “making it impossible for teachers to do their jobs.” Photo by David Fairchild
Tuck on a roll
Marshall Tuck waived a six-pound, 2,500 page California State codebook over his head in the manner of a seasoned politician bemoaning over-regulation for all that ails us.
Then fanning the 2,500 pages, he said, “Government has replaced creativity with bureaucracy. It makes it almost impossible for people to do their jobs.”
Tuck was addressing a small group of wealthy, potential donors in Palos Verdes. But he wasn’t talking about tax or business codes. He was talking about the State Code of Education that governs California’s 63 million kindergarten through high school students and their teachers.
Tuck is running for State Superintendent of Public Instruction. In his first run for the office, in 2014, he lost, 48 to 52 percent to incumbent Superintendent Tom Torlakson, who is now termed out. This past June, Tuck placed first in the primary but fell short of the 51 percent required to avoid a runoff. The runner-up and his opponent on the November ballot is Richmond Assemblyman and fellow Democrat Tony Thurmond.
State Superintendent is a non-partisan position, far down the ballot (it is listed 17th out of the 19 elected positions on the ballot), whose power lies largely in the bully pulpit it provides for focusing attention on the State’s education woes.
“The State Superintendent can’t change the law. Only the legislature can do that. But if I am elected, I will get the state’s 1,000 school districts together to ask for a three-year waiver from the Code of Education,” Tuck told his Palos Verdes supporters.
The purpose, he said, would be to give public schools the same freedom from regulation as charter schools enjoy.
As an example of the Code’s stifling impact, Tuck talked about the teacher layoffs that occurred during the Great Recession of 2009. Some low-income schools lost half of their teachers because of the code’s “last hired, first fired” policy and because low-income schools have more young teachers than do wealthy schools.
“The State Superintendent said there was nothing he could do about it. So we enlisted the ACLU to file a lawsuit on behalf of a seven-year-old student. A seven-year-old at a low-income school should not have to go to court for the right to a quality education,” Tuck said.
Spending on the State Superintendent’s race this year exceeds that of any other State race.
“This is going to be the most expensive election, period,” Sherry Bebitch Jeff, a University of Southern California professor of public policy told the education website EdSource.
“Expect a pretty brutal campaign that makes Marshall Tuck look like the wholly owned subsidiary of charter school interests and Tony Thurmond the wholly owned subsidiary of organized labor,” education consultant Kevin Gordon, of Capital Advisors, told EdSource.
Manhattan Beach real estate developer Bill Bloomfield has contributed $2.9 million to a campaign committee that backs Tuck. Los Angeles Philanthropist Eli Broad has contributed $1.9 million. Melanie and Richard Lundquist, who hosted the fundraiser Tuck spoke at in Palos Verdes this month, each made the maximum allowable individual contribution to Tuck’s campaign of $7,300, for both the primary and upcoming general election.
Thurmond has received $3.2 million from the California Teacher Association.
As of mid-October, according to the Secretary of State website, the independent expenditure committee supporting Tuck had raised $16 million. Tuck also raised $4.6 million from 3,176 individual contributors.
Thurmond’s independent expenditure committee had raised $9.1 million. Thurmond raised $3.1 million from 1,985 individual contributors.
Tuck, 45 is a UCLA and Harvard Business School graduate who worked briefly for the Wall Street bank Salomon Brothers, before deciding on a career in education. From 2002 until 2007, he was president of Green Dot Public Schools, which operates 10 charter schools in low-income areas of Los Angeles. From 2007 until 2014, when he resigned to run for Superintendent, he was the CEO of the nonprofit Partnership for Los Angeles, which manages 18 public schools, also in low-income areas, under the umbrella of the Los Angeles Unified School District.
During an interview preceding the Palos Verde fundraiser, and during his subsequent talk to donors, Tuck expressed admiration for teachers, while making no effort to reconcile his disagreements with their union. Nor did he dodge issues that discomfort his wealthy supporters.
One issue certain to displease the teacher’s union concerns Governor Jerry Brown’s Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), which disburses additional state funds to low-income districts.
“The current state superintendent interpreted LCFF to mean its $1 billion may be used for across the board teacher raises. As Superintendent, I will change that ruling on day one,” Tuck said. He wants the money used to hire more teachers and counselors. The state has a 10,000 teacher shortage, he said.
His position on LCFF funds is also at odds with his supporters in high-income districts, including Palos Verdes and Manhattan. Due to the vagaries of state funding formulas, Manhattan Beach receives the second lowest “funding per student” of any district in the State. Palos Verdes is also underfunded.
Tuck said he won’t propose correcting the problem with changes to the funding formulas. Additional state funding for high-income districts will only come when there is an increase in school funding, statewide, he said.
Additional funding he said, should be available from new online sales taxes and cannabis sales taxes. “The U.S. Supreme court has ruled that states may collect sales tax on online sales. That’s $1.2 billion for California that needs to be prioritized for schools. Cannabis sales could mean another $200 million in state revenue that could be pushed to the schools,” he said.
But the biggest new source of state revenue, he said, may come from eliminating Proposition 13 tax restrictions on commercial and industrial property. Tuck said he supports the “split role” measure, which has qualified for the 2020 state ballot. The Los Angeles Times estimates the measure would generate an additional $8 billion to $10 billion annually in property tax revenue. The money would come at the expense of Tuck’s commercial development backers, such as the Lundquists, Bloomfield and Broad.
Two other Tuck positions that do not sit well with teachers are increasing the years required for tenure (now set at two years) and reducing benefits for newly hired teachers.
Tuck, who taught math in Zimbabwe and Thailand for two years, after leaving Wall Street, sees the benefits issue as simple math.
“The current pensions aren’t sustainable. We need more revenue or reduced benefits,” he said. Because benefit reductions can’t be retroactive (unless the state goes bankrupt), the reductions would have to come at the expense of new teachers, Tuck explained.
In support of new teachers, Tuck said he would lobby for free college education for students who commit to teach for five years after graduation.
Teachers would also benefit from his advocacy of universal preschool.
“Education’s problem is not teachers and not principals. The problem is political. Governor Brown made the environment the state’s top priority. I plan to make education the state’s top priority,” Tuck said.
Tuck said the changes he proposes will take 10 years, prompting speculation about his future political ambitions.
Host Melanie Lundquist said she worked with Tucker for a dozen years at Partnership schools and is certain he does not have future political aspirations.
“He wants to fix public education. If he wanted to be governor, he wouldn’t do what he promises to do because neither political party would ever back him,” Lundquist said.