Patti Banks’ students at the University of Washington Tacoma call her an inspiration.
Jeff Chamberlain, principal at Curtis Junior High School, calls her a warm leader with a command of all the details and a powerful focus on learning.
The Washington Association of School Administrators calls her the 2012 Washington State Superintendent of the Year.
That’s not bad when you consider Banks runs a small school district of about 5,500 students in suburban Pierce County, and the association had its pick of leaders in 295 public school districts around Washington.
Banks has led University Place schools for 12 years. In making its announcement Saturday, the statewide administrators group noted that she’s helped bridge a gap that’s become a chasm for many school systems.
“One of her major accomplishments has been a sizable reduction in the achievement gap for kids at the low end of the socioeconomic scale,” the group said. “Over the past 12 years, the free and reduced lunch rate has doubled in University Place, going from 18 percent to 36 percent.
“Although higher poverty rates tend to lead to lower test scores, the opposite has been the case under Ms. Banks’ leadership. The district has actually improved its middle-grades math test scores during this time, for both low-income and non-low-income students. SAT scores have also improved since 1999, with University Place students now outperforming state and national averages.”
The principals and administrators who take Banks’ classes at UWT say she champions equal opportunities for all UP students, and she expects her UWT students to do the same in the 16 districts they serve from Olympia to Auburn.
“She persistently searches for ways to remove inequalities and to provide opportunities for disadvantaged students. She explicitly challenges her UWT students to do the same,” they wrote in their letter of support for her nomination.
Crummy budgets are no excuse.
“These are the worst budget times anyone can remember,” Banks said in an interview. “Three years ago we made $1.9 million in reductions.”
To keep the pain as far from students as possible, they started with $447,000 in administrative cuts, combining and eliminating positions.
“What we did was sort of squeeze the operation around the edges,” she said. “We took any extras out of the edges to preserve the core program that enables teachers to focus on the classroom. My job is to buffer them, keep disruption away from them.”
They cut custodians, food service workers, paraeducators and support staff members, she said. All of it hurt.
They saved librarians and performing arts programs.
They reminded teachers that the bad economy is the best reason to focus on student achievement. A good education gives a young person a fair shot at a successful life.
“She keeps all of us focused on the essentials of good schooling, high-quality curriculum and excellent instruction,” Chamberlain said.
But kids can’t concentrate if they’re hungry, and, in a good many families, they can’t save for college.
“Her genuine concern for the well-being and education of our students is obvious, and she has a particular interest in helping the least fortunate in our community,” Chamberlain said of Banks.
For all the warmth Chamberlain and her UWT students cite, Banks leads with an uncompromising determination learned as a child in a military family.
At 61, she has found a different kind of service, as have her husband and two sons. Her husband, Rich Knuth, is director of the educational administration program at UWT. One son is managing director of the Washington Association of Public Health Officials. The other works for the state Department of Social and Health Services.
“Everyone is invested in important social services programs,” she said.
Banks is refreshingly steady, said Ray Tennison, president of Simpson Investment Company and former University Place School Board member.
Steady in the same way as a duck.
“Above the surface it may not look like much is going on, because she doesn’t splash around,” Tennison said. “But below the surface, she’s paddling like crazy.”
Kathleen Merryman: 253-597-8677
kathleen.merryman@thenewstribune.com
blog.thenewstribune.com/street
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