Meet UCS Board of Education Candidate Carl Territo

With the Utica Community Schools Board of Education elections coming up May 3, Shelby-Utica Patch wanted to get to know the five candidates who are running for the three open seats on the board. The UCS board is made up of seven district residents who represent the community at large. Staggered elections of six-year terms give the board only three openings currently.

The Board of Education is responsible for the education of public school students, approving programs of study, textbooks and hiring of teachers and administrators. The board also endorses offerings such as adult and youth enrichment classes, early childhood education and high school completion programs. They also oversee the construction and equipping of school buildings and obtain and budget funds to operate the schools.

We start with veteran board member Carl Territo, who has served three 6-year terms and is running again. He and the two other members are running as a slate. Territo has lived in the UCS district since 1976 and has had four children graduate from Henry Ford High School. You may have heard his voice as the announcer at a football game, basketball game or for the band. He was a youth soccer coach for girls varsity soccer years ago, too. He began his interest in the school board while chairing the demographics committee back in 1980.

Shelby-Utica Patch: Utica Community Schools have proven statistically to be exemplary schools, what do you think they can do better?

Carl Territo: They can be better in that our students continue to excel in the academics but also grow as individuals with their community and their society.  I think that in some instances we can teach that. It's not something you teach, it's something you instill. I will say, a vast majority of our teaching staff believe in that. They believe in high ethics, quality of life and they try to teach that to the kids. They get a little bit of this in their core classes. But mostly, it's what they get in specialized classes, their clubs. And when you start to take away these, you take away the well roundedness of the individual. You don't give them the opportunity to explore and that's what we want to be able to do. We want to give them the opportunity to explore. If the kid is wonderful in math and science, push him to go on stage, and to the kid who is wonderful in the arts, convince him to take a higher math class.

Shelby-Utica Patch: Since you've been on the UCS board over the past 30 years, what have been some of the biggest changes you had to go through?

Territo: It's not only been tough times, good things too. One was in the early '90s the growth, when I was first on the board. We had 14,000 kids, and we got as high as 30,000. What do you do when you put 16,000 kids in a school district? There was expansion, adding of elementary schools.

And, there was adding specialized programs–the Math Science Technology, MST program. These are students who apply to be in (60 a year) to get a higher concentration of math, and science and technology. As long as they continue to get good grades and stay interested. This is like a magnet half school.

These are the good things, the bad things are the budget and we've been dealing with that for the last nine years, each year thinking all right, it will get better in two years and we would come back out of it. And we didn't, so that probably is the most depressing, since we were not able to do some things, program-wise that we did want to do.

On a positive, because of the voters' confidence in the school district, they've given us several bond issues to deal with. Those bond issues built  elementary schools, the instructional research center–a class building with all the bells and whistles from an education point of view. And now because of the speed of technology we can now do many of these things in each classroom.

These were good things; the bad things all come back to the lack of funds. And now I will get on my soap box a bit. The state has been stubborn in their decisions in restructuring and finding the way to adequately fund on a consistent level public education. This is not a republican thing or a democratic thing. Because in both administrations things were done that were harmful to the funding of education. However, some don't even compare to what the current governor wants to do.

Shelby-Utica Patch: How will you promote yourself for this next six-year term? 

Territo: We have lawn signs. And I've had one parent meeting and I'm trying to set up house meetings where interested people will invite their neighbors and friends and they can meet me. We are also running as a slate–the three us–we feel that what we've done in the past, as a group, we've done what we feel is the right thing for students and we want to continue. Between the three of us we have over 40 years of experience on the board of education. I would be very happy to be invited in for a home meeting. It's important that people know who we are. When you look at all elected officials, we are the least visible but we are making the most serious decisions. 

Shelby-Utica Patch: Are you involved in any other boards or volunteering?

Territo: I've been the announcer for the bands and the football and basketball games at Henry Ford High School for the past 25 years. Outside of the schools, I've been on and off in community theatre and started with a new group, the Sterling Civic Theatre Group, and I'm active politically.

Shelby-Utica Patch: We just came out of reading month in March. How did you celebrate?

Territo: I usually read in the elementary schools and this year I was not able to because of my job. But when I do, I like to read to the third grade and up and my story is Why is March Reading Month? The older kids understand. When my older daughter graduated from high school she was fortunate enough to give the graduation speech and she based it on the Dr. Seuss book Oh! The Places You'll Go!  I was very impressed by it, so I got a copy and retyped her speech and sent it to Dr. Seuss before he died.  We got an actual response from him. So I bring that with me when I read to show the kids.

Shelby-Utica Patch: What is your REAL job?

Territo:  My title is clinical liaison for Reckitt Benckiser, a pharmaceutical company. I worked in the industry since 1974 as a sales rep.  Today, I sell a niche product, which could affect 30 million people dependent on opium (heroin). Our product, medication, helps them get their life back. According to my company, my stats say that my doctors have treated over 7000 patients over the years, which impacts up to 140,000 people. It's a very rewarding job but it has a stigma with it. Similar to alcohol stigma in the 50s or 60s. Drug addition is a disease–a brain disorder. Today 17 to 23% of the population has the potential to become drug addicted.

Shelby-Utica Patch: Any more insight for readers?

Territo: Yes, there's so many things I do as a member of the school board. They (my fellow board members) have confidence in me and appointed me legislative liaison, so I deal a lot with the legislators on both the state and federal level. The National School Board Association has a conference (Federal Relations Network Conference) in Washington once a year and the board has been gracious enough to send me there, giving us the opportunity to speak with Congressman Levin and Congresswoman Miller and Senator Levin and Senator Stabenow regarding education issues.

I've also served on various committees with the Michigan Association of School Boards, the main one being the Governor Relations Committee. I'm currently the vice-chair of the Macomb County School Board Association, but because of circumstances, I've been acting chair this year and I will be chair next year.  

Take a look at the other candidate's interviews:

Michele Templeton

Gene Klida

Ken Krolczyk