The Hamilton County school system either is faltering badly with poor safety and declining academic scores, or it is continuing an upward trend with increased involvement from the business community and fewer disciplinary incidents.

It just depends on which District 2 Hamilton County Board of Education candidate you ask.

Board hopeful Joe Dumas points to the system’s composite 19.7 ACT score in 2007 — a drop from 20.1 the previous year — as a reason to step in and ramp up the district’s academics.

“At UTC, a 19 will barely get you in,” he said.

Communication between the school board and the public on both positive and negative issues needs to be improved, Dr. Dumas said. He called the fact that citizens can comment only at the end of the school board meeting, after the board has voted on all issues, “very restrictive.”

Dr. Dumas’ opponent, incumbent Chip Baker, said he thought the system of allowing citizens to speak at the end of board meetings worked well, because most people want to discuss subjects that aren’t on that day’s agenda anyway.

Dr. Dumas said it also is hard for students to do well academically if they are in fear because of an unsafe school environment, which he called a common problem in the Hamilton County Schools.

“We’ve had students bringing guns to school; we’ve had students beating up teachers; we’ve had school personnel interfering with police officers trying to control the situation,” he said. “We’ve had a number of incidents that illustrate that there’s still some room for improvement in the discipline and safety area.”

Speaking Thursday to the Times Free Press editorial board, Mr. Baker agreed that school safety is important, but he cited school system numbers that report discipline incidents actually decreased by 8 percent last year.

Operating with the district’s student population — about one-third of students attend private schools — Hamilton County is doing “pretty darn good,” Mr. Baker said.

Dr. Dumas, who spoke to the editorial board on Wednesday, supports measures such as allowing all students to attend the local school of their choice and posting an online check register to keep up with system expenditures.

“It’s very hard as a taxpayer to tell where the money is going,” he said.

Mr. Baker said such ideas are nothing more than phrases that make people feel good but have little substance.

“When you say words that resonate with people ... that’s what frustrates me,” he said. “It sounds good, so you throw it out there without thinking about it.”

He said he’d be willing to discuss the ideas of open enrollment, but said that, after talking with the system’s Chief Financial Officer Tommy Kranz, he didn’t think an online check registry was a good idea.

Instead, Mr. Baker said, he’d like to focus his potential third term on repeating successes such as the community-driven makeover of the former Chattanooga Middle Museum Magnet School, now Normal Park Museum Magnet Upper School.

With a Volkswagen manufacturing plant coming to Chattanooga in 2011, both candidates touted their background experience.

Dr. Dumas, who holds advanced degrees in computing and engineering, said he is the man to prepare the school board and school system for the technical jobs at VW for which Hamilton County graduates could be eligible.

As a public educator at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, he also said he’s well aware of what incoming college freshmen need to know.

Mr. Baker, on the other hand, said his experience as a hospital administrator and director of the local Riverbend Festival will help him continue building a positive relationship between the school system and local businesses.

It’s time to get away from “small-minded bickering,” he said, and instead focus on preparing for the influx of students that may come as a result of VW’s presence.

“It’s always problem, problem, problem. No solutions,” he said. “As elected officials, we need to set the tone, set the pace.”

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