Beach School Board member will use family experience

VIRGINIA BEACH

As a mother of five, Carolyn Weems has seen the inner workings of many aspects of Virginia Beach schools. She's had children in special education and gifted classes, on sports teams and at alternative schools.

As a School Board member, she draws on her children's experiences to help her make policy decisions.

"In my house, I have so many learning differences at both ends of the scale," said Weems, 47. "I think the reason we're ahead of the curve in Virginia Beach is the way we have special programs for so many different types of learners."

She has pushed the school division to make special education reform a priority and has defended the decision to close an elementary

school. She questions the administration politely, but persistently. Later this month, she is poised to succeed in changing the division's grading scale after a year of trying.

As she takes over the Bayside seat after seven years of serving at-large, Weems said she will be able to focus on schools her children attended.

"I've had someone in Bayside schools for 57 class years," she said.

The way the board handled her appointment has left Weems with some fences to mend. They accepted 11 other applications for the seat Dan Lowe held for 11 years, then appointed Weems in December without conducting interviews. Applicants for her former at-large seat get a hearing Tuesday.

"What should have been a simple cleaning became a root canal," Weems said. She said she'd work behind the scenes to ensure she has good relations with fellow board members and community members.

The Lakeview Park resident hopes to become the go-to person for Bayside voters and school employees. Last month she began to visit the 16 schools in the city's northwest corner.

In a third-grade class at Newtown Elementary, she pulled a pair of black and pink houndstooth reading glasses down over her eyes to look at student work on laptops. She crouched to admire the tiger/cheetah combo that student Shanayasia Olds, 8, had created for a lesson on animal adaptations.

"I wish I was in school!" Weems exclaimed as she left the classroom. "We did real boring stuff."

Weems nearly ended up a teacher. The Signal Mountain, Tenn., native went to Clemson University to major in education but came out with a business degree.

At odd ends after her husband, Billy Weems, was injured while playing baseball for the Houston Astros, the couple settled in th is area so he could go back to school at Old Dominion University.

Carolyn Weems, a college tennis player, applied to coach the women's team at ODU. At age 23, she was the youngest Division I head tennis coach in the country, she said.

When daughter Christi was 4, son Beamer was 2 and Weems was pregnant with Brian, she decided to quit coaching. The family had moved to Virginia Beach for the schools and Weems quickly became active in school PTAs. Billy started a silk-screening business in Pembroke called Ad Techniques. After a flood shut its doors, Carolyn turned a linen closet into an office for a new business, Simply Sales, selling specialty mugs, pens and fridge magnets. At the time, she was pregnant with Caitlyn, who is now 18.

The business took off. At the same time, Weems was getting a taste of politics, working polls and attending breakfasts for Republican candidates. Her youngest, Connelly, was born in 1996. As Bayside High School's PTA president in 2000 and 2001, she appeared before the School Board with the unpopular suggestion that Bayside be included in the redistricting of Cox and Princess Anne high schools.

Having gotten a taste of politics, she went to talk to Em Davis, then principal of Shelton Park Elementary, about running for office. The two ended up joining the board together in 2002. They became fast friends who pass notes during meetings.

Davis said that they both maintained a low profile for the first few years, but that Weems has gotten more outspoken recently.

"She didn't mind going out for controversial issues if she feels that's what's best for the kids," Davis said. "That's what I admire about her."

Weems, who often has a skinny vanilla latte from Starbucks in hand, is also a pragmatist. She acknowledges that some of the programs she has pushed to save will probably get cut this year. "If we don't have to lay anyone off, that'll be a success."

A year ago, Weems took on an expanded role as chairwoman of the board's legislative committee. Under her leadership, the committee has reached out more aggressively to local representatives. In particular, they are pushing for laws that would allow Beach schools to start before Labor Day and create a statewide grading scale.

State Del. Bob Tata, a Beach Republican from the 85th District, heads the House Education Committee. He said Weems' family life gives her credibility with lawmakers. "She speaks from experience."

Leo Wardrup said that's one of the major reasons he endorsed her to run for his former House seat representing the 83rd District two years ago. "She had the credentials to do the job." He said that even when people disagreed with her, they said they could tell she had considered her position carefully.

But during the campaign, family was a point of attack.

Bloggers criticized her for sending baseball standout Beamer, now 22, to Princess Anne High school for his junior and senior years instead of Bayside.

She said there were family and personal reasons for doing so. "It wasn't for baseball, believe me," she said. Beamer and his father rented an apartment in the Princess Anne area so he wouldn't be out of zone. Beamer now plays in the minor league system of the San Diego Padres.

Weems said her interest in education may lead her back to the classroom in a more permanent way. With four children out of high school, she is going back for a teaching credential. Her first class, on teaching special education students, starts at Old Dominion University later this month.

Lauren Roth, (757) 222-5133, lauren.roth@pilotonline.com