Meet The New State Board Of Education: Vince Bertram

When the General Assembly passed legislation allowing for a restructuring of the State Board of Education, everyone wondered: who might join the group?

All week we’ve been introducing you to the five new members appointed to the board by Gov. Mike Pence, House Speaker Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis, and Senate President Pro Tem David Long, R-Fort Wayne. So far, you’ve met Byron Ernest, Lee Ann Kwiatkowski, Eddie Melton and Steve Yager.

Last but not least, meet Vince Bertram, who will represent the fifth congressional district.

Vince Bertram will represent the fifth congressional district as a member of the State Board of Education. (Photo Credit: Vince Bertram/Twitter)

If you want to talk about bridging the local-national divide in education, Vince Bertram is your guy. He currently serves as president and CEO of Project Lead The Way, an engineering and technology program adopted by districts not only in Indiana, but in more than 8,000 schools across the country.

Prior to joining that organization in 2011, Bertram was employed in various school corporations around the state, working his way up from a high school physical education teacher and basketball coach in Angola, to principal at both Hamilton Heights and Lafayette Jefferson high schools, all the way to superintendent in the Evansville-Vanderburgh School Corporation.

Having been around the state and spending his entire career in education in Indiana, Bertram says he is excited to take on his new role as a board member.

“The opportunity to work together with the state superintendent, the governor, other members of the State Board of Education, as well as educators around the state to make a difference for students was something very appealing to me,” Bertram says. “Education is so important, it is so fundamental to our economic success as a state and certainly for our students in terms of their career opportunities. So unless we get this right, we’re going to suffer. It requires collaboration at the deepest level for us to be successful.”

Collaboration is a key word for Bertram as he joins the state board. After witnessing the internal board conflict that led state lawmakers to appoint him and his other new colleagues, Bertram says he intends to help keep the group on a positive track.

“I tend to look at that as a past tense – that’s something that happened and we’re all aware of it, we all read about it, we all lived it,” Bertram says. “Today is a new opportunity. My focus is going to be on collaboration, and I hope bringing both the school perspective as well as the national perspective.  What are the things happening across the country? What are the lessons we can learn from?”

Bertram adds that he thinks Indiana is well positioned to be a national leader in education, but there are a few issues that need to be addressed to help the state get there – including how the state handles standardized testing.

“Do we have to have assessments? Absolutely, but there are other ways to assess students,” Bertram says. “We cannot test our students to excellence, we have to inspire them, and that happens in a classroom. So what tools can we give teachers, what freedoms can we give them to create the kind of student experience that is engaging and exciting, and nurtures students curiosity in a way that learning is exciting and fun and relevant? That’s what I want to focus on.”

Bertram alludes to the model of activity-based learning executed in Project Lead The Way as one example of an alternative method of measuring student success.

“What can we see in a project-based classroom that teachers can observe and determine how students are learning?” Bertram asks. “How does this translate into college- and career-readiness for students, as opposed to students’ performance on a single exam? Those are things that are fundamental questions that need to be answered.”

Bertram, a 10-year member of Indiana’s Education Roundtable, has also served on a number of nonprofit boards. As a member of the State Board of Education, Bertram says he hopes to help find ways to attract the best and brightest into teaching careers, because he says what happens in the classroom is the most “fundamental aspect” of education.

“My focus has been on how do we enhance opportunities for children? How do we elevate them and give them hope and belief that they can aspire to something great?” Bertram says. “I will work really hard to make sure our focus stays in those areas.”

Bertram and his fellow new members will meet with the five returning INSBOE members and state superintendent Glenda Ritz for their first monthly meeting Wednesday at Purdue University. The meeting will be live-streamed.