- Representative Ocean Andrew and representative Tomi Strock are having a busy session here at the 68th Wyoming legislature.

They're co-sponsors of one of the most talked about bills of the session regarding the certification of public school teachers in Wyoming.

I'm Steve Peck of Wyoming PBS.

Join us now for "Capitol Outlook."

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- Welcome to "Capitol Outlook."

We're here at the Wyoming Capitol with two members of the Wyoming House of Representatives, representative Tomi Strock of Converse County House District six, representative Ocean Andrew, House District 46, that's in Laramie.

Thanks to both of you for being here.

You two are sort of what I would call living, walking, speaking proof that the Wyoming legislature is a diverse body.

On paper, I'm not gonna say you couldn't be more different, but you're sort of different kinds of people, I wanna just talk about that a little bit.

Representative Strock, you're a rural Wyoming resident, a ranch family living in Converse County where the county seat is, Douglas.

But you don't, you don't live in town, do you?

- I do not and I have never lived in town, so.

- Never - So this is, yes, it's fourth generation on a ranch and we have my children and grandchildren.

So we've now have six generations that have been on this ranch.

- Now Representative Andrew, you are, I'm not sure the word urban applies to too many places in Wyoming, but Laramie's a an urban center for our state, and you're a business person there.

What do you do?

- So I own a business in Laramie, we do food trucks and we serve Wyoming and quite a few other states.

- Really?

- Yeah.

I moved here in 2013 to attend the University of Wyoming, started a business and I have been around ever since.

- So go pokes, all right.

- Yes.

I understand that.

Now, it's a matter of public record, you're 30 years old, is that right?

- I am.

- One of the younger members, maybe the youngest.

- Yes, I'm not the youngest, but I'm one of the younger, yeah.

- And that's a trend that I've noticed in recent years, there are more 30 somethings in the legislature than there ever used to be.

It was almost unheard of.

My dad happened to be a state senator, joined the legislature at age 67 and served almost, you know, into his 80s.

- I think it's been a really good trend actually.

I've, you know, I was actually looking around the other day and just noticing how young the house is right now.

And even the Senate has a lot of younger members as it stands compared to, you know, if you go look at legislatures in other states, it's quite a bit different, so definitely a good group of people.

- What got you interested in public service?

- I had always been very interested in politics.

I think maybe listening to too much talk radio in the car as I was growing up when my parents would always have that on I think that infected me a little bit and never could get it outta my system.

So I was part of a lot of political clubs at the University of Wyoming, Young Americans for Liberty, I was president of that.

Students for Life, College Republicans.

So I got very busy with business for quite a while and then eventually just kind of felt the need to come back into politics once I realized that a seat was opening up.

- I've always felt, I was a newspaper man for many years and I talked to lots of people who sought office and I always said, if you've ever thought about, "Maybe I should run for office," you ought to, because so many people just don't.

And even people who've crossed their mind think, "I don't know if that would really be right for me."

But the impulses often can be one of the most important things, at least at the beginning.

Now, representative Strock, you told me before we came on that you weren't seeking recognition exactly when you decided to run for office, right?

- Oh, I was not, so no.

- [Steve] You've got it now, we're on TV.

- (laughs) Yes, thank you.

- What got you started in it?

- What got me into it?

- Yeah.

- Well, quite honestly, a lot of us, I think what happened in 2020 and it was a slight wake up call and probably in my life at a point I could do it.

I've spent my life trying to keep the ranch going with my dad and raising kids.

So there wasn't, you know, just you're busy with that.

- A mother of?

- Seven children.

- Seven children.

- Yes (chuckles).

So, and many grandkids at this point.

So yeah, so that was it, and then just what happened was that when I realized where we were at and that really that the government could come in and tell us that, "No, you're not leaving your house."

And just really opened my eyes to a lot of things that were going on and I said, "Oh, I can go, I can do this, "I can fight back."

And I think, you know, just that determination of pretty much when you, especially raised on a ranch and the work ethic and the hard work and a lot of fight to keep a ranch together.

And so I had that determination, so I was ready to see what I could do and to be quite honest, I was not involved in politics whatsoever.

So this whole thing has been a learning experience for me, but I've really enjoyed it.

And just at that time of my life, I was ready for a new challenge maybe.

- What year were you elected?

- In, oh my goodness, '23.

- So elected in '22, took office in '23.

- [Tomi] Yes, thank you, elected in '22.

- How about you, sir?

- I was elected in 2020 and took office in 2021.

- Both relatively relative newcomers, but- - [Ocean] Yes.

- It doesn't last long, does it?

You sort of jump into the fast water right away and- - Yeah, three terms in and I'm feels like I'm one of the more senior members at this point because there's been just such incredible turnover in the past couple years.

- You learn a lot and you bet you need to.

- Yes.

- In a short period of time.

- I did say it's a lot like being, for me, being a sophomore.

In high school even, they think you should know more than you feel like you do.

So, but yeah, it's still quite a learning and yeah.

- What committees are you on this year?

- I am in Ag and education.

- So fitting for your occupation?

- Yes, very much so.

I feel much more comfortable on it than where I was last year.

- And Representative Andrew, you have a chairmanship, you chair the education committee, correct?

- Yes, I am.

- And I ask legislators who have chairmanships and leadership positions, et cetera, that doesn't mean you can't continue to sponsor bills and in fact you're sponsoring the legal limit, so to speak this year, right, which is how many?

- There is no legal limit in the house.

There is in the Senate, which is seven.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- And that may be about how many I have.

- So a busy session for you.

Well, one of the bills that is getting a lot of attention and inevitably it was, I'm sure you knew it was going to, HB-100 regarding the certification and licensing of public school teachers in the state.

Representative Andrew, you're listed as the primary sponsor of that.

Representative Strock, you're a co-sponsor on it also serving on the education committee.

- Correct.

- Public school teachers in the state have been certified by the state for a long time now, not to say that it's always been exactly the same way, but the general feeling has been pretty consistent through the years.

What got you interested in this topic and recommending this change?

- I think the first thing that got me interested was sort of the idea of local control.

I mean, we go back and forth a lot in education on what we need to control.

- Everybody's an expert on public education, right?

- Right, yeah.

What we need to control at the state level and what we need to give the school board more control over.

And there's a balance there, I'm not necessarily super principled on it has to be one way or the other.

I certainly have bills that direct things in both directions where I believe, you know, that I'm responding to the will of the public.

But the idea of this one was really to give school boards more of a say and something important, something that affects their communities very directly and that communities might want to have a lot of input on.

Because I think that we need to make school boards something that people consider that matters more.

I think that, you know, school boards are very often an extremely under voted position.

I mean it's very far down valid and once you get down there, I mean the rates of people who don't vote for anyone at all in that position and even, you know, the competition in those positions, there's just not a lot of people running for them.

I know people who have ran for them successfully and often after one term they're just done because they don't feel appreciated, they don't feel like they can do a lot, they feel very controlled by the state.

There are of course many important things like curriculum that they do have a lot of control over.

But I saw this as another way when we're entering an era of school choice, of course.

We have currently in law right now we have an ESA program which we are working on- - I always stop people when we get into the abbreviations.

ESA?

- Yes, in education we have an abbreviation for everything and we did an education of education meeting to help train new members and the first thing they handed out was the packet of acronyms and abbreviations we had to learn and it, I don't know, was it six pages?

- Yeah, it was (chuckles).

- Okay, well educate us.

ESA is what again?

- So Education Savings Account.

- [Steve] Okay.

- And that is basically a program where a parent has an account and they can receive money from the state and then direct it to where they would like those funds to be spent on their child's education.

And we also have more charter schools.

We passed a bill in the house allowing more charter schools to be authorized by our board.

And one of the main functions of this is competition in education.

Who can provide the best and most attractive product.

And I think that we were trying to provide, with this bill, some flexibility to help schools compete with more of those options.

But to get into the controversy of the bill a little bit, if you want to talk about- - I mean, what we're talking about is that it wouldn't necessarily be required anymore, were the bill to pass- - Exactly.

- That the Board of Professional Teaching Standards certify and license teachers more or less the same way for every public school district in Wyoming.

Your bill as presented would change that or could change that how?

- So essentially the intent of what we are doing is very different than the public perception and- - Welcome to Capitol.

- And it is my fault because we do have to write legislation that's not only clear to us as legislators, but also clear to the public.

You need to write it in a way that it makes sense to anybody reading it.

And the intent of the legislation is more local certification, where those communities will come together with their school board, have a public process, and they can decide what they want in an educator, and that could very well is going to include a high level of knowledge on whatever they're teaching, I would imagine.

I don't imagine a community is gonna come together and just say, you know, anybody who can breathe is qualified to teach here.

And that's a lot of the criticism that we're getting is we're trying to make that happen.

But no, it's a may.

They may do this if they want to.

If they don't do anything, it's left alone and they're left- - You're not doing away with the PTSB?

- No, no we are not.

And you know, if it's left alone by the school board, nothing happens, nothing changes.

They would have to participate in an active process to take this up.

And then not only to take it up, they can't just decide, yes, we're gonna do this, the bill requires that they adopt their own policies and procedures.

And when a board does that, there's public meeting requirements and things like that that need to happen to have public input.

- I do feel like this really does open it up.

We've got a lot of in your tech type programs, you know, even your welding, your auto, so your ag classes, some of those, it's really hard to find teachers often.

But if you had someone that spent their lifetime doing this and would like to come in and teach this, why is this not something a possibility?

And again, it's totally left open to the school district themselves, it's left up to them.

- You were talking about a couple of areas of education that you mentioned which are known to have been eroded a little bit, there just isn't as much curriculum offered in the building trades, and the metal shop, and wood shop and ag as there in some school districts as there used to be.

- Exactly.

- Part of it, I know, I have my wife happens to be a public school teacher, I know is because of the problem you're talking about, shortage of people who are training both in the certified education portion of it and in this specific subject matter.

There's some news coverage this week about superintendents around the state being concerned about it.

Are you concerned about reassuring them in some way?

Or is that part of the process that you find yourself in?

- Yeah, I think we're very concerned about reassuring them.

I think that, you know, if and when this bill gets to our committee, we are going to have a very significant amendment that I think is gonna come in the form of a substitute bill, which essentially builds off of what we have.

It's just, it's an amendment, but it's- - A big one.

- Such a large amendment that it's just easier for us to replace the bill so people can understand what's happening.

And we're gonna really lay out the process of what we, in our mind, know it would look like if this were to go to a community and they were to have this discussion as well as changing sort of the, what we're calling it.

You know, our staff, the Legislative Service Office put a title on here and there's nothing wrong with that.

The title is accurate to an extent, but I think it can mislead and give people the wrong idea.

I mean it was called Uncertified Personnel in K through 12, but it's not, we mean uncertified by the PTSB, we don't mean uncertified at all.

- You don't mean unqualified.

- Exactly.

- Exactly.

Yeah, but we mean certified locally and we want to clarify that in the next version of this bill.

In a lot of conversation we kind of talked about that might be the best route to take is to bring something and just have it be as clear as possible and let people see that.

There's something that I wish I could change in our legislative process where you can't post amendments publicly until it gets to a committee of the whole through one of our standing committees.

And so we can't just put this online and show people like, this is what we want to do to it and so it stands in controversy until it can get to a committee.

- Interesting point, yeah.

- Yeah.

- Do you know someone reached out to me very, very upset with it.

Superintendent had pulled them all together, it was the worst thing that could happen, they were really upset.

They got back to me and said, "I'm sorry that I reacted, I read it, "I don't know what the problem is."

And that was a principal of a school said, "People just need to read it."

So that is hard.

Like again, Ocean mentioned, we just look at, you know, the title and it has everyone up in arms and they pass it around and it gets emailed out to everybody or send out a message that is, you know, we are trying to get out the truth on this and it's an uphill battle.

- Public education is one of the hottest button items there is every single session, almost every bill, and this is certainly not the only one.

I was observing the house earlier today and heard you talking testifying about a another education issue.

You said, "If it gets to committee."

Where does it stand now here on a couple weeks into the session.

- It's in our file at the education committee, so I can as the chairman introduce it at any time.

But the first thing we want to do is get our committee together and make sure that this is something that we can agree on and that we can pass.

Because, you know, we only have so much time to committee, we want to maximize public testimony and if you know we're gonna kill it no matter what, then I we can do that without going through the process.

- Yeah, a lot of times you'll find bills, I'm sure you've both experienced this.

A bill gets brought up, it gets kicked around a little bit and then it comes back the next session, maybe even the next one, and that's how a lot of legislation ends up getting passed because people learn more about it, and massage it, adjust it, educate the public about it and things can oftentimes get a better bill that way.

- Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

- Let me ask you just one more little personal thing 'cause I have a question about one of Representative Strock's bills as well.

Your first name is Ocean.

Is there a fun family story about that?

It's not a name that you hear every day.

- Yeah, my father was a captain of a commercial fishing boat in Alaska, so I guess that's just how I got that name.

- Representative Strock, you have a bill that's not getting nearly as much attention, at least so far.

- Yes.

- As the certification of public school teachers.

But again, I'm simplifying greatly, but as I read it and the number is HB-205 in case people want to read it more specifically themselves.

To put it simply, you would create a separate state department almost, or agency having to do exclusively with the Wyoming State Fair.

Is that- - Correct, yes.

- That's accurate.

Are you from Converse County?

- Yes.

- Douglas is where the state fair takes place each year.

It's a significant public institution that people don't realize that, I think a lot of people do.

Thousands and thousands of people, tens of thousands through the years, maybe hundreds of thousands have participated in, I know I did.

- Yes.

- But it's right there in in your neighborhood as well.

I thought all you republicans were for smaller government, but here we are suggesting a department.

I'm saying that- - Yes.

- Good naturedly.

But you think this is important to do, how come?

- Well, it's been under the Ag Department and they are very happy to let it go.

- [Steve] Are they?

- So part of the problem is it puts a liability on the ag and it's hard to be there all the time to watch, especially, you know, a lot of things happen on the weekend, but even during the kids, when they're getting ready to show livestock or you have the judging of any sort and a judge will say, "I can't be there."

And so they quickly have to pull in another judge.

That was then you would have to call the Ag Department, get all this approved and- - Is that right?

And what this is, it just, honestly, it simplifies the government to be quite honest with you.

It's taking out one step, it's its own.

Nothing will change besides they just won't have one more step they have to go through.

They will be up there where they can.

And I'll actually help the Ag Department.

They'll give them a little, they'll have less work.

I mean they maybe, you know, with their staffing even they'll help them out.

So they were all for this, they were.

- Really, it's received support within the department?

- Yes, yes.

- Do you know offhand, how big is the state fair?

How many exhibitors or how many participants or- - I go there every year.

- Yeah.

- I will tell you, I have been teased multiple times from friends from other states how small we are.

But I said, you can't take 600,000 people, that's the size of most cities, and expect much more than this, I don't know where we're going to pull the people, but yeah.

- It doesn't seem small when I've been there, it's big.

- It doesn't to me either but- - Compared to the county fairs that we all experienced.

- That's exactly it.

But no, that is a thing and it is a place for children.

I mean that is what it was meant to be.

It's for learning and experiences and I think sometimes we forget that.

I really would love to promote the state fair.

I mean, it's been one of those things that sometimes it's the bottom of the list of the, you know, I mean the legislators even because we forget how important it is for children, you know, that's what it was meant for and to educate them, so it's- - It's a lot bigger than it used to be.

Again, at least that's my- - It is, it's, yeah.

- That's my feeling, and an important thing, the people.

- And they're really trying to make it self-sufficient.

They're really working on that to make it- - What are keys to that as you see it?

- Well, they are trying to open it up where you can use so much during the year.

So one of them is, and it'll be something we need to really look at.

There's this arena that they would like to cover and with that would be opened up to all sorts of things throughout the year - Utilizing the state fair grounds facilities more than just that.

- Just for that one week.

- Yeah.

- You know, just open it up.

Which it's always had a few things, but that's what they're really working towards.

- And that's something that the State Ag Department probably wouldn't mind not having to do either.

- Exactly.

- I presume.

Not in the events planning business really.

- So nothing actually really will change.

It just won't be under the heading of the Ag Department so it should be fairly well received.

- Where does that bill stand here in late January?

- We will hear it tomorrow morning in the Ag Committee.

- And that's your committee?

- And it is my committee, yes.

- Well, this has gone faster than I wanted it to, but we're about at our allotted time.

I appreciate your willingness to be here.

Not every legislator wants to do it and I know you're over scheduled all the time and so to make time for us is much appreciated.

And I thank Representative Strock, Representative Andrew for being with us on "Capitol Outlook."

- Well thank you.

- Yeah, thank you for making time for us.

- Yeah, I appreciate it.

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