nevada's second district. ms. scahill discusses her book with district of columbia delegate eleanor holmes norton. @@@ú

extracurricular activity for students. how does such a woman decide to run for of all things, chris? of the school board, not the city council, but the conagra's? >> guest: blight. well, actually the students asked me to run for president first but i wasn't old enough, so then we had to look for something else. >> host: you could have went down to senter. >> guest: we did. we had to know if we could run for supreme court but we couldn't run for that and then they wanted samet pro tem and speaker of the house and we just marched right down. >> host: finally got to the bottom with those of us at the house of representatives. >> guest: they felt it needed to be something important and that was a federal race.

they wanted it to be in washington, d.c., they wanted to matter so i am sure they didn't think it was the bottom of the barrel. they thought it was pretty big stuff. >> host: do understand we are talking about a real campaign. this isn't a school project although, tierney, you were constantly asked if it was a real campaign? >> guest: sure. we had to defend that quite a lot, yes. >> host: tell me for real, tierney, yes, your students dared you and you took them up when you told them you could do anything but did awaken something in you that may have been dormant all the time? >> guest: mabey. my parents were fairly politically active and very outspoken about their politics in our home and taught us to have a conscience and to be involved and certainly to vote and be predatory citizens, and i

fought but a great opportunity to be a public servant. i already felt i was a public servant as a teacher and i felt i was taking it to the next level of serving my community and i really felt that as i was out campaigning leading my constituents and people in the communities that i visited that i really fell for and wanted to help. >> host: it turns out you didn't start out to be a teacher. i was very interested to read about your early life. for the daughter of an engineer and a father who didn't try to keep you from professions like his but taught you how to do years and how to be an athlete and work on cars, be an athlete, woodworking, the kind of things guys do. it seems that you're father perhaps at times your mother had done the feminist work on you. describe how you came to be a teacher rather than something

you had also weighed with being, a civil rights lawyer. >> guest: yes. i was dead set on becoming a civil rights lawyer actually. i had taken a class at the university of new mexico, african-american history. it was african-american history wan and i was addicted because i always loved history, left political science, and i remember challenging my professor, dr. curtis williams and saying every government and history book in my life lied to me or your lobbying i can't believe i've never heard this before he giggled and said where did you grow up you never heard any of this. >> host: and where did you grow up? >> guest: reno nevada and sacramento california and i was in a predominantly upper-class schools and black history to me was martin luther king and rosa parks and that was it. >> host: that was the beginning in the end. >> guest: that was it, and i had found a new frontier in african-american history and was very excited about it and to get

free class i could and got a minor and african-american history -- >> host: and that leads to the civil rights law i take it? >> guest: i was interested in pursuing a degree in civil rights law, and went back to the mentor of mine, dr. williams, and told him as i was graduating getting ready to take the test preparing to go to law school and choose a school and he said why are you doing this? why do you want to be a civil rights lawyer and i told him about discrimination and intolerance and how it bothered me deeply and i wanted to make that my life's work and he said okay, all right, obviously you don't care about money because you're never going to make money, you know this right? i said that isn't my motivation. i want my life to have meaning and give back and do something for my country. and he was the one who said why don't you think about teaching? nothing wrong with being a lawyer but there's a lot of them. and you know, goodness knows there's plenty of hungry lawyers out there just not making it, and knowing you you will end up

taking on lots of pro bono cases and they will get appealed and really you're being reactive to the situation instead of proactive. if you want to be proactive dealing with intolerance and prejudice why don't you think of being a teacher. think how many in kids you could impact. >> host: you were going to impact people one way or another. watch out for ms. cahill. don't they do know her just because what she says. he says think about being a teacher. you, who were raised postfeminist, the feminist generation, so you could have been anything you want to be. civil rights law occurs to you and instead he says be a teacher. now, so you decide to be a teacher. it looks like your students are going to propel you closer to law in the first place i would like to say good word from your edify is from your professor as i continue to be a law professor

at georgetown university law school where i taught full time. i have never been in the habit of saying to people you really got to go into law and because i am an walz. indy 500 my favorite joke as we have been over-lawyered since thomas jefferson, and we are going to get into the kind of teacher that you turned out to be. first let me explore a little bit more about this campaign. i was intrigued by the mystery judge. >> guest: yes. >> host: i've always felt judges can hardly purge themselves entirely of their political instincts, the politics is in their soul. i wish you would talk about this advice from this mystery judge who found you and apparently is the only real adviser other than the students you ever had. >> guest: while i don't know why should use his name. >> host: why not asking his name, we want him to keep his job. [laughter]

>> guest: we do. the judges are largely elected in many seats, so they are political animals and he had been involved deeply with the democratic party. of course had to step away from that once he became a judge. but i know he kept his eye on it. his wife was a middle school teacher of course he had heard about me. and he wanted to meet with me to see how serious eyeballs. he said he needed to look me in the eye to see if i really wallace willing to take on what was going to muster out of myself and if i was prepared for that and so he was trying to kind of, you know, sure me out and see what i was made of i suppose, but he was just a great guy. we met sort of thing cockney though. i remember thinking this is odd, but he had a hat and the green coat and sat next to me in this little diner that is known as jim kelly's logic in the back of a casino where they had five

barstools where they solve these creasy workable hamburgers, i say horrible but they are called awful, awful's and they are wonderful. he would look at me and i felt i was meeting with a cia agent or something and he said i just need to know what you've done, who you talked to, what kind of things you've done to prepare for this. and of course i was a huge meal fight. i really had very little knowledge about how the inner workings of the party worked or the process itself and was learning on the go. so he finally, adding he was a little discouraged i didn't know as much as he hoped i knew, but he sent me in the direction to meet people that could help me which was very beneficial to me. he told me to meet with the attorney general who was a great female role model in the state and another of connected people within the party to could possibly help me and connect me

with fund-raising and being at evens and those kind of things. >> host: we will get to the party in a moment because there's interesting points about the party. now, let's get to these kids. these kids are running this campaign? >> guest: yes, ma'am. i had no desire to do it and that is the condition i agreed to take this on a to run for office, you can live vicariously through me, that's great but you guys will run this campaign, and i felt this was a perfect opportunity for real world of learning which is what we talk about making things matter to kids. have them be the stakeholders, and worked. boy, they were 12-year-old genius is as far as taking this and running with it. >> host: we will get in a moment how you were able to make this work and the key to education as well. that means that parents agreed

and went with you to events and you had no other staff? >> guest: no. myself and 286 craters. >> host: 26th graders and two glasses that participated >> guest: went over a 14 months ansel one went off to middle school and i picked up the next group and we went on. >> host: now when do you hear -- we are going to save this for the end, just how many votes the kids campaign garnered through their teacher. a real campaign we are talking about, people, and whenever you are thinking you will find may not turn out to be the case. but i would like to know how much different did having kids managed the campaign make and i am going to ask a question about the drawbacks may have been. i remember reading you said who

can resist taking a campaign from a kid? what about you were kids and how you were able to approach people? you were on nolan. did they say what are these kids with you for? did you have to spend time simply convincing than the durkan team was serious because you were all these cute thing is helping you out? >> guest: not really. and i guess a way that we certainly didn't anticipate it was a huge benefit because the press was enamored with these children. they were just in love with them. they loved coming to the classroom and shooting and interviewing and filming and interviewing kids in the hallway to talk about the process and that was the goal to stick to the process and not get into party politics. i wasn't trying to brainwash children into becoming die-hard democrats, from a very conservative part of nevada. so i had to be careful and be very diligent about focusing on how to run for office and how that process works.

and the kids were so good and charming with the press and so articulate they just became the darlings. so in many ways people knew who we were because they would say i've seen you guys on tv or heard you on the radio and that is wonderful. we wish more normal people would run. and so we didn't have to do -- we didn't have to a lot of explaining. a lot of people already had seen and heard about all of us and we were very enthused. >> host: described this district. publicly described the district, what area it encompasses. >> guest: sure. nevada district ii, the seat their -- when i ran the year was 2,000 so we had to congress people and we're getting the third which was john border. >> host: this is because that is one of the fastest-growing states in the country. >> guest: that is correct the district ii is very large. it was from the organ idaho border above all the way down to

north las vegas. >> host: how many people in the district about? >> guest: goodness -- >> host: probably more now. >> guest: the times shelley berkley in the district of mullah politician clark county las vegas was the largest population center so very rural and mining and ranching. >> host: the district you reimputed >> guest: the largest metropolitan area if you didn't count of north las vegas a real would have been reno and in carson city. >> host: did you have all of reno? >> guest: yes. >> host: so now this is is it fair to call this a fairly conservative district? >> guest: very conservative, yes. the only state in tradition that goes blue is clark county, las vegas and the rest typically go read it. washo can go either way it depends on the candidate and i'm proud to say it went blue as did

our state but it's made a swing state for a number of election cycles. >> host: it is now represented by the district in which you ran is represented by a republican. >> guest: and has been for a long time which is dean heller. >> host: one of my colleagues. i do want the audience to know that if you have any sense of reading for fun or if you are a teacher or have any interest in education or children or politics or government, you will not want to miss this book. now you just heard how cute it lies to have these people who were your campaigners and people couldn't resist. but, ms. cahill, i was impressed by the honesty of this book and this is what you also said later on in the book when your opponent, jim gibbons at the

time who is now the governor of the state is he? >> guest: yes, he is the governor. >> host: -- was crafty enough not to attack ms. cahill and hercules mittal volunteers, and here is ms. cahill in frustration if i can read from you, ms. cahill. his gentle response was surely politically motivated. but while a campaign spearheaded by students made it very hard for people to attack me, it became a double-edged sword because it was also hard to get anyone to discuss the issues. i am a serious candidate, i wanted to say. but it was hard to get the press to focus on much more than how cute our campaign was, and cuteness wasn't going to win the race. why don't you describe that. >> guest: there was a level of frustration as we made it through the primary which i have to say was a surprise. i never anticipated making it through the primary.

there was a gentleman we ran against and i didn't know him but he was in vegas and i figure that is the democratic mecca of the state, he will win this. >> host: just a moment, tierney, was he supported by the primary or is this where you don't support. >> guest: that's correct. >> host: you beat him by a much, this is the primary everybody. >> guest: honestly that morning i woke up and read the paper and was in shock that i had won and later herter was on a technicality, he was a felony and wasn't allowed to go forward. so, that was news to me. i certainly haven't been told that and i was just trying to be the best candidate i could be and let the chips fall where they may and we will deal with whatever happens after august. but i was certainly shocked to have won the primary and then head off into the general i realized i am the democratic candidate. [laughter] >> host: get ready for it, ms. cahill. >> guest: and was something i

wasn't prepared for. i had numerous organizations asking me to come speak, you know, you're the candidate, we want to at this event and that was the expectation, and now i had to shift gears from focusing on the process a loan to being the candidate for the general election, and it was hard to get much attention beyond the fact a sixth grade class started this campaign and was running it because certainly that was the key factor that sold in the media and it was a benefit, but it did make it hard to talk about issues like education and mental health and nuclear waste in nevada because they didn't take any of them seriously, so it was difficult >> host: watch, ms. cahill, what you wish for because you shore got it. i think people would be interested in your view of teaching. this is a serious teacher, france. this is someone that thinks about teaching for whom teaching was unjustly will do this on july can do something else. and i want to question you about

your view of teaching. >> guest: yes. >> host: you say in the book instead of helping build strong effective citizens, but figuring of all that they have learned, you try to find out what they haven't and instead of measuring comprehension and growth all too often these tests include tricky questions that require students to select the best dancers from several partially correct options. gotcha, that's hard to me. i would much rather find out what they know and teach to their strengths rather than try to figure out their weaknesses. ms. cahill i have to ask in the era of no child left behind where there is a certain modicum of knowledge. every child is supposed to learn how do you make sure that these children answer these gotcha questions and yet teach so that

they do have comprehension and how do you do that in a campaign and make the campaign part of what is already a difficult learning process we gather for teachers and students in the country in any case? >> guest: well, the campaign we limited the cost time -- class time a soaked up. we certainly had a number of other things and a areas in the curriculum we had to get through so when it was matthau were a was matthau were and we didn't do campaign stuff. >> host: so you did have to teach so the kids could take these exams? >> guest: absolutely. and that would be irresponsible making sure they've certainly been exposed and can master the sixth grade curriculum so that they can move to seventh grade and be where the need to be here and that's completely appropriate. you know, we is our social studies block time to have the campaign meetings and then after school and those kind of things so i was very clear with the school district how to manage time and make sure the children

were getting what they needed. you brought up no child left behind and i certainly don't on the phrase but i have heard it talked about quite a bit and i wish it were called every child moves forward because i don't think testing a child at the end of the year and then saying you know, they are reading a fifth grade level and they are a seventh grader, shame on you, school, because the problem is you don't know where they came in. you don't know how much growth they've had. maybe they came in a second grade level and they moved a fifth grade reading level they have grown three years in one school year. that's amazing stuff. but you won't know that if you only test than at the end of the year so it needs to be very specific, measurable testing. at the beginning of the year to see where kids are coming into the end of the year to look for growth and that is what should matter is the growth. at bat is a very transient state. we have high turnover in the schools. i don't think i've ever had a school year i started with the

same group and ended with the same group, that's never happened so when we have all these children that move into the school district, we pick them up, we are a public school, we take everybody and to keep up where you take in and move you forward as best as we can and one of the most important ways is to differentiate instruction and every child deserves to have their strengths taught to and learning style taught. >> host: how does that help pick up on the weaknesses of the move with their weakness? >> guest: certainly you know what their weaknesses or but you don't focus on them so much to where they are not realizing what it is they are good at. >> host: a kid for example is good that lets say half but terrible in spelling in english. so how do you teach the matt strength and bring the english op? >> guest: and that's the beauty of differentiated instruction. differentiated instruction looks at all those things and then helps you teach the child. you're not teaching curriculum, you're teaching children and we need to remember that.

>> host: how many children were in the class? >> guest: 28. >> host: does that become difficult with children transient sometimes? you describe children from very different homes. how were you able to give time, the required time to all these kids? >> guest: well, i think good teachers find a way and if that means to stay in at lunch and recess and help the kids that need extra attention or after school i reentering sessions just to make sure they were getting the extra attention they needed and school districts are looking at that. school districts are looking at longer days making sure kids have more instructional time so they are getting the services they need and certainly when we are weak in an area it needs to be addressed. you can just focus on you are good at math and we will stay there. absolutely find a thing you are reading and second grade reading level we have a moral obligation to make sure we get you up to speed and greed level because we know what happens when kids can't perform and are not able

to graduate from school. nevada has the highest dropout and the nation. the way our prison system determines how many prison cells they need is a look at third grade reading scores and beside my goodness, this many children are not reading at grade level, that's how many prison cells we need. >> host: that's how they plan ahead. >> guest: that's right. just knowing that i get goose bumps and i took a lot of statistical the time, the way they determine and projections. it means we have a huge moral obligation to make sure children can read, write, do math and be good critical thinkers. and that is what standardized testing doesn't always allow. it doesn't amount to show a child's ability to quickly think. >> host: well, ms. cahill, students take can think and pass a test he were something of a workaholic which may tell something about what a gifted teacher is and if the next time

i see the president i'm going to ask him what he like to read your book because a lot of what you are saying sounds like what president obama is sinking, and i will get to this also in a moment. i know that this is a union teacher. this is an national education association teacher who is loyal to her union. we will talk about that, but you see where she is in education. her children come first without forsaking of the institutions that have also been important in her life. it's interesting how lessons get hot and you seem to have had a very keen gifted cents how to teach a lesson out of the clear blue sky. there is a part of your book in which you talk about what the children are doing in order to decide the logo and the logo is

congress, house of representatives is a big long and formal. but the thing they had to decide in this republican district whether to use the democratic label and there was talk about how that might keep you from getting to people in the first place so there was a good argument you heard on the side not using the label and then a child spoke up. why do you tell about that? >> guest: on the logo they wanted, the t-shirts and buttons all those things, you are right, they had a picture of the capitol building and tierney cahill for congress and then democrat and we were sitting at the table and they were presenting their ideas for the logo the de date laws if you use democrat there's some people that won't listen to anything you have to say. they will immediately be turned off.

there's nothing you will say it is of value to me. i am a republican. and another child said but it's important we are honest and we are not trying to trick voters, we just want them to know who you are and put you out there and be honest and to me we talked to the kids about that kind of behavior all the time, being honest and who you are, so i felt that that child had great wisdom and needed to be honored and this was their campaign and as long as i could live with it and it was ethical and they could defend their reasoning i was going to go with it so we put it on the signs and buttons and all of that and we were sort of advice by other campaigns that ran across and shouldn't have done that and i said i think we did the right thing. >> host: this was a moving part of this book because there was a good strategic reason for some people it's not for me to say i am from a largely democratic district there's people that would say it wasn't

dishonest, she's not telling a lie she is just not telling the whole truth, but you allowed the children to reach an answer based on sheer honesty in the middle of a campaign, ms. cahill, my hat goes off to you. i want to ask about -- we are going to shortly go to a break -- but you have in the earlier segment talked about some of the problems with schools teaching to the task but it was interesting to see how balanced this book is because you defend schools and another part of the book and i'm going to have a suite in just a few minutes to talk about how you do your own schools. we will be back shortly.

>> "after words" and several other c-span programs are available for download at podcast. more with tierney cahill and washington, d.c. delegate eleanor holmes norton in a moment. "after words" with tierney cahill and delegate eleanor holmes norton continues. >> host: we are back with ms. cahill, who ran a remarkable campaign for congress. i can't tell you she's one of my colleagues in the house but watch out,