ENID — The primary election for Oklahoma State Superintendent for Public Education is only five months away, but one of the Republican candidates hasn’t even had time to officially announce his candidacy.

Enid Superintendent Shawn Hime has been too busy doing his “day job.”

Hime is running for the position, now held by Democrat Sandy Garrett, who announced she won’t seek re-election. He indicated his interest in late August, and since that time he has been spending some nights and weekends raising campaign money.

But the little matter of trying to pass a nearly $100 million bond issue for Enid Public Schools has kept the superintendent pretty busy here at home — and that’s the way he says he likes it.

“I’m transitioning from having 50-plus meetings on the bond issue to my evenings and weekends now going around the state and talking to groups about the needs of children statewide,” Hime said.

Hime faces a tough challenger in the Republican primary. Janet Barresi, a dentist and a charter school advocate and organizer in Oklahoma City, has outpaced Hime so far in fundraising and campaigning.

However, Hime said his experience as a public school educator and his desire to make decisions at the state level about what’s best for the schoolchildren of Oklahoma makes him the best candidate for the job.

“I’m not looking at what the next political race will be or what looks good in the newspapers,” Hime said. “I’m about educating our future citizens.”

Before taking the job as superintendent in Enid, Hime was assistant superintendent at Oklahoma Depart-ment of Education. He served as di-rector of Student Assessment for the department. In that position, he focused on improving low-performing schools and oversaw the state’s student-testing program.

Prior to that he was a math teach-er and football coach at Lexington and Ardmore public schools. At Ardmore, he also served as athletic director, assistant principal and, eventually, assistant superintendent.

Hime said he is an advocate for local control and accountability.

“We have a lot of people who talk about accountability and local control, but it seems like every year we move closer and closer to people in Oklahoma City or Washington determining what time of day we’ll teach reading or math rather than allowing our local communities and educators the flexibility and room to be innovative and creative.”

Hime said the state superintendent is a key advocate for children when it comes to the governor and the Legislature.

“The superintendent should be the No. 1 resource for our state legislators in educational issues,” he said. “The key role for the state superintendent is to make sure legislators and the governor understand the impact of any pending laws or current laws on what’s happening in schools.”

Hime said it’s also the superintendent’s job to be a guiding factor in budgeting for school improvements.  He said he would work with the Legislature and governor to get better estimates on where funding stands each year.

“It’s very important that schools have accurate information and timely information (on the budget),” he said. “We haven’t had that. The nature of school budgets is once you have personnel in place then your budget is set for the year. Right now, it is the most important thing for school leaders to know what’s going to happen this year but also what next year’s budget will look like.”

Hime said he wants to do on the state level what he’s done in Enid.

“When I came to Enid, I said I wasn’t here to make change or for Shawn Hime to dictate change,” he said. “You make change by working with the stakeholders. You build consensus on what needs to be done, then move forward.

“It’s the same at the state level. If you go into the state superintendent office and say, ‘This is what we’re going to do,’ that’s the first way to fail. You have to bring in stakeholders and key people and work through the consensus-building process to make change.”

Hime can point to that kind of success in his two years in Enid. Since coming to Enid, he worked the first year with staff and parents to make some significant changes, primarily moving the junior high schools to a middle school concept and moving the ninth-grade classes into the high school. His most notorious achievement, however, was passage of the $99.5 million bond issue Feb. 9, although he doesn’t want to take credit for that victory.

He said he gives all the credit to the facilities group that worked for a year to come up with the bond issue package.

One of the bigger issues facing the Oklahoma education system, Hime believes, is testing and accountability. He doesn’t believe Oklahoma schools lack in academic rigor — he believes there is not consistency in testing standards among states.

“States need to work together to develop tests,” Hime said. “There is no reason algebra in Oklahoma is different than algebra in Michigan or Texas.”

Hime said he is excited about the Race to the Top program, fueled by the federal government, which is advocating some accountability measures be put in place for districts to receive grants.

“It’s a way for us to move forward with innovation,” he said. “I’m a big fan of merit pay or incentive pay as long as we have a data system that actually shows us the value-added side.”

Hime said he is looking forward to the next few months, even though he will be out on the road a lot of nights and weekends.

“My job is share my vision about where education should be going and hope that resonates with Oklahoma,” he said. “I’m really excited about this opportunity.”