If his replacement isn’t announced today, that’s no problem for Don Soltman. He’s prepared to continue his work on the Idaho State Board of Education until that person is in place.

He or she should be ready to pick up right where he’s leaving off.

“Somebody’s going to inherit a full calendar,” he said with a smile Thursday afternoon during a visit to The Press office.

Soltman, of Twin Lakes, is nearing the end of his 10-year, two-term tenure as a member of the board, which meets at different higher education institutions throughout the state as it makes and oversees policy for kindergarten through college public education in Idaho.

It’s a bittersweet time for Soltman, who has built a lot of friendships through his work for education in Idaho.

“I love the people I work with, from the K-12 side all the way through,” he said. “Over 10 years, you get to know a lot of people in higher ed.”

Soltman joined the board in May 2010 after serving on the Lakeland School Board for 13 years. He was a part of the Professional Standards Commission, which reviews certificates for teachers in Idaho, when he was invited to serve on the board. Soltman had also worked as an administrator at Kootenai Health for 27 years, which helped him prep for the task.

“There are so many similarities between health care and education,” he said. “In the administration field, there’s no difference between dealing with doctors and teachers. They’re both autonomous; they have their own mindset.”

Education in Idaho is taking small steps toward a big payoff thanks to the work Soltman and his board colleagues have set in motion.

“We developed the overall goal for the state board and that was to get 60 percent of our population, age 25 to 34, with some type of a certificate,” he said. “It didn’t have to be a degree but it could be some type of working certificate, an A.A., a B.S.”

He said the 60 percent goal “was a watershed; people would say, ‘That’s really ambitious,’ and it is. People could argue that you’re never going to get there, but still, it’s an aspirational goal.”

A decade later, research examining jobs in the country shows that Idaho is now in need of 67 percent of the population in that age bracket to have a degree or certification: “It’s done nothing but go up,” Soltman said.

“That’s where it takes so long — we’ve identified the goal, and then we’ve tried to put in place strategies to get us there,” he said. “To be honest with you, we have not moved the needle. The needle is still about 42 percent, I think. That’s the frustrating part. For 10 years we’ve been working on this.”

Also during his time on the board, the dual enrollment system that allows students to attend and even graduate from college while they finish high school has expanded into the Advanced Opportunities and Fast Forward programs. Now, every student in Idaho can get more than $4,000 to go toward college tuition.

“There are a lot of kids who graduated from North Idaho College prior to graduating from high school,” he said.

Soltman championed getting more students into the WWAMI Medical Education Program, a partnership with the states of Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho. The program gives students the opportunity to complete their first and second year of medical training through the University of Idaho and University of Washington School of Medicine.

“We doubled the number of Idaho kids,” Soltman said. “We went from 20 to 40.”

Recently, the Education Commission of the States announced that Idaho is the 2019 recipient of the Frank Newman Award for State Innovation for its “collaborative approach and progress toward increasing the number of students who pursue and acquire a post-secondary credential.” The commission recognized the Idaho State Board of Education’s work to remove barriers that prevent high school grads from enrolling in college and to encourage them to continue their educations.

Those strategies include a new online resource to help students and families understand the schooling options in Idaho, a direct admissions policy for all Idaho high school seniors to the state’s public colleges and universities, and a single, online application that is accepted statewide.

Soltman said critical thinking, good listening and objectivity are the qualities to be found in the right candidate to take his seat on the board. He said he hopes his successor is John Goedde.

“John is supremely qualified,” he said. “He was on the Coeur d’Alene School Board, he was in the Senate as a state senator and he was chair of the Senate Education Committee. I think he’s got six or eight years as chair of senate ed, so he knows this stuff inside and out.

“He knows where the skeletons are, and the pitfalls. He’s politically astute. He’s known throughout the body of legislators now. He’s got a good head on him.”

Soltman plans to stay involved in the education world, although his next role is not yet known. He serves on the Lakeland Education Foundation to raise funds for scholarships and help teachers where they need it, and he plans to be open to the next opportunities that come his way.

“I have a lot of friends in education,” he said. “We’ll see.”

Debbie Critchfield, president of the state board, said she looked to Soltman as a mentor and leader when she joined five years ago. She described him as “an exemplar of diligence, thoroughness and reason.”

“His lifelong experience in a variety of fields provided an anchor to policy discussions,” she said. “During every discussion, Don’s perspective and influence was a valuable resource in the decision-making process. His calm and steady persona was a tremendous asset to the board and to the state by extension.

“During Don’s tenure he represented the board well as president, as well, and as a board member during a critical implementation period of new policies, initiatives and statewide goals. It is not overstating to say that the board is better because of Don and he will be missed.”