Education and political involvement are at the top of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mark McCormick’s goals — if elected to the state’s top office.

McCormick stopped in Ames Thursday while doing some last-minute campaigning for today’s primary.

The primary election will determine whether candidate Tom Vilsack or McCormick will receive the support of the Democratic party for the governor’s race.

McCormick, 65, is a Fort Dodge native who moved to Des Moines when he became an Iowa Supreme Court justice in 1972. After deciding to return to the political arena, he and his family remained in the Des Moines area.

After serving the court for 14 years, McCormick decided to return to practicing law and returned to politics.

McCormick said the key to winning in November is trying to lure the moderates and independents.

He plans to do this by “letting the Republicans nominate [Jim Ross] Lightfoot, a radical right-wing Republican,” and then demonstrating to Iowa voters that he is moderate and mainstream.

“The key to winning is to get the support of one’s own party,” McCormick said.

He also said there is a great opportunity for a Democrat to be elected after several years of Republican control of the governor’s office.

One of McCormick’s priority issues is public education, on which he has a comprehensive proposal. The majority of the proposal focuses on grades K-12.

Some of the major points include reducing class size to only 17 in grades K-3 and making school buildings safe.

He also plans to raise teacher compensation and set state standards for education.

McCormick’s objectives for post-secondary education include research development, keeping graduates in good jobs and combining job training with opportunity.

“Iowa has three great public universities, this [Iowa State] being one, and we need to support them,” he said. “We need to do more to show our commitment to our public universities.”

Another key issue of McCormick’s platform is hog factories.

He said he hopes to have one uniform set of environmental laws at the state level and also do a much better job enforcing those laws.

McCormick said he would also like to see location standards of hog factories regulated by the local governments, not by the state of Iowa.

McCormick said the whole topic circles around “quality of life issues.”

The three things he would like to accomplish include environmental control, local control over location and the right to hold the operation accountable for problems.

While on the campaign trail, McCormick said he has had many individuals come to him and relate stories of the stench of hog lots contaminated drinking water and of decreasing property value. He said he feels this is an important issue that effects more than just property value. The most important issue is ensuring a clean and healthy standard of life for all Iowans.

If elected in November, the first thing McCormick intends to do is address education and “stop the slippage and save the public system of education.”

“I encourage students to participate in the political process,” McCormick said.

Students are welcome to assist with the campaign and encouraged to vote, he said.

“I want to win in November and want to get young people involved,” he said.

McCormick added that although young people exude cynicism and different priorities, they can rise quickly in the political process because of energy and fresh ideas.

“If you are not satisfied, take over the process,” he said.