@@@@ school board when you don’t have @s

[rubytue]

My neighbor, whose kids are grown and didn’t even go to school locally, was talking to me about school board elections the other day, and how it’s a very important local issue, even when you don’t have kids. This has typically been something I haven’t paid much mind to. But he convinced me I should think about it before I return my ballot.  I’m curious how other child-free people go about making the decision.

I started researching the candidates a bit. Then I decided perhaps I should ask local parents for “endorsements.” At least that would give me a list to narrow down. Best case, they all give me the same names and I’m content these are the name like-minded people would select and I can use my vote to help them. It seems somewhat lazy, but… they are the ones most affected?

So, if you don’t have kids in schools, do you vote on school board? And if so, how do you research?

[af1212]

I do have kids but I 100% think it something everyone should vote for. They are spending your money. You should agree with how that money is being spent.

It’s hard for me to think as a child-free person since I am not one but I think I would try to imagine the knowledge and qualities I would want my future doctors, teachers, business people, etc to have. Those people are currently children in school so what they are being taught and the experiences they have are I influencing who they will become.

[formerlyak]

I am a parent, but I generally rule out people who clearly see school board as a jumping off point for their political career.

I also look for people who ask good questions, who aren’t afraid to say the need to do research and make informed decisions. I like candidates who understand that not all kids want to go to college so they support investment in other pathways at the high school. Candidates who are respectful to the school district admin.

[sonrisa]

I’m torn on this - on the one hand I think it is an important role and everyone in a. Community has reason to care. On the other, I think a lot of the issues can be complex and mischaracterized in bullet points so someone who isn’t following closely might not fully understand what is truly being discussed. On a basic level, I’d say look for the dog whistles: Is someone yelling about critical race theory? Saving sports for cowgirls? (ETA: that’s an autocorrect from ‘cisgirls’ lol) Anything like that?

[rubytue]

Jun 27, 2022 8:04:31 GMT -5 af1212 said:

I do have kids but I 100% think it something everyone should vote for. They are spending your money. You should agree with how that money is being spent.

I will add that all the shit going on with schools over the past two years has helped to solidify what an important issue this is. Even if it’s not affecting *your* kids education. Any way I can help tell the people who think *individuals* should decide what is taught I’m *public* school that it’s time to sit down. I will. 

But shit it’s a lot of people on the ballot. Thank goodness for mail-in ballots so you don’t have to remember a list of names between your car and the room.

[suzyp]

I don't have kids, but I always vote in school board elections.

I am in Texas where I think the make up of the board is extremely important due to the BS CRT/white washing of history issues. I look for people that align with my political views. From there, I pick people who I believe will support the school and all children. Most of the time there are little differences between candidates from the same party, but there can be in how they have/have not advocated for children (or here in TX, stood up or did not stand up to the BS that is happening).

I tend to not be a fan of anyone who runs whose kids are in private school - mostly because they are normally right wing lunatics.

I think it's very important even if you don't have kids because educating children is a society issue and the issues that school boards decide can have much larger impacts.

[wise_rita]

Jun 27, 2022 8:16:16 GMT -5 suzyp said:

I tend to not be a fan of anyone who runs whose kids are in private school - mostly because they are normally right wing lunatics.

OMG what jackasses.  You don't vote for public education with your kids you deserve zero votes.

If you are sane (i.e. not Republican) you should definitely vote to keep the insane (i.e. Republican) ones far away from any position in power.

I would ask likeminded people, maybe with kids who are closer to the day-to-day, for recommendations.

[mccallister84]

For me, I would start with who the teachers union endorses and go from there.

[af1212]

Beyond just straight issues, at least where I live the board only gets elected half at a time. So I always think it’s great to balance the board with a variety of professional and life backgrounds.

Ex if there are already four lawyers on the board I would choose some social workers, teachers, etc to sort of balance that out.

If the board is mostly made up of people who have lived in the town forever I would balance that out with people from other regions and experiences, etc.

[bears]

Jun 27, 2022 8:23:20 GMT -5 wise_rita said:

Jun 27, 2022 8:16:16 GMT -5 suzyp said:

I tend to not be a fan of anyone who runs whose kids are in private school - mostly because they are normally right wing lunatics.

OMG what jackasses.  You don't vote for public education with your kids you deserve zero votes.

This was a huge issue in the town next to where I grew up--religious fundamentalists were voted into the school board, their kids went to private school, and they absolutely gutted the schools.

I am a parent, but before I had kids, I still tried to vote for candidates who I felt like had the best interest of the kids, teachers, and schools at heart. Schools are so important to a community, especially long-term, that all community members need to support them.

[Michelle]

Jun 27, 2022 8:53:18 GMT -5 bears said:

Jun 27, 2022 8:23:20 GMT -5 wise_rita said:

OMG what jackasses.  You don't vote for public education with your kids you deserve zero votes.

This was a huge issue in the town next to where I grew up--religious fundamentalists were voted into the school board, their kids went to private school, and they absolutely gutted the schools.

I am a parent, but before I had kids, I still tried to vote for candidates who I felt like had the best interest of the kids, teachers, and schools at heart. Schools are so important to a community, especially long-term, that all community members need to support them.

I think 99% of the time this is likely to be the case. Please always dig though.

Someone appeared to be ideal in the opposite regard and was voted onto our school board and is horrible now - supporting book banning, anti-covid precautions, supports teachers carrying guns. He never spoke publicly about those things before. The person others in the community wanted to run against him didn't because his kids are in private school and he didn't want to have to defend why. But his reasons included that he wanted his kids to get education on DEI issues, wanted mandatory masking for COVID, wanted them at a school that took seriously the problem of high school suicides when our district was doing jack squat and we had a whole rash of them, and finally he knew stuff about our superintendent that others were sweeping under the rug.

I wish more people had dug deeper and supported his run. Our kids would be much better off.

[secretagent]

I think this is an important election as it helps shape the future of your community.

I do have kids and read board minutes monthly, etc, and I actually find this really difficult to research. Our board elections are not totally bonkers (which might be a product of where I live with a lot of small districts). A lot of candidates "quiet campaign" on our town FB pages, and that's unfortunately where I end up making a lot of decisions based on what candidates say there.

[minzy]

Jun 27, 2022 8:25:08 GMT -5 mccallister84 said:

For me, I would start with who the teachers union endorses and go from there.

This. For Maryland, try the apple ballot: mdappleballot.com/

[maddiepaddy]

Voting in school board elections is SO important. The crazy far right/fascists know that local government is where they can make big change quickly if put into power and they’re specifically targeting school boards (and well, everything). These nutters are organized and attend specific candidate training etc.

I belong to a local progressive group on FB (one of the few things I still do in FB), and that’s really helpful in finding sources to research local candidates - particularly for school board. Maybe you have something similar?

I look for candidates endorsed by the teacher’s Union and other locals that I trust to know. Also, people who already have a proven track record via working on non-profits, in the schools, etc rather than some rando person, etc…

[Velar Fricative]

Jun 27, 2022 9:01:35 GMT -5 Michelle said:

Jun 27, 2022 8:53:18 GMT -5 bears said:

This was a huge issue in the town next to where I grew up--religious fundamentalists were voted into the school board, their kids went to private school, and they absolutely gutted the schools.

I am a parent, but before I had kids, I still tried to vote for candidates who I felt like had the best interest of the kids, teachers, and schools at heart. Schools are so important to a community, especially long-term, that all community members need to support them.

I think 99% of the time this is likely to be the case. Please always dig though.

Someone appeared to be ideal in the opposite regard and was voted onto our school board and is horrible now - supporting book banning, anti-covid precautions, supports teachers carrying guns. He never spoke publicly about those things before. The person others in the community wanted to run against him didn't because his kids are in private school and he didn't want to have to defend why. But his reasons included that he wanted his kids to get education on DEI issues, wanted mandatory masking for COVID, wanted them at a school that took seriously the problem of high school suicides when our district was doing jack squat and we had a whole rash of them, and finally he knew stuff about our superintendent that others were sweeping under the rug.

I wish more people had dug deeper and supported his run. Our kids would be much better off.

All the more reason why people need to dig deeper and ask questions of every candidate. Parents with kids attending the schools can be shitty board members too, so they need to be grilled too. But I don't think a candidate whose kids attend private schools or have no kids in the schools at all should be shocked when there are questions about why they they specifically want to be a public school board member (perfectly good responses include "I care about the education my community offers all kids," or "My child couldn't get the services they needed from the public school district and I want that to change," etc.). 

[momof2ms]

We also had several candidates in a few local school districts try to get on the boards who were looking to dismantle certain areas of education including an anti CRT agenda. I would not have assumed my area would have been a “target“ but here we are. Very glad we paid attention.

[wise_rita]

Jun 27, 2022 9:01:35 GMT -5 Michelle said:

Jun 27, 2022 8:53:18 GMT -5 bears said:

This was a huge issue in the town next to where I grew up--religious fundamentalists were voted into the school board, their kids went to private school, and they absolutely gutted the schools.

I am a parent, but before I had kids, I still tried to vote for candidates who I felt like had the best interest of the kids, teachers, and schools at heart. Schools are so important to a community, especially long-term, that all community members need to support them.

I think 99% of the time this is likely to be the case. Please always dig though.

Someone appeared to be ideal in the opposite regard and was voted onto our school board and is horrible now - supporting book banning, anti-covid precautions, supports teachers carrying guns. He never spoke publicly about those things before. The person others in the community wanted to run against him didn't because his kids are in private school and he didn't want to have to defend why. But his reasons included that he wanted his kids to get education on DEI issues, wanted mandatory masking for COVID, wanted them at a school that took seriously the problem of high school suicides when our district was doing jack squat and we had a whole rash of them, and finally he knew stuff about our superintendent that others were sweeping under the rug.

I wish more people had dug deeper and supported his run. Our kids would be much better off.

Ok I will revise my statement that exceptions can be made. Being not fascist and insane is FAR more important than sending kids to public vs. private school.

As always, zero tolerance is useless.

[jeaniebueller]

Read your school board minutes (likely available online) and see what the current climate in your district is, attend a few school board meetings, search the candidates on facebook and groups that they may be in. Chances are if they are part of any of the anti science groups, you will find things that they have said online easily, as these people are always LOUD about their opinions. For everyone, please know that these anti science people are highly organized on social media and online and don't take for granted that your incumbent school board/county commission/city commission/drain commission/dog catcher are  safe positions. We have had a few local ballot mileages that are non controversial go south because these groups knew to turn out at low turnout elections. I even encourage you guys to organize locally on your own. Its really easy to put together a facebook group.

[beetea]

Ditto the previous poster who suggested looking to see who the teachers union endorses. I'd also talk to any teacher/school admin friends you have to get their opinions too.

[sillygoosegirl]

To be perfectly honest, it's not something I paid much attention to until recently, not because I didn't have kids in school, but because I didn't realize what horrible people were running for school board or how badly whitewashed public school history traditionally has been, nor quite the extent of the anti-science out there that people are trying to apply to our schools. I figured those were decisions best left to--not so much parents--but people with expertise about education. But school boards are actually highly political... I don't know if they always have been or not, but with the teaching of anything other than a whitewashed version of history being labeled as CRT, clearly it is now. I mean, all other things being equal, I'd like my school board members to know a lot about education, but if it's a choice between someone who is openly racist and someone who's heart seems to be in the right place, I don't even really need to know about the other qualifications. And sadly, that's exactly where we were last year with our local school board elections (although the liberals did also seem well qualified, but I would have voted for them regardless).

The education of the community's children should be very important to everyone, as these kids will be voters when we are old. They will staff our hospitals and nursing homes when we are old. From a less selfish perspective, if you are the sort of person who cares about people in red states being able to get abortions, I'm guessing you are also the sort of person who would care about kids in your own school district getting comprehensive sex ed. Obviously we all have an interest in this beyond just locally, but the local school board is the one you get to vote on.

I looked this most recent election at who was endorsing the various candidates, which made the decision very clear. There's no party affiliation for school board candidates (at least not here), but you can see it in their endorsements, which clearly split along party lines. Although some of them made it even easier than that by coming out and saying in their voter's pamphlet statements that they were white supremacists. One of the worst of our recent candidates seemed to have literally moved here from Texas to run for school board, and supposedly a lot of the money for her campaign was coming from conservatives out of state. These folks are out to shape the hearts and minds of the next generation of voters, including in traditionally very liberal areas... where I really wouldn't have imagined such a person would bother to run.

[basilosaurus]

I want an educated populace that's not radicalized, so, yeah, I think school board is extremely important regardless whether you have children or not.

While I don't generally have to worry about this in my elections, it's been on my radar since the early oughties with TX BoE and how they fuck up science education, and now history, for the rest of the country.

[mala]

Are you in Carroll or Howard? I cant remember exactly where you are.

Edit:pre kids I woild just not vote for school board as I usually didnt dig into the canidates enough to make an informed decision. After my kids are out of the school system, I fully plan to research and vote as appropriate. If you're in Carroll, there are really only three options for the school board that haven't been homophobic. And three seats open.

[MixedBerryJam]

I have kids so I’m not who you asked. But if we want a third party to succeed that has to start at the local level. So I at least consider that when I’m looking at school board and other city- or county-level races.

[rubytue]

Jun 27, 2022 12:10:26 GMT -5 mala said:

Are you in Carroll or Howard? I cant remember exactly where you are.

Edit:pre kids I woild just not vote for school board as I usually didnt dig into the canidates enough to make an informed decision. After my kids are out of the school system, I fully plan to research and vote as appropriate. If you're in Carroll, there are really only three options for the school board that haven't been homophobic. And three seats open.

Howard. 

I think sillygoosegirl expressed what I’m feeling. I’ve realized what a profound impact these positions are, whereas I never really gave it much thought before. I probably deserve a lot of shit for taking a “this doesn’t affect me” attitude of privilege. But, I’m trying to do better. 

and TW for the below:
There is a guy I knew in college who is on his local school board. And, aside from 90s college fraternity attitudes on sex and consent when drunk, he is also a Pepe frog fan, maybe Q, too. And the fact he is on his school board makes me ill. To the point I’ve considered mailing photos to his local paper. 

[terpsfan]

Jun 27, 2022 13:45:09 GMT -5 rubytue said:

Jun 27, 2022 12:10:26 GMT -5 mala said:

Are you in Carroll or Howard? I cant remember exactly where you are.

Edit:pre kids I woild just not vote for school board as I usually didnt dig into the canidates enough to make an informed decision. After my kids are out of the school system, I fully plan to research and vote as appropriate. If you're in Carroll, there are really only three options for the school board that haven't been homophobic. And three seats open.

Howard. 

I think sillygoosegirl expressed what I’m feeling. I’ve realized what a profound impact these positions are, whereas I never really gave it much thought before. I probably deserve a lot of shit for taking a “this doesn’t affect me” attitude of privilege. But, I’m trying to do better. 

and TW for the below:
There is a guy I knew in college who is on his local school board. And, aside from 90s college fraternity attitudes on sex and consent when drunk, he is also a Pepe frog fan, maybe Q, too. And the fact he is on his school board makes me ill. To the point I’ve considered mailing photos to his local paper. 

We need your (sane) vote here in Howard. We’ve got some crazies in the running for BOE and I’m afraid because of the volume of signs I see for one where this is going… :-(

[jeaniebueller]

Also these groups are running a lot of nationwide 'how to run for school board/elected office' primers. I'm not sure whether dems/progressives are doing the same.

[rubytue]

Jun 27, 2022 13:52:55 GMT -5 terpsfan said:

Jun 27, 2022 13:45:09 GMT -5 rubytue said:

Howard. 

I think sillygoosegirl expressed what I’m feeling. I’ve realized what a profound impact these positions are, whereas I never really gave it much thought before. I probably deserve a lot of shit for taking a “this doesn’t affect me” attitude of privilege. But, I’m trying to do better. 

and TW for the below:
There is a guy I knew in college who is on his local school board. And, aside from 90s college fraternity attitudes on sex and consent when drunk, he is also a Pepe frog fan, maybe Q, too. And the fact he is on his school board makes me ill. To the point I’ve considered mailing photos to his local paper. 

We need your (sane) vote here in Howard. We’ve got some crazies in the running for BOE and I’m afraid because of the volume of signs I see for one where this is going… :-(

Feel free to PM me with endorsements, or “not this one thinking you are supporting a rational female candidate” 

[RoxMonster]

I am child-free and a former teacher. If you have friends who are teachers in your district, I would personally ask them. At the district where I worked, our school board was horrible. They absolutely did NOT have the best interest of the teachers (or students IMO) in mind. It was really laid bare during Covid. I would want to support the candidates who teachers support.

[bronxgirl]

In addition to all the reasons mentioned, the right wing has used school boards as an entry level position into politics and policy control. School board members have a lot of power in their community, but also can use it as a stepping stone to work their way up through political offices.

[whattheheck]

I have kids but not in my district's public school. I moved them to private school b/c the district did such a horrible job with COVID. What I hate seeing is bright, intelligent, independent thinkers who end up as ass-kissing, fall-in-line, stepford wife-ish board members after they get elected. It's been so disappointing. But when voting on the budget and the board of ed - I look to see if there is a balance to benefitting the students and benefitting the community. Raising taxes to get back the teachers you slashed during the financial improprieties of the past is going to cause some serious financial hardships to community members. "But it's for the kids!" Well I still need to be able to put food on the table and pay my electric bill so no, I can't vote for tax increases that will bring back the football team that my kids don't play on but leave me deciding which bills to pay. I can't put the kids of the community before the well being of my family. (My kids are on scholarship to the private school.) The percentage of families on free and reduced lunch in our district has skyrocketed while our enrollment numbers have plummeted. That means those with money are moving out of the district and we are now a much poorer district. We have a large agricultural base/population. The school board members need to act for the benefit of the community - not just the teachers and the students.