What will things be like for the new Wake County school board that has seven registered Democrats, an unaffiliated member who used to be a Democrat and a registered Republican called a RINO by some critics?
As noted in Saturday’s article, members of the new board and their supporters say the partisan fighting will end and the board will be able to focus on student achievement instead. But critics say they worry the new board could become just like the pre-2009 board and ignore dissenting opinions.
School board Chairman Keith Sutton said you can’t assume the new board, which takes office in December, will be in lock step on everything.
“You still have a board of nine individuals,” Sutton said. “Everyone still has their own ideas of what they truly want. I don’t think you can say that you have eight or nine people who agree on everything.”
But Sutton said less political partisanship should lead to more compromises on issues.
“You won’t have factions standing at two different extremes of issues,” Sutton said. “We may disagree on issues, but you’ll probably have a majority of folks moving ahead on the same philosophy.”
Sutton said it would e “unfair” to say the new board is just like the pre-2009 board. He said it’s a different board with different people with only Kevin Hill and Bill Fletcher having served before then.
“This is not a board of partisan individuals,” Sutton said. “This is a board of different individuals who want to improve student outcomes and student achievement.”
For instance, Sutton said they’re not going to mandatory year-round assignments, “which doesn’t work.” Keep this in mind if the rumors about more year-round school conversions coming soon turn into reality.
Also unlike the old board, Sutton said they’re using different tools now to deal with diversity. He said the old board just used magnet schools and the assignment policy.
Sutton said they’ve got new tools such as the STEM schools and the Global Schools.
“We’ve got some things to make schools more attractive other just magnets,” Sutton said.
Sutton pointed back to how when he became chairman in December he laid out as goals filling the District 1 vacancy (the District 9 vacancy came later), hiring a new superintendent, passing a budget, passing a school bond issue and implementing a new assignment policy.
“The board has done a lot of work,” Sutton said. “The board has accomplished a lot and had a fair amount of success.”
In the year ahead, Sutton said he’s looking to focus more attention on student outcomes/student achievement.
Sutton said he wants the board to look at raising the graduation rate, implementing the recommendations of the school safety task force (which he said would improve student outcomes), implementing the recommendations that come from the District 1 task force and reducing student suspensions.
Sutton said he also wants to develop a strategic plan, implement the bond and build a strong bond on the board.
“Now we can begin to focus on these things and not have to worry about passing a bond issue or interviewing people to fill vacancies on the school board and superintendent,” Sutton said. “We want to focus on student outcomes and student achievement, which is what we’re eager to work on and deal with.”
Sutton said the attention on growth in the past caused the district to lose focus on student achievement. He said the partisanship on the board also made it harder to focus on achievement.
School board vice chairwoman Christine Kushner echoed many of Sutton’s statements.
In terms of the board members elected Tuesday, Kushner said Fletcher and Tom Benton bring their experience on the board. Kushner said Monika Johnson-Hostler brings her experience of being an advocate for parents and children. Kushner said Zora Felton brings her experience as an educator.
“The board needs to be non-partisan,” Kushner said. “There shouldn’t be a voting bloc. There should be shifting votes and ideas. I hope there’s real talk and ideas without partisanship that’s been plaguing us. The public doesn’t want us to be partisan.”
“We’re going to be a group of nine,” Kushner later added. “ I’m not going to speculate on their positions. But I’m hoping we’ll have constructive comments on the issues we have.
I want to return Wake County to being nationally admired. We’re a strong school system but there are things that we can improve on. We’ve got a strong group on the board.”
Kushner said there are some things that all nine board members share.
“The similarity is that we’re going to be focused on academic achievement, strengthening our school system and supporting our teachers, principals and administrators by having effective policies,” Kushner said. “We’re not focused on politics or partisan gain.”
Kushner also rejected the idea that the board doesn’t listen to people. She pointed to things like how she meets with parents and different groups and how other board members do the same thing.
“Many of the current board members are engaged in community discussions,” Kushner said.
Like Sutton, Kushner said she wants the board to focus going forward on academics and supporting teachres.
Yevonne Brannon, chairwoman of the Great Schools in Wake Coalition, said passage of the bond issue take a big worry off the minds of the board, allowing members to focus on achievement issues.
“This is a good time for our county,” Brannon said. “We have a very experienced board now. Seven of the nine are continuing on. In the past year, we’ve seen a very stable board that has done good work.”
Brannon pointed to how Benton and Fletcher have served on the board several months since they were appointed to fill the vacancies. She said she doesn’t expect much of a change with Felton and Johnson-Hostler now joining the mix.
“You already have a fairly stable majority on the board,” Brannon said. “I don’t think it’s going to be a big change. I think the public said they like the direction the board Is going.”
Over th next two-three years, Brannon said she’s hoping the board focus will be on achievement.
“The public wants a board that works well together and is focused on achievement,” Brannon said. “They don’t want politics.”
Moving forward, Brannon said Wake has both a strong board and a strong superintendent.
“We had a win-win on the election Tuesday,” Brannon said. “ We had the county speak clearly that it wants to keep our schools high quality. We want a school board that’s focused on achievement. It’s a very proud moment for Wake County.”
The former GOP majority was accused of being bought by Art Pope because of his donations to the Wake County Republican Party and the advice he gave for the election. That’s a charge that GSIW members made during the majority’s two-year reign.
Based on the Pope accuations , I asked Brannon how she’d respond to those who charge the new board was bought by Great Schools because of the donations of individual members, particularly Ann Campbell.
Campbell has given at least $31,000 to the eight Democratic-backed board members in the 2011 and 2013 elections. She also gave at least $1,000 to Fletcher. I’m not counting the donations made by her husband and the ones the couple made to the Democratic Party and the Wake Citizens For Good Government.
Brannon said she didn’t know about any donations made by any members of the group. Brannon said GSIW shouldn’t be held accountable for donations made by individual members.
Now for the other side, school board member John Tedesco said of course there’s going to be less partisanship if the board is made up almost entirely of just members of one political party.
“Anytime you have nine people who are likeminded, you are going to have less disagreement,” Tedesco said. “Unfortunately, I don’t think it’s a true reflection of the county. In the county, there are strong differences on the biggest issues. I hope they’re respectful of those different perspectives.”
Tedesco said the new board shouldn’t “just quietly steamroll over the rest of the county” that disagrees with them.
Tedesco said the considerable debate on the board in the past four years has been good in ensuring both sides are heard on issues.
“I hope we don’t’ see a rubberstamping board that sings Kumbaya for whatever initiatives the administration wants,” Tedesco said.
Tedesco said he’s worried that other groups such as the media might pay less attention to the board now that it’s singing Kumbaya.
“When you don’t have competing interests at the table, you tend to quiet down interest from outside groups,” Tedesco said. “You can slip into the complacent rubberstamping board that’s so much of the case in other areas. I’d hope that they don’t become that way.”
Tedesco said you could see some differences on the board when it comes to issues, singling out Sutton for his focus on achievement gaps and suspensions.
In terms of this year’s elections, Tedesco said some voters might not have turned out for school board because they knew their vote wouldn’t change who is in the majority.
“While all the board members have been duly elected, I’m hopeful in the process they’ll recognize that a large portion of the community doesn’t necessarily think like they do,” Tedesco said.
Tedesco said that if the board doesn’t learn from the past, such as the way the pre-2009 board acted or even the way the GOP initially acted after taking office, there will be repercussions.
“If this board becomes complacent and sings the same song, they will ignore what was done before and in 2016, there will be a different conversation,” Tedesco said pointing to the next scheduled cycle of school board elections.
in addition to election consequences, Tedesco said the new board needs to keep in mind that parents now more than ever can take out their frustrations by leaving the school district for alternatives such as charter schools and private schools. Tedesco said the loss of these affluent, motivated parents won't help Wake but will instead leave behind more struggling students in the system.
“If this board oversteps in a manner that is completely disregarding a large portion of the community who doesn’t believe it’s okay to bus a student an hour-and-a-half each way to fill a quota, they will again incite great interest in the public to make a change,” Tedesco added.
Allison Backhouse, who was former school board chairman Ron Margiotta’s campaign chairman during his failed 2011 re-election bid, predicted dire results for families under the new board.
“People are going to be in for a rude awakening when they experience things from this point on,” Backhouse said.
Backhouse also called Brannon’s explanation about the donations “BS.”
