Sometimes local elections have big national implications. That’s the case with Jefferson County, Colo., which this November will vote on whether to recall three conservative school-board members. If the recall succeeds, teachers’-union allies will likely retake control of the board in a swing Denver-area district in which one out of ten Coloradans live.
“Jefferson County is the purple county in a purple state, and therefore it is ground zero for all kinds of political wars, but at the moment that political war is over the public-education system,” non-partisan political analyst Eric Sondermann told Denver’s CBS affiliate. “If these board members survive the recall, it sends a message that you can be a reformer, even do that in an up-for-grabs district and live to tell about it.”
The education war in Jefferson County began in 2013, when voters dissatisfied with faltering schools elected a conservative majority to the school board. The incumbent superintendent promptly resigned, and the board went about implementing reforms such as fully funding charter schools, linking teacher pay to performance and empowering principals to make more decisions at the school level. The board also angered the local education–industrial complex by building a new school without incurring any new debt.
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The Jefferson County Education Association, the local teachers’ union, reacted badly. It was especially riled at the board’s new compensation system, which gave highly effective teachers a 4.2 percent raise, effective teachers a 2.4 percent raise, and inferior teachers no raise. (Only 2 percent of all teachers received no pay increase). Some teachers organized “sickouts” in several schools to shut them down, but the compensation plan stuck.
The union then proceeded to focus on red herrings. It seized on a proposed board review of a national Advanced Placement history curriculum and labeled the review “censorship.” Egged on by some teachers, thousands of students protested. The curriculum review was dropped, but problems with the proposed AP History course weren’t imaginary.
#share#Last month, Newsweek magazine reported that the College Board, the non-profit behind the new AP standards, “will release a revision to the standards . . . after significant pushback from conservatives who claimed the redesigned course framework, released last year, painted American history in too negative a light.” Among the revisions are that the contributions of Founders such as Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Alexander Hamilton will finally be mentioned and that the importance of “American exceptionalism” will be recognized.
Despite clear evidence that the AP History standards were flawed, the union-backed recall petition still cites the proposed curriculum review as a major grievance against the three Jefferson County school-board members. Other grievances are an alleged lack of transparency, overcompensating a new superintendent, and an alleged limiting of public comments at board meetings. The Denver Post found that the compensation claim was in error.
As recall supporters gathered their petition signatures this summer, it became clear to many observers just how little their effort is about real education reform.
Linda Pelon, a parent with three boys in Jefferson County schools, says that board meetings are open for public comment but that pro-board parents who attend are frequently bullied: “It’s so bad I felt nervous walking to my car after speaking out in favor of the board.” Board president Ken Witt calls the transparency allegations specious, noting that indeed the board has for the first time allowed cameras to cover negotiations for a new union contract.
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Such refreshing transparency may have helped the board and the union come to an agreement on a new and improved contract last month. The 41-page document (down from 120 pages in the last contract) limits layoffs based purely on seniority, ends automatic deduction of union dues from teacher paychecks, and allows teams of teachers and administrators to make many decisions on training, school calendars, and caps on class sizes.
But union president John Ford trashed the contract even after it was signed. “It’s a bad deal, we know it. We absolutely know it,” he said. “But we had to get rid of this distraction. . . . We have to get to work right now. We have a big lift in November,” with the recall.
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As recall supporters gathered their petition signatures this summer, it became clear to many observers just how little their effort is about real education reform. The Denver Post, which endorsed Barack Obama for president twice, calls the recall “nakedly political.” The left-wing website Daily Kos is already raising the red herring of the Koch brothers, claiming that they’re “planning to support the embattled conservative board members.”
“The stakes in Colorado couldn’t be higher,” says Jon Caldara, president of the Independence Institute, a free-market think tank in Denver. “Many other states allow local school boards the full authority to negotiate contracts, so the Jefferson County reform model will spread if the recall fails. If it succeeds, you can bet it will send a chilling message to education reformers elsewhere.”