Susan Turk on the Upcoming April 2019 SLPS School Board Election and Return to Democratic Governance: Is there a plot underway to capture the board?

The April 2019 School, Board Election and the Return of the Elected Board To Governance By Susan Turk March 12, 2019                                                                                                                                                                                                                 Rick Sullivan Supports Return of the Elected Board February 26, 2019--St. Louis—At tonight’s Board of Education work session, Board President Dorothy Rohde Collins announced that SAB President Rick Sullivan had written a letter to DESE supporting returning the elected board to governance of the SLPS.  The State Board Of Education will hold its April 15-16, 2019 somewhere meeting in St. Louis.  The exact location has yet to be determined.  It is expected that at this meeting, they will vote to return governance to the elected board of education. When the Watch learns the meeting location, we will alert our readers.                                                                                                                                                                                                                 Correction and More In the February 18, 2019 edition of the Watch we reported on the status of Local 420’s effort to resolve a dispute over pay disparities. Based on a press release from Local 420, we misreported that they were going to court.  They next phase was an arbitration, hearing.  That hearing was held last week.  Now the parties must wait for the decision of the arbitrators. It was reported on KWMU that Superintendent  Dr. Kelvin Adams defended the district’s stance of disparate pay for employees. Dr. Adams claimed the contract with Local 420 allows the district to pay more to teachers in hard to fill positions. Whether all of the discrepancies can be explained as pertaining to hard to fill positions will be determined.  A decision will probably come in a few months.                                                                                                                                                                                                                 Pushing for Teach for America and Pro-Charter School Board Candidates With the expected return of the elected board of education to governance over the SLPS this year, dark money has returned to school board election politics. On Sunday, March 3rd, the Watch received several reports of a push poll regarding the school board election and related issues. A company named B&R Associates, which is not a registered corporation in the State of Missouri, was phoning city residents over several days and asking questions in such a way as to elicit positive answers about charter schools, school choice via the use of vouchers, and providing favorable quotes concerning the three school board candidates who are former Teach for America corps members and charter school proponents, Adam Layne, Tracee Miller, and Daniel McCready.  The push poll also asked about support for a mayor appointed school board.  One person called referred to the poll as a phone survey and reported, “The survey definitely wanted me to say that I was in favor of vouchers and "school choice." Polls with questions which slant potential answers are not taken to collect data.  They are administered to form opinions.  The question about appointed boards gave away one of the sources.  Appointed boards are highly favored by former Washington University Chancellor Dr. William Danforth, who previously served as the settlement coordinator for the St. Louis Desegregation case and chair of the appointed task force which recommended the state takeover of the SLPS in 2006. Dr. Danforth will never concede the return of the elected board to governance. Additionally, the Watch has learned that former Teach for America corps member and State Director of Policy for the Sinquefield funded Children’s Education Alliance of Missouri, Katie Casas, representing a new group funded by Sinquefield and the Danforth Group has been interviewing school board candidates attempting to get them to support charter school expansion in the city in exchange for their endorsement. Casas left CEAM in 2018 to form her own Jefferson City  lobbying firm, Nexus Group. With the impending return of the elected board, charter school interests see an opportunity to take over the elected school board to further their agenda.  Between now and April 2, money will flow to these candidates. It is incumbent on citizens who support SLPS rather than charter school expansion to be alert to the infusion of money and how it will impact the campaign. The three Teach for American candidates are all from out of state and have lived in St. Louis for less than 10 years.  They are all young and do not have children of their own. But they all have backgrounds in the growing private not for profit education sector of our national economy which is being funded by people like Bill Gates, the Waltons, and the Kochs, nationally among many others and Rex Sinquefield and the Danforths locally. These three candidates represent the interests of those who promote the privatization of public education. It would be a tragedy if any of them are elected to our soon to be empowered school board. The Watch usually waits to editorialize about school board candidates until after publishing their questionnaire responses.  But the campaign activity that has already taken place warrants this early alert. Link to another update and the candidates' responses to Susan's survey can be found here.