Publications and Press

As a school board member representing the school where Ruby Bridges integrated, the 69th Anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education takes on special significance for our work. This anniversary is an ideal time to reflect on decisions school board members like us make every day — those that seem mundane but crucial like approving budgets and evaluating the superintendent, and those that are framed as controversial, like approving curriculum, book banning, critical race theory, gender neutral restrooms, and parental rights. It may seem like controversial culture war issues are a new phenomenon, but in reality they are simply a continuation of culture wars that have persisted for decades — a modern reawakening of oppressive ideology that ebbs and flows across the decades — sometimes more hidden and sometimes more explicit like the current moment. Instead of avoiding these culture wars, we have a golden opportunity right now to bring about positive, systemic change by facing these issues head on and doing away with policies that reinforce inequality, racism and unacceptable student outcomes.

Elected school boards need a complete transformation if we are going to provide our nation’s children with the education they deserve. That transformation must occur in three areas: people, power and professionalization. Our students need the right people on school boards who are representative of the community they serve. Those people need to use their power to dismantle systematic barriers for students. And that power will be enhanced by the professionalization of school boards, with rigorous training, tools, and support to effect change.