by James A. Bacon
Virginia’s public-school districts are fracturing along the same lines of the culture war as the rest of American society. Four school districts have pulled out of the Virginia School Board Association (VSBA) on the grounds that the training and advocacy supplied by the 118-year-old organization does not reflect their values. The board of a fifth school district, Hanover County, is considering doing the same.
“They lobby for many things that I, on principle, stand against,” Orange County school board member Darlene Dawson told Radio IQ. “If you try to disagree with them, they will shut you down. I’ve seen it happen. I’ve listened to recordings where they mock our governor and anyone who holds a conservative viewpoint, which I’ve been very clear that I do.”
The School Board Member Alliance of Virginia (SBMAV) has emerged as a potential competitor to the VSBA. According to The Virginia Mercury, the association represents one-tenth of Virginia’s school board members. Unlike the VSBA, whose members are school districts, the Alliance offers individual memberships.
The mainstream media coverage is vague about the specific issues that school board members in smaller districts are upset about. As a generality, the VSBA is dominated by larger school districts that advocate liberal/left policies antithetical to the values of smaller districts with more conservative populations. Articles allude to parental rights, the teaching of “divisive concepts,” transgender policy, DEI, and other issues that Governor Glenn Youngkin has tackled.
Warren County Board Member Ralph Rinaldi also raised the issue of school discipline during a Sept. 6 vote to leave the VSBA.
The Alliance lists the following in its mission statement:
- Priority of Traditional Academics: SBMA holds the belief that traditional academics should be a primary focus in Virginia’s K-12 education system. We advocate for an educational framework that emphasizes core academic disciplines.
- Parental Rights in Education: We firmly believe that parents have essential rights regarding their children’s education. SBMA supports and promotes the involvement and decision-making authority of parents in educational matters.
- Educational Freedom for Families: SBMA is committed to supporting educational freedom, offering Virginia families the liberty to choose the best educational paths for their children.
- Meritocracy: We believe in meritocracy, advocating for a system where effort and talent are recognized and rewarded, ensuring fair and equal opportunities for all students.
- Transparent Governance: SBMA stands for transparent governance in educational institutions and policies, promoting openness and accountability in all our dealings.
- Fiscal Accountability and Oversight: We are dedicated to fiscal accountability and oversight, ensuring that resources are managed wisely and effectively for the betterment of educational outcomes.
In the past, Virginia’s educational lobbies have been aligned with the political left. Most famously, the Virginia Education Association has been a force for embedding “progressive” priorities in schools: advocating for racial and gender “equity,” rewriting curricula, relaxing academic standards, and ditching traditional disciplinary practices in favor of social-emotional learning. Less well known, the Virginia School Superintendents Association, which is dominated by large left-leaning school districts, has pursued a similar agenda.
The mission statement of the Virginia School Board Association states that one of its three main goals is “taking a leadership role in education reform.” But there is little information available on its website on the specifics of what “education reform” looks like. In reading the group’s annual report, you get the sense of an enormous amount of legislative activity taking place without any idea of the positions that the VSBA has lobbied for.
Professional educators skew left philosophically and politically. As the old guard with more traditional values retires, it is being replaced by a younger generation graduating from Virginia’s uber-woke schools of education. The leftward drift within the profession may be accelerating. But elected school board members, coming from the community, have not drunk the Kool-Ade.
The difficulty in challenging orthodoxy is that parents unhappy with their local schools tend to be untutored in the complex legal, regulatory, budgeting and bureaucratic processes in which the public school system is embedded. They have a long climb up the learning curve, and they can come off as naive, if not downright ignorant, about how the system works.
The creation of the School Board Member Alliance of Virginia is a potential game-changer. The Alliance can provide a resource for newly elected school board members to hone their knowledge and, thereby, become more effective advocates of their values.