PCE wants pro voucher State School Board candidates by Thursday for flawed elections, and UEA "monopolizes" the caucus??

Parents for Choice in Education (PCE) appealed to supporters today to file and run for the State School Board. They realize informed advocates of public education on the board often intelligently oppose PCE initiatives to weaken public education and want a majority of sympathetic votes.

The Parents for Choice in Education PAC operates on extremely large out-of-state donations from anti-public ed. organizations and individuals. They literally have no grassroots financial support in Utah. They reported over $209,000 dollars sitting in their PAC account on their August 2011 report, which is the most recent posted at the Lt. Governor's website. This money came from large donations in the election years of 2010 and 2008. (The state switched systems in 2008, and the reports showing the millions of out-of-state money received during the voucher fight in 2007 and the systematic support of pro-voucher candidates in 2004 and 2006 do not show up. I know there's some way to link to the old system. I would be grateful if anyone could post a link in the comments.)

The PCE PAC received $179,000 in 2010. $4000 was from the Conservative Caucus of Utah politicians; the other $175,000 came from two national anti-public education organzations: All Children Matter, founded by the DeVos and Walton families, and The American Federation for Children, a new group (with the same founding board as the National Alliance for school Choice) founded by the same people apparently to avoid the bad publicity from All Children Matter being fined $5.2 million for hidden illegal campaign contributions in Ohio. (It looks like PCE was one of the final recipients of All Children Matter funds before it became defunct) The AFC is apparently also closely affiliated with ALEC and its proscriptive model bills to weaken public education. In 2008, the PAC received just over $342,000. $175,000 came from All Children Matter; $164,000 came from Patrick Bryne, the Overstock.com CEO who contributed millions in 2007 to the voucher campaign and continues as one of the only 3 sponsors of Howard Stephenson's Red Meat Radio program; the other $3424 was donated by the Board Members of PCE.

PCE has poured tens of thousands into State School Board elections before, and appears to be ready to enter the fray this year again. They are looking for candidates in all districts having an election this year: 1, 4, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, and 15. Here is part of PCE's plea:

Dear School Choice Supporter,

If we want to empower parents with quality school choice options, both public and private, we absolutely must recruit like-minded candidates for the State Board of Education. The innovation and reform necessary to improve our public school system will require a majority of supportive board members - something we currently do not have. This upcoming election provides us with a rare opportunity to change this!

We urge you to please consider becoming a candidate for fthe Utah State Board of Education. If, we ask you to help us recruit good candidates to run for the 9 spots up for election this year.

We need committed individuals to serve who understand how critical it is that we find solutions for an outdated public school system that will better meet the diverse learning needs of our students. 21st century innovation has the power to transform our one-size-fits-all system. The State Board of Education and the legislature have the most direct influence on our state's K-12 education. We can't expect change unless we are willing to get involved!

The whole process for State School Board elections is literally run by special interests, as a committee of industry lobbyists and then the governor get to select which candidates the public gets to vote on in this non-partisan election. This is detailed here, here (with more links to the 2008 vote), and here. (Gov. Herbert has expressed his desire for an open election, but the latest in many attempts to un-rig the elections, HB 331, appears to have had a weird provision for the primary date, increasing costs, and was killed by the House Education Committee without a hearing)

In 2008, there were shenanigans in my State School Board district 13, where the election winner resigned the day the election was certified because he suddenly "discovered" that he didn't live in the district, ensuring that the BYU Education professor who would have otherwise been eligible to contest the seat had no opportunity. The erstwhile winner, C. Mark Openshaw refused to answer opinion surveys and emails while campaigning, literally putting up no signs and making no campaign appearances. His family's blog said he didn't even want to win!

It appears Mr. Openshaw is running again from the state candidate website (Scroll to the bottom), and unopposed, though his paperwork is not linked like the others as of this moment. What kind of school board member was he the last 4 years? I have no idea. Maybe I would actually love his representation on the board, but I have no easy way of knowing. I saw his name mentioned one time in the paper with a lukewarm comment about the upcoming school grading system. The State School Board needs to get some sort of public vote display up on their website showing official votes of each individual on proposals. That would be positive all around and give voters better information on which to base their votes.

Two of the districts, 10 and 12, have no candidates filed today, two days before the deadline. The positive thing is that if only two candidates file for a district race, they get to completely avoid the flawed lobbyist selection board and governor narrowing. The scary thought is that some of these candidates might run unopposed. Who will sign up for an automatic State School Board seat on Thursday afternoon? We'll see how it shakes out.

PCE also encouraged supporters to run for delegates at the caucus with this comment:

The teacher's union works hard to monopolize the caucus system, ensuring their powerful stronghold and dominance over our taxpayer-funded, public school system. YOU can make sure this doesn't happen! Get involved in the legislative process and become a Delegate.

After years of barely fighting off destructive voucher proposals and other bad policy, I only wish public education supporters had more "dominance" PCE. I only wish. If more teachers would run and become delegates, maybe we could get support for more legislators in Utah Valley who value public education like the silent majority does. Our "taxpayer-funded, public school system" needs to continue to serve the public, not the whims of out-of-state multi-millionaires.

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"Boxcar bills" waiting until the last two weeks to start big education budget battles

I've been torn lately -- so much going on at the legislature and so little time to write about it. The small government loving Utah legislature has proposed 109 bills related to education for the 2011 legislative session. That is not counting the 19 abandoned bills at the bottom of the page or other education related bills not labeled as such like Rep. Draxler's bill HB 25 using "excess" oil and gas taxes to create "petroleum literacy" materials for elementary schools.

There are also numerous "boxcar" bills (meaning they have a name and a number, but the sponsor has not chosen to allow anyone to read the text of the bill yet with only 2 1/2 weeks remaining of the session ) sitting like timebombs, waiting to be sprung onto the floor "under suspension of the rules," which means they can be rapidly debated on the floor with no committee hearing to allow public comment and which also prevents the public and legislators alike from having time to read and understand the bill before it gets voted on. Some of these bills I've been watching finally received text on Monday, Feb. 21, Presidents Day.

There are multiple final education budget battles looming as likely candidates for last minute shenanigans, including again stealing locally voted funds for charter schools, de facto vouchers as "backpack" funding, funding for reading programs for K-2, actually funding growth instead of just moving funds around and claiming to fund new students, or completely removing the ability for local districts to raise taxes while increasing the sales tax on food, which is of course controlled and distributed by the state legislature. Watch Howard Stephenson who has a history of anti-education last-minute tactics and also has a bill tucked away intended to make school board elections partisan. Rep. Merlynn Newbold is his frequent partner in crime, initiating Stephenson's ideas as bills in the House -- like HB 313, an empty boxcar bill replacing the Charter School Finance Amendments bill Stephenson abandoned -- so it isn't as obvious how much Senator Stephenson is single-handedly manipulating education policy in Utah.

Here are some doozies to watch out for. These are all boxcar bills as of Feb. 21 if they are listed, unless I explain when the bill was made public next to the item on the list. You can sign up at the bottom of each link to receive email updates if and when these bills become active. Notice how many have vague titles about "amendments" and "modifications" which lets the legislator stick in anything they want at the last minute.

H.B. 65 Public School Funding -- Harper, W. Received text last week. Financial mumbo-jumbo that would usurp some local taxing control.
H.B. 123 K-12 Education Amendments -- Sumsion, K. Received text yesterday. This bill would totally change the whole basis of how the state distributes education funding, likely giving more to charter schools. It would also shorten terms for school board members. No big deal to hold it until the end.
H.B. 145 Education Amendments -- Eliason, S.
H.B. 151 Compulsory Education Amendments -- Briscoe, J. Received text last week. Would make kindergarten non-optional.
H.B. 290 Public School Transportation Amendments -- Wimmer, C.
H.B. 301 School District Property Tax Revisions -- Newbold, M. Received text last week. Another example of the legislature taking away local tax control and giving the power to themselves.
H.B. 302 Reading Program Amendments -- Newbold, M.
H.B. 307 Public Broadcasting Funding -- Herrod, C. Though Chris Vanocur has already revealed the liberal plot on this one.
H.B. 313 Charter School Funding Amendments -- Newbold, M.
H.B. 339 Charter School Enrollment Amendments -- Hutchings, E.
H.B. 346 Provisional Teaching Modifications -- Herrod, C.
H.B. 377 Higher Education Textbook Fairness Act -- Cox, F. Aimed at specific companies or increasing conservative leaning texts?
H.B. 388 Financial Oversight of Charter Schools -- Herrod, C.
H.B. 426 Education Funding Amendments -- Pitcher, D.
H.B. 427 Education Modifications -- Newbold, M.
H.B. 443 School Business Administrator Amendments -- Richardson, H.
H.B. 447 Modifications to Education -- Dee, B.
H.B. 455 Land Exchange Distribution Account Amendments -- Noel, M. Presumably related to this dust-up over HB 98 where Noel wants to further remove local control from counties. (Click on the Floor Debate audio file to hear his rant) Related to HB 400 yet another boxcar which Rolly references?
H.B. 464 State-Supported Voted Leeway Program Amendments -- Briscoe, J.
S.B. 4 Current School Year Supplemental Minimum School Program Budget Adjustments -- Buttars, D. C.
S.B. 78 Public School Early Graduation Counseling -- Buttars, D. C. Received text yesterday. Actually seems like an easy, good idea rather than eliminating 12th grade.
S.B. 163 School Restructuring -- Stephenson, H. Stephenson bragged on his radio show that this bill is intended to close down a set number of schools each year. No need to consult the teachers on this one, let alone the parents. Great candidate for a rushed debate.
S.B. 210 Utah Postsecondary Proprietary School Act Amendments -- Bramble, C. Received text yesterday. One of two or three bills Bramble is running about the regulation and taxation of private schools and training programs. I have no idea what these bills will do, but I smell a tax break for "economic development."
S.B. 217 Education Policy Amendments -- Bramble, C.
S.B. 224 Partisan School Board Elections -- Stephenson, H. Of course a "school board elections" bill run by the chair of the Senate Education Committee was not labeled education. Easy to miss this one.
S.B. 227 Student Based Funding for Public Education -- Liljenquist, D. "Backpack" funding. The PCE and charter lobbyists will hit hard for these pseudo-vouchers when this bill is unveiled in the near future.
S.B. 241 Tuition Waiver Amendments -- Hinkins, D.
S.B. 245 Higher Education Tuition Revisions -- Valentine, J.
S.B. 256 Teacher Effectiveness Evaluation Process -- Adams, J. S.
S.B. 263 State Board of Education Powers Amendments -- Buttars, D. C.
S.B. 265 State Charter School Board Modifications -- Madsen, M. Unnecessary due to SB 140?
S.B. 278 School District Modifications -- Bramble, C.
S.B. 292 Private Institutions of Higher Education -- Valentine, J.
S.B. 304 Bullying Amendments -- Okerlund, R.
S.B. 305 Economic Development Through Education / Career Alignment -- Stephenson, H. Stephenson's 2.5 to 8 million dollar career web app and chat room that will convince undergrads not to be dance majors. And of course, IBM developed this one-of-a-kind software prototype at his request (meaning no private company has seen promise in making a for-profit chat room developed around career information easily searchable for free already), but Senator Stephenson "doesn't know" if they would win a bid for this service. We have seen this before.
S.B. 316 Disclosure of State and Institutional Trust Lands Information -- Niederhauser, W.

I am 99% sure I have missed some boxcars or recently posted bills, but here are at least 36 education-related bills which have either not been posted for public viewing or only received their text in the last week. These last two weeks could get even uglier for education in what is already the worst session in recent memory...

SJR 1, SJR 9, HJR 15...Three different ways to give GOP leadership more control over education, but is the end game really partisan school boards?

Using the permanent, significant process of amending the state constitution to achieve temporary, political ends would normally be something conservative Republicans would oppose, but if involves giving them more control, especially over public education which they have made abundantly clear this session that they hate, their standards become more flexible.

Utah Republicans have proposed three different conflicting constitutional amendments this year. If they pass both the Utah Senate and the Utah House by a 2/3 majority vote, they will go on the ballot in 2012 for the public to vote on the changes. I don't believe Governor Herbert can veto proposals for constitutional amendments, but I am not 100% sure about that.

SJR 1 Joint Resolution on State Board of Education Authority, Senator Chris Buttars
This proposed constitutional amendment would give the state legislature control over curriculum in answer to supposed socialist teachings and law breaking by schools. Click on the link and then listen to the audio recording of the Jan. 26 committee hearing to hear the claims. This has already passed a vote in the Senate Education Committee.

SJR 9 Joint Resolution - Governance of Public and Higher Education, Senator Stuart Reid
This proposed constitutional amendment would give the governor "CEO" power over both K-12 and Higher Ed. for the entire state, including the ability to dissolve the State Board of Education or eliminate the position of state superintendent. Governor Herbert knew nothing about this proposed amendment until after the session started. The sponsor, Stuart Reid, does not know what effect this change would have on the large system of educational governance in both systems. He and Senator Stephenson speculated in committee that they could pass the amendment and then figure out a bunch of laws they will need to change afterward. Once again, this proposal has already passed a Senate Education Committee vote and the audio of the justification can be found at the above web page for the bill.

Governor Herbert opposes both of these proposals, saying the current system of governance by the State School Board "is actually working pretty well" and that the legislature would just become "a super school board of 104 personalities." (Two more stories on the proposed amendments and committee debate: The Trib and Channel 4.)

HJR 15 Joint Resolution Amending State Board of Education Provisions, Representative Chris Herrod
This proposed constitutional amendment would eliminate public elections of the State School Board. School board members and the state superintendent would instead be appointed by the governor "with the advice and consent of the Senate." This amendment was sent to the House Rules Committee Friday afternoon and has not yet been discussed. It will likely be sent to the House Education Committee next week. Keep an eye on the "Bill status/Votes" link on the bill's web page or subscribe to receive updates at the bottom of the page. You can listen to the committee debate live or after the fact.

If the legislature had an excellent plan, an optimal alternative to the current structure and authority of the State School Board that they thought was important enough to change the constitution rather than just tweak a law, there would have been one proposed amendment with a compelling reason for its existence. Instead, three conflicting amendments have been thrown against the wall to see what sticks.

What is the common thread between the proposed amendments? These three amendments propose three different ways to put politicians directly in charge of education. I think the desire to gain control over the check and balance of an independently elected State School Board is plain. The board strenuously opposed private school vouchers in 2007 and has often opposed other pet GOP leadership proposals since. Sen. Hillyard asked the cogent question to Sen. Reid whether he would be proposing the amendment if the governor were a Democrat. Reid replied "Absolutely," but do you believe that?

I have commented before that the public trusts educators much, much more than politicians. This may not be true of the Eagle Forum echo chamber that sees public education as a socialist plot to "bring down America," but they don't represent close to the majority of public opinion, even in Utah.

So I'm not completely surprised legislators would attempt any of these power shifts, but I don't see any of them as likely to pass a public vote. Why the glut of huge changes now? I don't know how coordinated these amendment proposals may have been, but there is at least a plan to take advantage of the fear they are generating. On Red Meat Radio today, State Superintendent Shumway was interviewed again and asked about the proposals, including the possibility of the State Board or Superintendent being eliminated. At the end of the discussion, Senator Stephenson pushed Shumway to state whether he would prefer the State School Board being eliminated or elected in a partisan election with Republican and Democrat candidates voted on in political conventions. Shumway was badgered into saying he thought both were bad ideas, but he would prefer a partisan election to complete elimination of the State School Board.

Was this the dry run for the line of reasoning that will be used in committee? Partisan school board elections will be the "good cop" after the "bad cop" threats of complete overhauls of the education system via constitutional amendment?

Running state and/or local school board elections through party conventions will basically accomplish the same goals of the three amendments. Vouchers failed statewide, even among Republicans, but state and county Republican delegates as a group share many more of the antagonistic views toward public education held by Sens. Stephenson, Buttars, Dayton, etc. The highly conservative candidates vetted in the Republican conventions would automatically win 90%+ of their general races simply by virtue of the R before their name. Within two election cycles, the State Board of Education would be taken over by candidates who do not represent the common views of Utah citizens. The legislature could run extreme ideas such as vouchers, converting traditional public schools to charter schools, and drastic budget cuts, and be able to tell people "the State School Board supports our proposal."

I've already shared my opinion about partisan school board elections and some excellent links to arguments for and against. (Further clear discussion at Utah Moms Care.) If the threat of a partisan school board election bill amendment doesn't happen as detailed in the post, Senator Stephenson has a bill of his own in waiting titled "Partisan School Board Elections."

Utahns overwhelmingly oppose partisan state and local school board elections by 66% and 72% counts. The legislative leadership has demonstrated they don't care about that, vouchers being only the most obvious example of knowingly pushing their ideology over the will of their constituents, and they know they won't suffer any repercussions at the ballot box after emerging largely unscathed from their voucher defeat.

I am worried. Really worried. The legislature has spent the first week of the session on an all out offensive against public education and they have more in mind than just insults. Follow these important education bills and contact your legislators. Encourage other constituents to contact them with a voice of reason about public ed. as well. Public education is vulnerable and strained to the breaking point already. Don't let it be turned into a political football based on rigid ideology rather than concern for kids.

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Two different viewpoints on the Republican proposal to make school board elections partisan...plus mine of course

Currently, local school board elections are non-partisan and open to any eligible resident of the school board's boundaries to run for office.

The current system of electing members to the Utah State Board of Education is broken. It's not even strictly an "elected" position. A "nominating committee" of appointed individuals and legislatively mandated to be half-composed of "industry interests" (i.e. lobbyists. And no, I'm not kidding.) screens potential candidates in any state school board district where more than three candidates file to run for office. They meet and then eliminate any candidates they want based on whatever criteria they want, provided they leave at least three. The governor then selects two of the three (or more) candidates from those chosen by the nominating committee, or two of three from a district where exactly three people filed. Those two candidates are then the only people allowed to appear on the ballot. There is no independent mechanism for a candidate to run for this public office. Someone could run as a write-in, and even then you have to "file" as a write-in candidate which makes no sense to me, but that person would have no chance at actually being elected except in some set of very, very peculiar circumstances. The public can only vote for two candidates pre-screened by an appointed committee and the governor.

The process makes no sense, and Governor Herbert, to his credit, has said the confusing process should be reformed. (Though he also didn't endorse a plain old election...) The obvious and fair solution in my opinion is to make the state school board races just like any other non-partisan race. Interested and eligible citizens run for office, and the people vote. There will be a bill run this session to do just that, change the state school board elections to a normal election. Certain Republican legislators plan on amending the bill on the floor to change the state school board election, and possibly even local school board elections, to partisan elections like those for the legislature. This exact same process happened in 2009, with the partisan amendment failing on the House floor while the "normal" election bill passed. However, five unsurprising state senators voted the bill down in committee. (Bramble, Dayton, Hillyard, Jenkins, Stephenson)

I mentioned my opposition to partisan school board elections in a recent post addressing Senator Buttars' proposal to amend the Utah State Constitution to give the legislature control over curriculum. Oak Norton and I discussed various points in the comments, and he linked to his post on why the state needs partisan school board elections.

Tom Gregory, the former State School Board member from my district, also chimed in on the proposal today, voicing his strong opposition to a partisan school board election. Among his reasons, he mentioned his conversations with state school board members from the few states that feature partisan school board elections.

So my bias is obvious. Here are two more sets. I think seeing the reasoning and contrast of both positions is valuable and will be useful to those evaluating the proposal.

We SHOULD make school board elections partisan -- Oak Norton

We SHOULD NOT make school board elections partisan -- Tom Gregory

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Willful ignorance and fear about public education PART 2: Senator Buttars' constitutional amendment to give the legislature control over curriculum

 

Senator Chris Buttars literally believes that public education in Utah has been subverted to promote socialism/communism/anything not in agreement with the political views of Oak Norton. His solution is to make a subtle change in the state constitution. Buttars' SJR 1, proposed amendment to the Utah State Constitution. More after the quotes from the news report on his part at the Eagle Forum convention in Salt Lake City.

http://www.fox13now.com/news/kstu-buttars-vs-school-boards,0,2924086.story?track=rss

"We're in big trouble in our public education system. I didn't realize how much until a month ago when I was asked to chair public education appropriations," said Buttars. "We met and when we got done we were all so terrified we couldn't believe it. This was right under our nose."

Buttars' positition as the chair of the Public Education Committee means he has the power to make this plan a reality.

"Socialists have found that the best way to change a country is not by a revolution," said parent and Eagle Forum panelist Susie Schnell. "Teach children the concepts at a very young age so by the time they're ready to vote they'll vote for the right candidates. Hence, Democratic Socialism."

Panelist Oak Norton refers to Kleon Skousen's 1961 book The Naked Communist.

"In that book he lists 45 goals of the Communists," said Norton. "One of them is to get control of the schools. Soften the curriculum. Put the party line in textbooks."

These party lines, Norton says, are things like global warming, gay rights, and teaching students to question absolutes.

"By accepting that, there's no God because he deals in absolutes," said Buttars. "This is an entire program to bring America down and I want to tell you right now it's well entrenched in Utah."

Schnell and Norton have been on a crusade for over a year, claiming that the Alpine School District in Utah County and BYU are secretly promoting socialism. The viewpoint and the evidence it is based on is stupid. There is no other way to put it.

I think Norton can make legitimate complaints about whether the school board listens like any government body, but the political and religious backing for the socialism charges is stupid and offensive.

Politically, they told the school board that Cleon Skousen's The 5,000 Year Leap and The Making of America would be acceptable curriculum materials. Skousen was not a true historian and his books are political views poorly supported by history rather than history. (I have read both of those books--well parts of the huge Making of America-- and actually agree with many of Skousen's larger points, but he is not a credible person to me on many levels and I disagree with his pseudo-scholarly method of trying to assign credibility to his views. Using his other book as evidence of the "Communist plot" is not compelling evidence.) I would be the angry parent at the school board meeting if a public school were basing curriculum off of Skousen. It is ironic that the people claiming the schools are pushing political viewpoints are the ones actually attempting to get the schools to teach their political views.

Religiously, teaching students that academically they have must have evidence to back up their claims or to fully evaluate both sides of an issue is not teaching them there is no God. Stuff like this only perpetuates a stereotype of Utah County voters not being critical thinkers. Teaching students the current scientific view of evolution is only beneficial to them, even though that socialist BYU Department of Science supports that teaching. Cleon Skousen has also published more false Mormon doctrine that I am aware of than the BYU School of Education. That doesn't mean supporters of his political views also subscribe to his doctrinal mishaps any more than agreeing with John Goodlad that good public education is crucial to our democracy and Republic means BYU and Alpine District endorse every other view Goodlad has ever held.

I've held off from publishing my strong views on the issue, but now they've convinced the head of the Senate Public Education Appropriations committee of their foolishness. Now all of the schools of the state stand accused of secret socialism. It reminds me of when Senator Dayton claimed the International Baccalaureate program was an "anti-American" U.N. plot based on information from the Eagle Forum and Cherilyn Bacon Eagar (Not a coincidence that Eagar is quoted in the 2nd Alpine District link above claiming the whole curriculum is "leftist"). Both of these non-issues are falsehoods based on political ideology and fear rather than fact.

The Utah State Constitution was written so that the State Board of Education has "general control and supervision" of public education, including curriculum, and NOT the political legislature. Based on anecdotal stories from Norton, Schnell, and I'm sure others, Buttars wants to give all that power to the state legislature, which hates big government intrusion except when they are the ones hypocritically intruding. It's SJR 1, a proposal to add only four words to the state constitution. The best way to get a quick explanation is to watch the two minute video at the top of the post.

Another proposal, not numbered and made public yet so I can link it, is the repeated suggestion to make the State School Board a partisan election with the goal of getting candidates elected only after being vetted by the state Republican convention.

Do I perfectly trust any elected official or body, including the state or local school board? No. Do I trust school boards elected in non-partisan, local elections 1000% over the often willfully misinformed and politically vindictive state legislature? Emphatic yes.

Go online and read the state core curriculum, helpfully divided by subject and grade level. Notice the lack of coded socialism. Then contact your state legislator and speak out against both of these proposals. Contact your local school board about an issue you care about and attend a meeting. Enjoy local, non-partisan government and make any earnest proposal to improve it. Do some research and please don't run to the state legislature to override any local decision you disagree with.

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Willful ignorance and fear about public education PART 1: The Common Core

I had first planned this post because of a comment on the Utah Moms Care blog last week. This blog has regularly posted rational, succinct (much, much more succinct than I ever manage) information about education issues along with its other material. The post on Jan. 13 dealt with misperceptions of the new “Common Core” math and English curriculum being adopted by Utah and 30 or 40 other states. I can actually understand the mistaken impression that this is some federally mandated curriculum—it’s not—and Karen of Utah Moms Care simply explains what the core is and isn’t, notably providing links to support her explanations. She supports the core in relatively mild language.

Now, I think there are very understandable reasons to be more hesitant about the common core than Karen. It’s claimed they are more rigorous in English than Utah’s current standards and about the same as math. (This rating was by the Fordham Institute, a politically conservative, education policy advocacy group that supports school testing, vouchers, etc. So I take their ratings more skeptically than most, but it can’t be claimed the rating was biased by “liberal teachers unions” or something like that.) I have read large parts of the middle grade core for both and think the claims are overblown.

There are some excellent lesson plans and supporting material for the English side, and it raises the bar on how high of a “lexile score” (one way of measuring reading comprehension) is expected in each grade, but the actual changes in what is taught are not drastic. I think it will be a positive, but not extremely noticeable change. It remains to be seen if the higher lexile expectations are a good stretch or an unrealistic overreach.

The math core drives me crazy. It supposedly isn’t any more rigorous than the current core, but it requires huge changes for students and work for teachers for no real benefit. Some concepts will be required to be taught a grade earlier in elementary school. I think this is minor, but the benefits are highly debatable. The big thing to me is that it changes later math courses from algebra, algebra II, geometry, etc. to Math 8, Math 9, Math 10, etc. with elements from all of those courses integrated in a new order. I personally disagree with the comments of the school board member in this article describing the changes. I think breaking down the content of the traditional math courses into smaller pieces and mixing them will more confusing for students both as they learn from week to week, and in terms of defining what they have learned. “I learned Math 8 which is a mix of some algebra and geometry” is not a clear achievement. I know many students have very different experiences with algebra and geometry, often understanding one group of concepts better than the other. I did. They will receive less immediate repetition in the skills, and remediation will be doubly as hard as new teachers or schools try to figure out the specifics of what a student doesn’t understand. I would rather my kids take the traditional classes. I think there will be some justifiable major pushback from teachers, parents, and students as the planning continues for this.

So well and good. I have some concerns about the new curriculum based on their academic impact. But the negative commenter on the Utah Moms Care blog was bizarrely unconcerned with any of the issues I raised.

Anonymous said...
With all due respect, I believe you are off base with your understanding of common core standards. States will not be able to opt out of these standards. Standards must be adhered to 100%--no addition to curriculum or deletion. Students are taught to a standard vs standards being taught to students.

You, as a state, will have NO voice to any curriculum you find objectionable. The 10th Amendment gives the authority to EACH state to set educational policy for THAT state. Utah is giving up that right to educate her children.

How can you sign on to standards WHEN THEY HAVEN'T EVEN BEEN DEVELOPED? You don't even know what you have signed onto! Would you pay for a kitchen remodeling before you had the plans? Of course not! You would be throwing your money into a black hole! You would be irresponsible for giving money and control to a contractor with no plan; so are legislatures that are making these educational decisions without due diligence.

Why are you supporting signing onto to standards that are unknown and the people or organizations (who knows?) are determining what your children are learning! Again, with all due respect, this is foolish.

You may not want to use this comment. So be it. You must learn more about common core standards. They are deadly to students. They will not help educational progress.
January 13, 2011 6:35 PM

I almost imitated the commenter by starting “”With all due respect,” but I cannot honestly say I respect the reasoning of this comment.

1. The two initial paragraphs about the state being unable to opt out or modify the curriculum are purposefully ignorant. And yes, I know I said earlier I can understand thinking this a “federal curriculum.” I meant that I can understand that mistake on first hearing the name “Common Core” and hearing that other states have adopted these standards. But the post provided links explaining that the core is voluntary, the commenter knows that no organization, even the federal government, has any authority to impose a mandatory curriculum on the state of Utah, and the crazy, inflammatory language is dead wrong about an easily verifiable claim. It reeks of mindlessly passing along a fearful email warning from the Eagle Forum, which is ironic since the commenter chides the blog and state for not researching on their own .

2A. The second false claim is even more blatantly incorrect and the commenter contradicts him/herself. The person uses capital letter shouting to claim the standards are “unknown” and haven’t even been developed yet. But the commenter concludes that the original blogger should learn more because the standards “are deadly to students” and “will not help educational progress.” How can you make that claim about supposedly non-existent standards??

2B. The original post included a link to the completely developed Common Core standards in the last paragraph. A bright red link in a 3-sentence paragraph at the end of a 500 word article. “You must learn more about common core standards” indeed.

3. In my opinion, this provincial, conspiracy theory, “public education is evil” mindset is harmful to the state and nation and is used for misleading political gain by many conservative politicians.

At the time, I attributed the comment some general anti-public ed. and common core sentiments expressed at the Eagle Forum convention last week. The Tribune gave us a stub saying some people were against the Common Core and public schools' “anti-family” agenda and quoted Senator Chris Buttars “We’re in big trouble in our public education system.” (I don't mean that as a cheap shot against the Trib. It's not like the Eagle Forum convention is major news. And notice that all of the above links about the Common Core are to the Trib. The Trib has always covered education more extensively, but The Deseret News doesn't even try since they fired half of their staff last year.) From the text and pictures in the article, Buttars was apparently getting much of his information from Susan Schnell and Oak Norton of “BYU and the Alpine District are secret socialists” fame, which was again ironic because of his quote a couple days earlier regarding the Common Core: “We’re dropping Utah’s moral and ethical standards in favor of a more national [set], and I don’t like it,” said Sen. Chris Buttars, R-West Jordan. He also said he was concerned that the new standards contain “code words for socialism.”

We’re apparently dropping our “moral and ethical” Utah standards tainted by BYU’s secret socialism to adopt national standards with “code words for socialism.”

I was originally going to make a joke about “critical thinking” and “research” apparently being these code words, but that is apparently too close to the truth. On to part 2.

Answer to previous post: Very blatantly. The committee illegally voted in secret to avoid scrutiny of the lockstep lobbyist block voting

Once again, I manage to be shocked at how openly political insiders and lobbyists hold the public in contempt.

Here is a link to the official page at the state website of the State Board Of Education Nominating And Recruiting Committee. (Link to separate post listing information as currently posted, for use when the committee or law change in the future.)

These twelve people get to vote and eliminate candidates from the ballot in the non-partisan races for the State Board of Education. In all other cases in the state, political parties may hold caucuses and conventions to winnow down official nominees from their private organizations, but any citizen is free to run for office independently. No other public political office that I know of is forbidden to members of the public unless approved by a screening committee--a screening committee by statute made up of 50% industry interests that submit names to be appointed by the governor. What if the Orem City mayor appointed a committee that questioned citizens of the city and only allowed those approved by the committee to run in the non-partisan races for city council? How many seconds until that process would be abused?

So the entire process assumes that the governor can appoint 12 people that can better decide on elected officials than the public. Today, an incumbent was eliminated and Kim Burningham--the former board chair and anti-voucher champion--managed to continue in the process "because he tied with two other hopefuls for getting the third-most committee votes for the District 5 seat." I want to see the votes to confirm my contention that these nominated lobbyists--who regularly support, seek support from, and intermingle with the Republican leadership--are voting en masse based on ideology.

But the nominating committee, a public body paid per diem for their duties, openly tried to shield itself from public accountability during its vote on Wednesday--it gave itself permission to vote secretly. A lawyer from the governor's office informed the committee that they had to put their names on the ballots, so they did that, but wouldn't show the public or the press who voted for who. Stan Lockhart, Micron lobbyist, husband of Republican House Whip Becky Lockhart, and the head of the state Republican Party when the voucher law was passed in 2007, is somehow supposed to represent the good of the voting public and is the person who suggested the secret ballot. I have underlined many of the weak justifications for a secret vote in the two articles below.

A quick run-down of the six "industry representatives":

Stan Lockhart -- Micron lobbyist and Republican partisan as outlined above
Tom Bingham -- President of the Utah Mining Association (I suspect most of this list has ties to the Utah Taxpayer's Association, but I know Kennecott is a high-paying client of Howard Stephenson's.)
Leland Hogan -- President of the Utah Farm Bureau
Chris Sloan -- 2009 President of the Utah Association of Realtors, the single most influential lobbying group in the state, current Chair of The Tooele County Republican Party
Richard Thorn -- The President of the Associated General Contractors of Utah
Jan Wells -- "Representing public utilities." I couldn't figure out who she was among several Jan Wells involved in Utah politics.

Do you see a pattern here? The "organizations representing each of the respective sectors" nominate their presidents/spokesmen/lobbyists and the governor appoints them. Past and present officials of the Republican Party are disproportionately represented. Does anyone not directly involved with these organizations feel these committee members adequately represent the public's interest in the governance of the public school system? I personally do not feel any teacher can represent me in terms of choosing who is qualified to receive my vote.

Natalie commented on my previous post that she believes Governor Herbert will be more thoughtful than governor Huntsman was narrowing the 3 candidates in each district (apparently 5 in Kim Burningham's district) down to 2 to appear on the ballot in November. I actually agree with her and was happy to read in the Trib article below that the governor supports changing the system. I urge Governor Herbert to give the public the chance to vote on Kim Burningham's retention on the State Board of Education and to speak out forcefully in support of primary elections for all candidates who wish to run. The committee could continue its candidate recruiting role as long as it's done in some sort of objective fashion, although I don't know that I see the need.

Here are the Deseret News and Tribune articles about what happened yesterday. I have underlined some of the text to emphasize it. My comments will be italicized in brackets.
The Deseret News article:

Governor's education commission opts for secret vote
Published: Wednesday, May 19, 2010 9:11 p.m. MDT

SALT LAKE CITY — Controversy is not a new thing for the governor's commission tasked with choosing candidates for the State Board of Education, and Wednesday night was no different when the committee opted for a secret ballot in the selection process.

The 12-person committee interviewed 29 candidates Monday with the names planned to be announced at 4 p.m. Wednesday. However, after almost an hour of debate, the commission decided to choose their nominations via secret ballot — an act which several commission members spoke out against, arguing that transparency is important in narrowing down the candidate pool. The State Board approves curriculum and policy for all the students and school districts statewide.

The commission is to choose a minimum of three candidates per district to forward to the governor who then whittles it down to two names for the November 2010 ballot. Districts in which there are three or fewer candidates are generally automatically forwarded to the governor.

The secret ballot procedure was the idea of Stan Lockhart, a commission member representing the technology field. Lockhart, who chaired the commission in 2004, said he was simply following previous procedure which abides by state law.

"It follows the law, and it follows precedent of what this committee has done in the past," Lockhart said.
[Lockhart claims this public body has voted secretly in the past. I only have direct knowledge of 2008. The voting was done publicly, at least at the meeting, and then put online by the Accountability Blog with commentary. I have not been able to find an official online record of those votes or past years. Can anyone help us out? Were past commission votes also done secretly? If they were public, are there any accessible records of those votes?]

Committee co-chairwoman Gayleen Gandy, a member of the Granite School Board, spoke against doing a secret ballot, saying it flies in the face of how political bodies should do business. "We are a public body," Gandy said. "We should be responsible for our votes."

Commission member Leland Hogan said he wanted a secret ballot so the public and news media couldn't ask about the members' choices.

Hogan said the commission needs to "keep integrity in the system. If you do not have a secret ballot, you won't be able to get anybody to serve on this committee again."

Without the secret ballot, Hogan said, commission members' choices "will be publicized — and that's not what this is all about. It's about giving names to the governor which will make the school system in Utah better."
[I as a person have failings...but how do you respect a comment like this? Seriously. I don't believe Hogan, the president of the Utah Farm Bureau Federation, would be OK with his city council making secret votes "just to make the city better." Or how about an appointed public lands commission making land use decisions affecting grazing via secret ballot "just to make the the land use system in Utah better?" This is blatant hypocrisy Mr. Hogan.]

The commission members debated the Utah Open and Public Meetings Act, some disputing that the commission constitutes a public body. The commission then voted to do a secret ballot and went into a closed session for an hour to discuss the candidates.

The commission then opened the meeting and proceeded with the secret ballot, writing their choices on pieces of paper to be tallied by the commission secretary.

Utah media attorney Jeff Hunt told the Desert News Wednesday night the law is clear that under the Utah Open Meetings Act, "secret voting is not allowed." Hunt added that the governor's commission is definitely considered a public body and "clearly covered under the Open Meetings Act."

Cheryl Phipps, State PTA Legislative vice president, who served two terms on the commission in previous years, said she believes the commission itself is "ridiculous." The voters need to be choosing who should be on the November ballot, she said. "Why don't we trust the voters?" Phipps said.

e-mail: astewart@desnews.com

TWITTER: AKStewDesNews

State Board of Education nominees

The governor’s commission nominated the following candidates Wednesday:

District 2 (Weber County area) Keith Buswell, Richard Favero, Monty Hardy

District 3 (Utah County area): Craig Coleman (incumbent), Burtis Bills, Clark Turner

District 5 (Davis County area): Nicole Toomey Davis, Diane Smith Cales, and tied, Ruland Gill, Lawrence Wright and Kim Burningham (incumbent)

District 6 (Northwest Salt Lake County area) Hank Bertoch, John Hohlbauch and Michael Jensen, (incumbent);

District 9 (Southwest Salt Lake County area): Joel Coleman, Milton Witt, Daniel Isham

District 10 (Murray area) Laurel Brown (incumbent);

District 14 (Eastern Utah): Dixie Allen (incumbent), Johny Thayne, Michael Miles

District 15 (Southern Utah) Tom Jett, Debra Roberts (incumbent) and Paul Terry.

© 2010 Deseret News Publishing Company | All rights reserved

And the Tribune article:

Committee ousts state school board incumbent

By Lisa Schencker

The Salt Lake Tribune
Updated: 05/19/2010 09:20:11 PM MDT

A governor-appointed committee ousted a state school board incumbent Wednesday evening, and the group did it by secret ballot.

The 12-member committee voted by secret ballot not to forward Denis Morrill's name to the governor for consideration to appear on the November ballot for a District 9 seat. Morrill, an attorney and businessman who has served on the board for 10 years, said Wednesday evening he wasn't surprised he lost his seat given the process.

"Those are basically charter school people on that committee, and they don't like me," Morrill said, explaining that he has been critical of charter schools in the past because he doesn't believe the state can "afford two school systems." "Experience isn't what they want. What they want is someone they can control."

He called the process by which state board candidates have to run for office "absolutely absurd from start to finish."

It's a process many say takes choice out of the public's hands, while others say it's the best way to get qualified people into office. Every two years when roughly half the state board seats open, the governor appoints a 12-member committee representing various education and business/industry interests to help recruit and narrow the field of candidates. The committee must choose at least three candidates for each seat to forward to the governor, who then chooses two candidates for each seat to appear on the ballot.

And this time, the group decided early in the meeting Wednesday to vote by secret ballot. But John Pearce, general counsel for the governor, later conveyed to them that they would have to write their names on the ballots. The Utah Open and Public Meetings Act requires minutes of open meetings contain, "a record, by individual member, of each vote taken by the public body," and the committee is required to vote in public.

The committee, however, refused to show those records of who voted for whom to The Salt Lake Tribune on Wednesday evening. Christine Kearl, the governor's education director, said members of the public will have to make formal open records request to see that information. Utah law indicates that, "Written minutes that have been prepared in a form awaiting only formal approval by the public body are a public record" and that "Written minutes shall be available to the public within a reasonable time after the end of the meeting."

The committee voted 9-2, by secret ballot, to vote for candidates by secret ballot. One member of the committee didn't vote on the issue.

Stan Lockhart, a committee member and former chairman of the Utah GOP, said he wanted the ballots to be secret because that's the way the committee had voted in the past. Committee co-chair and realtor Chris Sloan said he also believed that was the best way to go.

"That part of the process is something that goes back to the founding of our country" Sloan said. "The ability for someone to be able to express their vote unfettered is sacred."
[The comparison is ridiculous. Public officals--whether elected or appointed--being accountable to the public goes back to the founding of our country. Comparing those votes to our individual votes in the ballot booth is misleading. If public officials could vote in secret, that would take away the sacred ability of citizens to vote on their representation.]

"Some of us know some of the individuals in contention," Sloan added. "Our ability to either make or continue friendships and relationships shouldn't be a part of this thing."
[You volunteered or accepted your organization's and the governor's nomination to this undemocratic committee. The public's right to transparently see your influence on the candidate selection outweighs your desire to not feel uncomfortable. I believe you would raise hell if an appointed body dominated by Democrats tried to make their votes secret.]

Committee co-chair and Granite School Board vice president Gayleen Gandy, however, vehemently objected to the secret ballot.

"I believe we ought to be responsible for the names we put forward, and I believe that ought to be open and public," Gandy said.

Jeff Hunt, a Salt Lake First Amendment and media lawyer, said the Open and Public Meetings Act is pretty clear in prohibiting secret ballots.

"There still needs to be some accountability to the public, whether you're elected or not, if you're selected for a public body and doing the public's business," Hunt said. And Hunt said he doesn't see why the records of who voted for whom were not released publicly Wednesday night.

"I don't see any purpose in making the public or reporters wait five days to respond to a GRAMA [an open records request] to get information they should have been able to get just watching the open meeting and seeing people vote openly," he said.

Kim Burningham, a state board incumbent, called the secret balloting "ridiculous." The committee voted Wednesday to forward Burningham's name on to the governor because he tied with two other hopefuls for getting the third-most committee votes for the District 5 seat.

But Burningham said the whole process needs to change.

"I just think it all boils down to do you really want a highly charged political process to make the decision of who the public gets to vote on or should the public decide themselves? Clearly, the public should decide themselves," Burningham said.

During the process two years ago, the committee ousted two incumbents, including the then-state board chair.

Gov. Gary Herbert also would like to see the process changed, Kearl said.

Proponents of the process, however, say it's a way to make sure qualified people serve on the state board despite what can be a low-profile race. Before the mid-1990s, state board members were elected directly. But that, some say, led to even less interest in races than now and the election of unqualified board members.

Burningham called it "most unfortunate for an extremely competent, experienced member of the school board to be eliminated."

Morrill was beat by three other hopefuls, including two charter school founding board members and a young school custodian who wondered during a recent interview if districts could look at legal documentation of students as a way to reduce class sizes.

Gandy said she voted to forward all incumbents to the governor because she feels they should be held accountable by their constituents, not the committee. Sloan, however, said he voted not to advance Morrill because during the committee interviews Monday, "he touched on a lot of issues important to me but without the depth that gave me the confidence to support him."

Sloan said he didn't give preference to incumbents, instead voting only for those candidates he thought most fit.
[Most fit for what?? And decided by who?]

Five other incumbents including Dixie Allen, Craig Coleman, Michael Jensen, Laurel Brown and Debra Roberts will have their names forwarded on to the governor, either because they earned committee votes or because no more than two people filed to run against them.

How blatantly will the State Board of Education Nominating Committee thumb its nose at the public? Or will Kim Burningham get his today?

I don't have time for much. Utah Mom's Care had an excellent post on this a few days ago. The results of Monday's meeting and vote will be announced this afternoon.

Basically, Republican leadership can't keep it's theories straight on their opinions of Utah voters. In the case of the state school board, they're too stupid to vote unless there is an R(epublican) or D(emocrat) next to the name of a candidate, so we have to appoint a committee literally half made up of lobbyists (all the industry "rep's" are lobbyists appointed by the governor--people like Stan Lockhart, Micron lobbyist and head of the state GOP when they passed vouchers) to remove "unworthy" candidates from the ballot. In the case of vouchers, the public rejected them almost 2-1 because they were misinformed by evil teachers.

But when the ethics reform initiative didn't get enough signatures, that was because Utah voters are so smart and approved of the legislature's already passed reform. I think as the Utah Mom's Care post said--voter apathy enables this ridiculous, easily abused system. And in the last days of the ethics petition drive, there were still more people than not that had not heard of the initiative.

Here's an opinion piece by two Republican activists spelling out how the public is too dumb to vote without party affiliation, and the Tribune Editorial rightly stating that this system actually takes advantage of voter apathy for political gain rather than doing anything to make the final election between the chosen candidates more informed.

Sara Brate at the Accountability blog covered this bad process two years ago. Most revealingly, she put the candidate vote totals in an excel sheet for all to see. Notice that industry voter block that pushed the agenda. There were two incumbents pushed out by the vote of 6 people and shenanigans in my state school board district.

So Kim Burningham effectively represented the overwhelming majority of both Utahns and his district in the anti-voucher battle, infuriating Republican leadership. He fought hard on the ethics initiative, once again battling for things large majorities of Utahns want, but legislative and political party leadership abhor. Will he be taken off the ballot by 6 lobbyists? If so, I predict a short period of outrage from observers, and then no consequences. If only 2 legislators got taken out after the voucher debacle, and the bill to change this process couldn't get traction the last 2 years, nothing will happen now.

HB 150, restoring State School Board elections to a democratic process and eliminating the state nominating committee

After the farce of a process for choosing candidates for our State School Board elections last fall, HB 150 was proposed to change the process to a non-partisan primary and election just like most city councils, eliminating the nomination committee entirely. It was passed by the House yesterday with some split voting among Republicans. My county voted poorly. I think Steven Sandstrom, Francis Gibson, and Kenneth Sumsion were the only Utah County representatives to vote for the bill. Representatives Dougall, Frank, Fowlke, Daw, Lockhart, Steven Clark, Herrod, Grover, and Painter voted against the proposal, with Rep. Morley missing the vote.

The current members of the State Board unanimously supported the bill, even those members who were nominated through that process. Various Republicans tried to amend the bill to convert the State School Board elections into partisan elections with candidates run through party caucuses and conventions (Rep. Sumsion eventually voted for the unamended bill, but said partisan elections would provide information on candidates’ stands on sex education…) or argue that the current process was fair and effective. "Why fix things that aren't broken?" said Rep. Ron Bigelow, R-West Valley City. Thankfully, their attempts failed and the bill has moved on to the Senate.

Please contact your Senator and ask them to support this bill making the process of electing State School Board members more fair and open, rather than merely the gubernatorial appointments of committees and candidates posing as an “election.”

Especially contact the members of the Senate Education Committee (Click on this link and then the Committee Membership link on the left side), who will decide if the proposal will even get a floor debate and vote, and express your desire for fair elections. They meet tomorrow, Wed. Feb. 25, at 8:00 am. HB 150 is not currently on the agenda, but that may change. If not tomorrow, they will likely consider the bill next week. This common sense bill needs your support.

Results in State School Board District 13 and double-disenfranchisement shenanigans?

First, I was wrong in my prediction that vote totals for State School Board District 13 would be significantly lower than the 2004 election. The unofficial results (pg. 3, lefthand column) show just a few hundred fewer votes than the race in 2004. Kyle Bateman defeated C. Mark Openshaw with 17,509 votes. I hope the almost 300 votes not for either candidate on the ballot were mostly write-ins for A. LeGrand Richards, the highly-qualified BYU professor excluded from the ballot.

However, my frustration with the apathy and lack of communication demonstrated by Bateman and Openshaw, as well as the entire school board candidate selection process, has been confirmed by subsequent events. In a minor, but indicative Election Night note of the silly process that allowed seven businessmen not living in District 13 to choose our candidates, Openshaw confirmed my suspicions that the candidates represented the same viewpoints: "I know Kyle well," he said. "I like him. We agree on many things, and so I give him my full support." And in keeping with the theme of his successful campaign, it appears that Bateman was the only victorious candidate in Utah County who did not return the Daily Herald's phone call after winning election on November 4th.

But the Tribune yesterday revealed that the situation has become even more sneaky and non-representative.

Bateman said he has two homes -- one in his district in Provo and one that his company bought as an investment outside his district in Mapleton. He said he intended to live in the Mapleton home for a time and sell it eventually while keeping the Provo home as his primary residence.

In his letter, however, he said he sought private counsel, who recently told him the law "would not likely support" that arrangement.

So he was going to move out of the district he was elected to represent to "eventually" return to his "primary residence" as soon as he was able to profitably flip that investment home in today's market, and he honestly thought that was no problem? I personally have trouble giving credence to the assertions that Bateman: A. sincerely believed that his living arrangement would meet state requirements and B. that this belief was "recently" disabused by private counsel so he could conveniently withdraw on the last possible day. If he cared about serving, why couldn't Bateman stay in his Provo home that is ostensibly his primary residence? He is apparently financially secure enough to own two houses, so living in the Mapleton house is a personal preference rather than a necessity in order to sell it. I also have trouble believing that Openshaw did not know this was coming.

So voters in my district were subjected to a political farce on two levels. First, they were arbitrarily denied the opportunity to have the most qualified candidate, A. LeGrand Richards, on the ballot, and second, the two candidates chosen to be on the ballot refused to campaign...literally. Neither Bateman nor Openshaw spent one penny on their campaign beyond the $15 filing fee. They didn't return phone calls and emails from organizations asking their positions and even voters in their district.

They expect us to believe that they somehow knew, independently, that they wouldn't need to spend any money or even respond to questions to win an open State School Board seat? They just assumed the other guy wouldn't campaign either in a year when increased scrutiny has been paid the board because of the voucher dispute and the faulty selection process? They "would love to have served," but put forth no effort to campaign in a district where the winner in 2004, Tom Gregory, spent $300 dollars of his own money to buy signs? The district was important enough to local politicians in 2004 that the defeated candidate, Brian Woodfield, raised over $1000 for flyers and signs from Becky Lockhart, Curtis Bramble, and Micron (i.e. Stan Lockhart), and the voters are supposed to believe that those political interests just went away? Bateman has close associations with PCE through his position on the Children First Utah advisory board, and they didn't donate money to a candidate in need? (I don't know if the PIC Development that Bateman was chair of is this PIC Development based in Orem Utah, but the lack of specifics and "Board of Sages" sound vaguely Koerberian. And Bateman's house flipping "investment" that is more important than the election he just won seems vaguely similar to "equity milling"... I bring that up because PIC Development is still the job listed on the CFU website and he is now president of Action Target, Inc. (I think that's him in the middle of the top picture) and holder of several shooting equipment related patents...which then makes absolutely no sense as to why he would be forced to live in the Mapleton house "his company bought as an investment.")

So a lot of things don't add up here. Why would two apparently competent and successful businessmen, both in high CEO/President positions, run apathetic, careless campaigns that actually alienated any of their constituents that did any research? How could they not post one sign, deliver one flyer, walk one neighborhood, or even answer an email inquiry? They could not have become successful in business if this was their normal persona. (Openshaw's company actually specializes in facilitating communication!) How could they have honestly thought they had a chance to win the election with such a campaign if they didn't know that their "opponent" was going to do the same thing?

Furthermore, why would Bateman's shooting supply company even be involved in real estate flipping and why would that force Bateman to move to Mapleton? How long has Bateman known he would be moving? Why did Bateman continue running at that point? He is the president of the company and just won election to state office--does anyone believe he could not stay in Provo if serving on the school board were important to him? How big and how nice is the "company" house in Mapleton that the company president is going to live in "for a time" that Bateman values the move more than the public service he ostensibly sought? Why wait until the last day of vote certification to make that decision public? Why move your family at all if you're just going to sell the house anytime in the near future?

I don't believe either Bateman or Openshaw is that clueless. I think the circumstances point to exactly what current State School Board Member, Kim Burningham, and excluded candidate, A. LeGrand Richards decried in the Tribune article...a willful collusion to ensure neither candidate had to face Richards on the ballot. The initial faulty process gave us two candidates with similar views, eliminating a choice for the district's voters. Bateman planned to move to Mapleton, whether before or after he signed his oath that he met residency requirements upon filing for candidacy on March 17th, I don't know. (Though I think that ownership of a home in Mapleton by either Action Target or Kyle Bateman and the date purchased would be part of public tax records...) Bateman knew that the next highest choice of the selection committee, A. LeGrand Richards, who differs philosophically from Bateman and Openshaw, would be put on the ballot if he dropped out--this was confirmed as the public education choice in District 11, Ralph Haws, who also finished third in committee rankings behind two voucher supporters, almost replaced Ted Heap on the ballot over a finance reporting mix-up. There was contact between Bateman and Openshaw in order to communicate the plan, i.e. that Bateman would remain on the ballot and that neither needed to waste any time or money campaigning since the result was a foregone conclusion.

This is admittedly conjecture, but I don't know how else you can spin the actions of these two intelligent men. I would love to hear their explanation for their non-campaigns, their non-responsiveness, and how much they honestly communicated before, during, and after the election. I don't think a run-off election would be allowed or cost efficient, but a run-off between Openshaw and Richards would be the best way to allow District 13 voters a real choice of representation on the State School Board. Are there any provisions for something besides appointment if extenuating circumstances are found to exist...such as a candidate willfully misrepresenting his intention to abide by residency requirements of the office?

Tribune Article: Kyle Bateman "discovers" he lives out of area and declines State School Board 13 position

.

I underlined a couple of important passages of the article.

Key Questions that might be answerable: When did Kyle Bateman know of his residency problems? It appears to be a situation where he knew about this for some time. Did C. Mark Openshaw or others know of the probable outcome of the residency problems?

Key Question that we'll never know: Did Kyle Bateman seriously think it was OK to move outside of the district he was elected to represent? He signed an oath that he did...

Snarky, but relevant question: Does Mark Thomas of the Lt. Governor's office really think it's OK for candidates to lie on their oath and that it's up to others to challenge those assertions?! For example, how would one possibly prove that a candidate did or did not know of the residency requirement they were apparently planning to break soon after being elected?

http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_11006927
State ed board race winner drops out

Residency » Worried he didn't meet requirements.
By Lisa Schencker
The Salt Lake Tribune

Article Last Updated: 11/17/2008 07:18:01 PM MST

The winner of a recent state school board race has decided not to take his seat because of problems related to residency requirements.

Kyle Bateman, who won the race for the District 13 board seat two weeks ago, sent his letter of resignation Thursday. His opponent in the election, C. Mark Openshaw, will now likely take the seat, said Mark Thomas, administrator at the Lt. Governor's Office.

"This is just me trying to follow the law," Bateman said. "I would love to have served but I didn't want to get up there and find out there was a problem and create controversy."

Bateman said he has two homes -- one in his district in Provo and one that his company bought as an investment outside his district in Mapleton. He said he intended to live in the Mapleton home for a time and sell it eventually while keeping the Provo home as his primary residence.

In his letter, however, he said he sought private counsel, who recently told him the law "would not likely support" that arrangement.

Bateman said the confusion was due to a misunderstanding. State school board member Kim Burningham, however, said he believes Bateman purposefully waited until now to drop out.

"They knew this ages ago," Burningham said, referring to the residency problem, "and they have just purposefully manipulated it."

Burningham said he believes Bateman waited until now to drop out to prevent other, possibly anti-voucher candidates from appearing on the ballot. A total of six people originally vied for the seat. Those six names went to a governor-appointed committee, which narrowed the list to three candidates, ranked in order of the committee's preference. The governor then chose the top two ranked candidates to appear on the ballot.

Had Bateman dropped out after today -- the day election results become official -- the matter might have gone to the governor or to court, Thomas said.

Had Bateman dropped out much earlier, Openshaw might have had to run against the committee's third-ranked choice, A. LeGrand Richards, chair of the Department of Educational Leadership and Foundations at BYU.

"The democratic process has been totally sidestepped," Richards wrote in an e-mail Monday. "Voters were not allowed to decide on the candidates in the first place and now their choice doesn't matter either. It looks like a great way to stack the deck."

Bateman said he did not purposefully wait until now to withdraw to cut anyone out of the race.

"I don't know anything about that," Bateman said. "I'm not trying to play the system. I have nothing to gain from doing this."

Openshaw, co-founder and president of AirComUSA, a fax and business services company in Provo, said he also thinks Bateman's withdrawl was due to an honest misunderstanding.

"I don't think there's anything nefarious about it," Openshaw said. He said he thought Bateman would have made a good board member, but he'll take the seat if that's what state officials recommend.

Thomas said candidates sign an oath when they file for office stating that they meet the requirements, and it's up to others to challenge those assertions if they feel them to be untrue.

Several lawmakers and the governor are now pushing to change the election system to so voters directly elect board members instead of first sending the names through a committee and the governor.

A. Legrand Richards in State School Board Distict 13...Could the rules be broken if the others don't even show up to play? Sign search...

OK. Tom Gregory, the current State School Board member from District 13 let me know about some technicalities, and I found the stats from 2004 when he won his seat.

In 2004, Mr. Gregory won his seat on the state board with a total of 16,865 votes, while his opponent received 13, 310. My candidate of choice, A. Legrand Richards obviously will not be receiving that many votes. Plus, for reasons unknown, the county doesn't count votes for write-in candidates if they don't register a "Write-In Candidacy." Can someone please explain that to me? Candidates register with the state or county in order to get on the ballot, not to be a resident citizen eligible for office. Why should their registration have any bearing on my right to cast my vote as a desire for them to represent me? What if in some unusual circumstance, an undeclared write-in candidate won? It's not like he or she would be "cheating." Why should those voters be ignored?

This is just reality, but it's really frustrating because I will be surprised if either Kyle Bateman or C. Mark Openshaw receive even 10,000 votes. Has either one even put up a sign? I am certain that A. LeGrand Richards would have beaten either handily if he hadn't been undemocratically disallowed as an eligible citizen to run for elected office. I also think that if we had started a month or two ago, he would have had a much better chance as a write-in candidate than normal because of our two candidates' complete lack of interest in campaigning. Neither has a web presence. When you search for their names, the few newspaper articles about the race and some blogs, including mine and the Accountability Blog show up. I am receiving dozens and dozens of hits each day from people searching for information on the mystery men.

As I said, neither has a website or has given out their email or phone numbers except when required to for candidate registration. Neither provided contact information to the Tribune. They ignored some requests from organizations for their positions. Kyle Bateman at least responded to the Utahns for Public Schools questionnaire. I emailed C. Mark Openshaw as a citizen (after searching out his email on the state candidate registration) and asked what he thought were the most important issues and he didn't answer me. I honestly wonder if either has put up even one sign, walked even one neighborhood, or reached out in anyway except when cornered by the newspaper? Even the current rep., Tom Gregory posted that he can't find anything the two candidates. Do they care about what voters think? And that doesn't mean they would have needed to spend a lot of money either. I'm joking around about their signs, but you could run a campaign for State School Board and at least articulate your values and answer questions for free if you wanted. A blog costs nothing. Answering an email is just common courtesy and a responsibility of an elected official in my mind.

I disagree philosophically with Kyle Bateman and I'm assuming from circumstances, C. Mark Openshaw, but I sincerely disagree more with their aloof attitudes towards their constituents. I do not support Mark Cluff in District 12 either, but I can at least respect him as a competent, hard-working, and communicative person from what I've heard.

I don't know much about A. LeGrand Richards, but he has more qualifications than either of the other two candidates. He is the current Chair of the Department of Educational Leadership and Foundations at BYU, was the choice of all the school representatives on the governor's selection committee who got to interview him, and made some great points on temporal and spiritual education in a campus devotional last year. Tom Gregory has commented on this blog that he has met him and was impressed. Read what you can and make a good decision. I recommend that all write in A. LeGrand Richards for State School Board District 13 and let the total stand as further evidence as to why the State School Board selection process should be reformed.

On a final, lighter note, has anyone seen even one sign posted for either Openshaw or Bateman? I would love if someone could post a picture and confirm the existence of said signs to mildly rebut my assertion that they haven't put forth any effort. Signs are nothing, yet still a basic indicator of some level of involvement in the campaign. The local Alpine School District Board races have signs up everywhere. Those offices are not any more important and those candidates are not any more wealthy.

WRITE IN...A.Legrande Richards...for STATE SCHOOL BOARD DISTRICT 13

That’s it. This post is now the unofficial headquarters for the write-in campaign for A. LeGrande Richards for State School Board District 13.

See my frustration with the two candidates. Kyle Bateman is a voucher proponent with little to no relevant experience; C. Mark Openshaw most likely holds similar views, but also has no relevant experience and literally will not answer a polite email from a potential constituent asking why he is running. He refuses to answer any and all questions from any group besides one vague paragraph that he “will do stuff” to the Tribune, but he refused to even give out his contact information.

Then finally, last night, I attended a small cottage meeting to hear State Attorney General Mark Shurtleff. Two women were discussing the State School Board District 13 race. One said she had heard nothing about either candidate. The well-connected lady replied (This is a paraphrase of what I heard, not an exact quote.), “Neither one is really campaigning. They see it as a 50/50 shot. They get picked by a weird process, a committee and then the governor approves them…They are both similar. They were chosen by the same people. My husband and I just each voted for one.”

They won’t even campaign?! It’s a 50/50 shot?! Apparently it’s not just my neighborhood and my emails going unanswered. That’s arrogant and unacceptable. The corrupt selection process eliminated the BYU professor in the School of Education who has experience and was the choice of all of the public school members of the selection committee…A. LeGrande Richards.

I could and should have a choice of viewpoints on the ballot to vote for, but 6 businessmen and a charter school representative—and none of them live in Provo and Orem I believe—chose two under-qualified voucher proponents for me. That’s undemocratic and wrong. I sincerely believe A. LeGrande Richards would have beaten either of them handily if he had been allowed on the ballot instead of arbitrarily eliminated by 7 non-participants in the election.

See the Accountability Blog for a great summary of all these problems. Especially see the results of the vote on June 2nd when the business representatives voted as a bloc for Bateman and Openshaw, with none of them voting for A. Legrande Richards.

Here is A. LeGrande Richards' biography page at BYU.

Provo residents and south Orem residents up to about 400 North…. Write in A. Legrande Richards for State School Board District 13. I would have had a homemade poster up at my house last night, but I fell asleep sitting at the computer after midnight. Make a poster; call a friend; send an email. No one knows who the candidates are. Almost everyone will listen to a friendly recommendation for a State School Board race where they know none of the candidates. We can actually make a difference. Your homemade poster may be the only one people see.

WRITE IN
LeGRANDE RICHARDS
STATE SCHOOL BOARD DISTRICT 13

I don’t know if we can turn the tide in only 6 days, but I think we would actually win this election if we had a month. Make a difference.

State School Board District 13 Candidates are MIA; A great validation of the selection process

HEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO?! C. Mark Openshaw? C. Mark? C. Mark run...away from all contact with possible constituents. (Bad pun made worse by the fact you're probably reading this on a Monday morning.)

I know the State School Board is unappreciated, unheralded, and probably less than 1% of the population could name their representative on the board, but we saw how important they can be as principled advocates for education during the voucher campaign. (They took hypocritical cheap shots, but were vindicated as representing the people in the end.) I admit that I did not always pay attention to these races and that teachers mostly don't know who their State School Board Representatives are either. In fact, until last week I thought my representative was Mark Cluff of State School Board District 12 and was all set to vote for his opponent, Carol Murphy.

Oops. I actually fall into State School Board District 13 which has been represented for the last 4 years by Tom Gregory, by all accounts an effective board member whose blog allowed him to communicate well with constituents, as well as being one of the original proponents and a signer of the omnibus lawsuit.

Gregory is not running for re-election, and the political committee process of appointing candidates via anti-public-school voting blocks gave us the candidates Kyle Bateman and C. Mark Openshaw.

They are both new to the local educational scene as far as I know. I would wager about 99.9% of their district has not heard of either of them. They are trying to win an election for public office. Yet, when being profiled, neither of them saw fit to provide the Tribune with any contact information for the public to ask them questions. Not every candidate for State School Board had a website (Which is becoming almost mandatory these days so people can see where you stand 24-7.), but I believe EVERY other candidate provided the paper with their email address and in many cases their home telephone number so that voters could contact them. Kyle Bateman and C. Mark Openshaw were the only ones to stay incognito. They also ignored the voter information questions from the Utah League of Women Voters and only Bateman responded to the most detailed questionnaire given out to State School Board candidates by the Utahns for Public Schools advocacy group. (Hat tip to Utah Moms Care for putting both of those links in one place.) Why?

Now, I believe that both men are probably very nice people who care deeply about Utah schools because they have children in them. But why do they think they can run for an important elected office and provide the public with no information? Who are they? What do they believe about education in general and their role as State School Board members? Who knows?

I tracked down the email addresses and phone numbers that the state collected when they registered to run for office:

kyle@batemans.org and 801-226-8033

markopenshaw@gmail.com and 801-377-0790

Currently, Mark Openshaw has not returned emails from community members, including teachers, and at least one current member of the State School Board. His responses to the Tribune's questions were the shortest and most generic of all the candidates as well. He has not responded to questions from any other voting organizations that I am aware of, and in fact, I cannot find any position of his anywhere on the web. Is he under-prepared or just unresponsive? How I am supposed to tell the difference?

The problem is that his opponent, Kyle Bateman, is closely tied to Parents for Choice in education and has problematic views on vouchers, the "inefficiency" of education funding, and his role as an advocate for the schools. Besides his one response to UPS, he has avoided public comment as well.

Bateman was far and away the #1 choice of the biased "business block" on the governor's selection panel. Openshaw was the 2nd choice of the same block, and could likely hold similar views to Bateman since he was vetted by the same 6 people.

Right now, I'm feeling ripped off by the process and disappointed that the two candidates don't even care enough to state their positions somewhere.

So...what am I to do? I'm early voting this week , and my current plan is to write in A. LeGrand Richards as my choice for State School Board, unless C. Mark Openshaw puts up a website or something and really wows me with his views. Richards was the 1st choice of most of the school representatives on the selection committee and has excellent qualifications as a BYU education professor.

So seriously, write-in campaign for A. LeGrand Richards. My vast local readership and influence should net him 4 or 5 votes, easy.