{"id":12280,"date":"2020-02-20T11:36:51","date_gmt":"2020-02-20T16:36:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=12280"},"modified":"2020-02-20T11:37:00","modified_gmt":"2020-02-20T16:37:00","slug":"three-keys-to-school-board-races","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=12280","title":{"rendered":"Three Keys to School Board Races"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Adam Pagnucco.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Make no mistake: running for school board is TOUGH.  The MoCo school board has two at-large seats,\nfive district seats and one seat elected by MCPS students.  Of the seven non-student seats, all of them \u2013\nat-large and district \u2013 are subject to voting by the entire county\nelectorate.  Three seats \u2013 one of the\nat-large seats plus Districts 2 and 4 \u2013 hold elections in presidential years,\nwhich attract tons more voters than gubernatorial years when elections for\nother state and county offices are held. \nSince the school board seats are non-partisan, both primaries and\ngenerals can be real competitions. \nFinally, Republicans, unaffiliated and third party voters can vote in\nschool board primaries as well as generals. \nSo school board candidates have to communicate with waaaaaay more voters\nthan county-level and state legislative candidates and they have a lot less\nmoney to do that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dear readers, think about all of the above before you\ndecide to run for school board!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And so these races are distinguished by little money,\nlarge electorates and woefully inadequate press attention.  That\u2019s why three factors are almost always\nkey to deciding them.  They are:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. \nIncumbency.  This is an important\nadvantage in most elections.  Incumbents\nhave opportunities to learn the issues, assemble records, build relationships\nand accumulate name recognition.  School\nboard races are no exception.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2.  The Apple\nBallot.  The Montgomery County Education\nAssociation (MCEA) has long had the most advanced political program of any\ngroup that participates in MoCo elections. \nIts centerpiece is the mighty Apple Ballot, an apple-shaped endorsement\nflyer that is widely distributed at election time.  Few if any groups care more about school\nboard elections than MCEA since board members set policy, hire the\nsuperintendent and approve collective bargaining agreements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A version of the Apple Ballot from 2006.\u00a0 Note the placement of school board candidates at the top.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

3.\u00a0 The Washington Post endorsement.\u00a0 The Post regularly endorses in school board races and the newspaper has a reach that extends beyond traditional Democratic voting constituencies.\u00a0 The Post is also occasionally<\/a> critical<\/a> of MCEA<\/a> although it sometimes supports the same candidates as the teachers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without the benefit of significant resources to\ncommunicate with vast numbers of voters, school board candidates with one or\nmore of the above advantages are heavily dependent on them to differentiate\nthemselves from the pack.  That\u2019s why\nwhile all of the above advantages matter in any race, they may be especially\ncritical to candidates for school board.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The table below shows candidates in contested school\nboard races from 2006 through 2018 and the distribution of incumbency, the\nApple Ballot and the Post endorsement. \nIn some cases, the primary was uncontested because there were two or\nfewer candidates while the general was contested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A casual glance demonstrates the value of incumbency, the\nApple and the Post endorsement but let\u2019s be more explicit.  The table below shows win rates for all\nthree, as well as combinations of some or all of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In every tabulation, candidates holding at least one of the above three advantages win at least 75% of the time.\u00a0 Holders of more than one advantage often win more than 90% of the time.\u00a0 Candidates holding both the Apple and the Post, whether or not they are incumbents, are nearly a lock.\u00a0 The one recent exception was in 2016, when at-large incumbent Phil Kauffman had both the Apple and the Post and was still defeated by former Paint Branch High School Principal Jeanette Dixon<\/a>.\u00a0 In that race, Kauffman earned the Apple Ballot after the primary<\/a> and the Post did not endorse him until October<\/a>, possibly weakening the value of those endorsements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These three factors don\u2019t explain everything, but they\nexplain a lot.  While it\u2019s possible to\nwin without any of these advantages, as Dixon demonstrated, it\u2019s very\ndifficult.  Keep an eye on these keys as\nthis year\u2019s school board races move forward.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Adam Pagnucco. Make no mistake: running for school board is TOUGH.  The MoCo school board has two at-large seats, five district seats and one seat elected by MCPS students.  Of the seven non-student seats, all of them \u2013 at-large and district \u2013 are subject to voting by the entire county electorate.  Three seats \u2013 … Continue reading Three Keys to School Board Races<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[151,293,219,35,185],"tags":[1545,2116,1568,1476,941,937],"class_list":["post-12280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adam-pagnucco","category-apple-ballot","category-board-of-education","category-mcea","category-washington-post","tag-adam-pagnucco","tag-apple-ballot","tag-board-of-education","tag-mcea","tag-school-board","tag-washington-post-2"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4mKJE-3c4","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12280"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12280\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12284,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12280\/revisions\/12284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}