"Redesign by Whom?" Outside Influencers and the Nationalization of Local School Politics

• In Event: Redesigning Educational Systems: Influences and Practices Around Structural Changes in U.S. Education

Abstract

Objectives

This paper will examine the role of out-of-state campaign contributions to local school board elections, to provide insight into the way wealthy individuals and organized interests alter the political constituencies that determine school district priorities, policies, and practices.

Theoretical Framework

School board elections have mostly been known as sleepy affairs where candidates spend less than $1,000. However, in a handful of cases each electoral cycle, school board elections have found themselves in the hot glare of national attention and efforts at outside influence. This paper frames this phenomenon in light of a more general nationalization and centralization of American education politics, in which states and the federal government have become more assertive in holding local districts accountable and even telling them what to do (DeBray-Pelot & McGuinn, 2009; McGuinn, 2006). We distinguish centralization within a federal system from nationalization in which local districts retain strategic importance to national actors not only as sites for implementing national initiatives but also as arenas in which policy ideas and political power are formed.

Methods and Data Sources

Drawing on quantitative and qualitative data, we (a) identify links between large donors and reform organizations such as Teach For America and various charter organizations; (b) analyze characteristics of reform and union supported candidates, including their experience in the charter sector; (c) explore the extent to which outside money leads to the displacement of local issues by a national reform agenda emphasizing particular notions of district-based reform.
Focusing on five cities (Bridgeport, CT; Denver, Indianapolis; Los Angeles; New Orleans), we have compiled an original database comprising over 18,000 campaign contributions. This enables us to identify out-of-state donors and link them to specific races and candidates. We have also gathered and coded additional information on donors, interviewed a subsample of candidates (including some supported by teacher unions or national reform organizations, and some who ran largely locally-funded campaigns), and collected news reports and other documents that describe how local races and issues are portrayed.

Results

We empirically demonstrate links between national organizations and the charter sectors, on the one hand, and donors and candidates on the other. Preliminary findings suggest outside donors associated with a reform agenda are more targeted in their giving compared to teacher unions, which give for the sake of access rather than shifting political control. Our analysis shows how the involvement of outside donors affects the substance and style of local campaigns, including how this might inject national framings, priorities and polarized lines of conflict into local discourse.

Scholarly Significance

Other works highlight a growing centralization of power in which local arenas are being muscled aside. Consistent with the “new localism,” our paper emphasizes something else entirely, showing that national actors realize that local arenas are still quite important (Crowson & Goldring, 2009; Smrekar & Crowson, 2015). Rather than being marginalized, local school politics is being penetrated by national politics in ways that rattle and reassemble traditional lines of coalition and cleavage, with important implications for both democracy and educational improvement.

Authors

• Jeffrey R. Henig, Teachers College, Columbia University

• Rebecca Jacobsen, Michigan State University

• Sarah Reckhow, Michigan State University