鈥淭he Battle over Books Is a Battle over Democracy. We Can Win Both.鈥�

This post is by 楼凤天堂 member Cody Miller.

楼凤天堂 recently noted that school districts are the 鈥渕ost active battlefield in the American culture wars today.鈥� This assessment speaks to an understanding of school boards鈥� social and cultural power that demagogic: 鈥淚 would rather have a thousand school board members than one president and no school board members.鈥� The heart of education policy is located in local political bodies, and are producing a slew of policies that ban books by LGBTQ and聽 Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) writers.

Book bans are part of a larger bundle meant to curtail any progress made in the past decade, especially . Indeed, the legislative attacks on teaching about race, gender, and sexuality have resulted in a landscape where , , and . Contentious battles over curriculum and policy are always an adjudication of whose voices and experiences matter in public spaces, including public schools. The proliferation of book bans represents legislative assaults on and students, educators, authors, and communities.

I, like many educators, feel the sense of dread that accompanies the onslaught of news about the political horrors happening in many states, including my home state of Florida. The high school I graduated from issued an order that 楼凤天堂 called “a book ban like no other” years after I graduated. Yet, as former educator turned politician Harvey Milk informed, 鈥淵ou gotta give 鈥檈m hope.鈥� Two facts make me believe the battle over books and democratic education are winnable in the immediate future if we place importance on school board races.

One, . Many of the candidates who ran on racist, sexist, homo- and transphobic platforms . These election results echo recent polling data: a we鈥檙e seeing metastasize in state houses and school boards.

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Two, . These low rates stem from several reasons, including the timing. School board races typically take place in months removed from federal elections in November. In other words, the school board members pushing racist, sexist, homo- and transphobic policies are often sitting in their seats because of a small minority of eligible voters in their constituency. This small minority is often pushed to the polls by actors who want to enact harmful legislation. Reading the previously cited CBS poll, that the leaders and activists pushing bans 鈥渁ren鈥檛 capturing the public mood on this issue as much as they are successfully using it to mobilize their supporters and send them to the voting booth.鈥� People who believe in pluralism, public education, and democracy can organize around messages that emphasize the importance of including voices in the curriculum who have historically been silenced and maligned. Public opinion is clearly on the side of open discourse, civic dialogue, and teaching honest history.

As noted above, school board races are often not aligned with the more publicized federal elections, which can make tracking candidates and dates tedious. Fortunately, the that locates school board races and candidates based on your voter registration address. Identifying your current school board members and their stances on curricular legislation is a first step.

In winning school board races, we should also restructure how such elections are constructed and decided. I am a staunch advocate for : local, state, and federal. Until then, and make the lines between voting and political action bolder. We should also push for youth representatives on school boards. Currently, . After all, young people have to live with the decisions made by school board members in ways that adults, especially those who do not work in聽K鈥�12 schools, are often shielded from. Even without access to the ballot box, young people are demonstrating what civic engagement with educational issues can look like. For instance, young people are .

We should also work to recruit and support school board members whose experiences and identities reflect our K鈥�12 student demographics. The political attacks on LGBTQ and BIPOC students are made by school boards that frequently exclude LGBTQ and BIPOC members. , a think tank that works on developing LGBTQ civic leaders, documented that less than 1% of school board members in the United States identified as LGBTQ. Similarly, the . Running for public office, especially in the current political climate, is not an easy decision to make. The toll elections take on individual candidates and their families is very real, which is why . Candidates and school board members who fight book bans need constituents who fight alongside them.

I understand the hesitancy and criticism toward uplifting voting as the embodiment of civic action. I do not see voting as the ultimate panacea. I also recognize that voting as the sole strategy for change leaves out the participation of millions of people in our public sphere, including undocumented people and people who are or have been incarcerated. , I believe that 鈥渏ust vote鈥� is an inadequate response to rising authoritarianism. Rather than relying on voting as a singular tactic, I see voting as part of a phalanx of strategies to fight for democracy along with protesting, boycotting, community organizing, and teaching.