The elections on November 7 did not go well for school board candidates advocating restrictions on “woke” instruction and classroom discussion of “divisive concepts,” including race, racism, sexuality and gender identity.
The American Federation of Teachers claimed that 80 percent of the candidates it endorsed in 250 races were elected. AFT president Randi Weingarten praised the results as a victory for opponents of “banning books or censoring honest history or undermining who kids are.” Liberal and moderate school board candidates did especially well in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia and Iowa.
Jon Valant, an education expert at the Brookings Institution, suggested that the results might cause candidates to “seriously question” whether affiliating with “far-right groups,” including Moms For Liberty and the 1776 Project, “is good for their chances of getting elected.”
Perhaps. It is not at all clear, however, that the setback to the parents’ rights movement constitutes a knock-out blow.
To be sure, the movement must surmount significant challenges. A substantial majority of Americans oppose book bans and strongly approve of a public school curriculum that addresses the history of slavery, racism and segregation. And 76 percent of parents of K-12 children are “completely” or “somewhat” satisfied with the quality of education their child is receiving.
That said, few Americans are likely to disagree with the proposition that parents are — and should be — responsible for guiding their children, protecting them from harm and making decisions they are too young to make. Nor are assertions of parental rights limited to conservatives. In 1968, for example, Black activists and progressive allies demanded community control over the curriculum (“to supply the missing pieces of Black culture” and “counter the total focus on the European Anglo-Saxon experience”) and the hiring and firing of teachers in the Ocean Hill-Brownsville district in Brooklyn, New York. When 18 white teachers were dismissed, the resulting strike lasted 36 days and affected almost a million students across New York City’s public schools.
Many Americans remain concerned about public schools. In contrast to current parents of K-12 students, only 36 percent of the public at large is satisfied with the instruction K-12 children are getting, a record low since 1999.
Americans are sharply divided, often along ideological lines, over who should have primary responsibility for what is taught: 30 percent say teachers, 27 percent parents, 26 percent school boards, 8 percent the federal government, 6 percent state legislators. 38 percent of Republicans think state legislatures should restrict the subjects teachers and students discuss, and 48 percent believe school boards should regulate the curriculum.
Not surprisingly, then, parents’ rights advocates, including individuals endorsed by right-wing organizations, were elected in ruby red school districts on November 7. Moms for Liberty said that 44 percent of its candidates won, bringing the total number elected nationwide since the organization was founded in 2021 to 365. The 1776 Project claimed that 58 percent of its candidates were successful.
Advocates of restrictions on LGBTQ-themed materials prevailed in Hanover and Roxbury, NJ; five of 12 candidates endorsed by Moms for Liberty won in Morris County, NJ; and a conservative slate in the Frankford school district in Sussex County, NJ won three seats in a hotly contested six-person race. In Pennsylvania’s York County, 36 of the 37 candidates endorsed by the 1776 Project were elected.
Relying on simple but simplistic claims, parents’ rights zealots rarely address fundamental questions. What criteria should be used to determine which topics and instructional materials are age appropriate? What should requirements for parental notification about, for example, a student who is experimenting with or has changed their gender identity be?
Most important, should a majority of parents, taxpayers or citizens decide which books should be banned and which “divisive issues” should be kept out of the classroom? Should such decisions be made by a majority in each school district or in the state? How should that majority be determined? What role, if any, should teachers, administrators and school board members play in these decisions?
A slew of studies has confirmed that collaborative trust among parents, teachers and administrators — including deference to competence, expertise and experience — improves academic outcomes and student well-being. Alas, hyperpartisanship and polarization makes it highly unlikely that parents’ rights extremists will subordinate their agenda to this worthy and attainable goal.
Glenn C. Altschuler is the Thomas and Dorothy Litwin Professor of American Studies at Cornell University. David Wippman is President of Hamilton College.