"Live so that when your children think of fairness and integrity, they think of you."
-- - H. Jackson Brown Jr.
Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) School Board members are the politicians who directly affect the daily lives of our children. Some, like BD3's Scott Schmerelson, take this responsibility seriously, visiting school sites regularly and meeting with the students they were elected to represent. For others, the children seem to be an afterthought; they only show up to pose for the television cameras or to take pictures for their campaign websites.
With the eyes of students on them, what responsibilities do candidates have for modeling ethical behavior? Are they role models who should make sure that their campaigns always exhibit fairness and integrity? Or are the stakes too high to be concerned with what impressionable young minds take away from these multimillion-dollar campaigns? Is controlling the School District so important that a win-at-all-costs mentality is justified?
The special interest group that by far spends the most money on LAUSD School Board campaigns, the Charter School Industry, has repeatedly proven that their desire to avoid any meaningful oversight of their publicly funded private schools is more important to them than conducting ethical campaigns. In trying to replace the LAUSD's most anti-charter Board Member, Bennett Kayser, they sent racist and ableist flyers to mailboxes in the district. What message did that send to minority and disabled children who saw these advertisements?
Unfortunately, this was not an isolated event. In the 2020 election against Schmerelson, the political arm of the California Charter School Association (CCSA) engaged in a campaign that was widely condemned for its use of anti-Semitic tropes. Beyond the immediate effect on Jewish children in the San Fernando Valley who found this flyer in their mailbox, what bigotry did it cement in the minds of their classmates? Was securing a seat on the School Board so valuable to them that it was worth validating the same stereotype that Nazis used to justify the slaughter of six million Jews?
In this year's primary election, the example of anti-Semitism fell on the other side of the aisle, but the Charter School Industry still found a way to provide an example of unethical behavior. Charter School Industry operative Michael Trujillo held onto evidence of BD1 candidate Kahilid Al-Alim's Tweets praising a book described as "The Bible of new antisemitism" until just before Election Day, hoping it would get his candidate over the finish line. His plan did not work and public school supporter Sherlett Hendy Newbill is facing Al-Alim in November after defeating the charter school candidate. Trujillo is still hard at work attacking a victim of sexual assault at gunpoint because she filed a lawsuit against his client, BD5 candidate Graciela Ortiz.
Trujillo is also a supporter of BD3 School Board Candidate Dan Chang, but Chang does not seem to need any help in providing examples for Los Angeles students on how they should not behave. He has repeatedly lied his way through debates, misstating the number of schools he opened while employed with the Green Dot charter school chain, making false statements about the performance of these schools, and blaming his opponent for a policy introduced by Chang's allies that Schmerelson voted against.
Unable to match his opponent's knowledge, reputation, or experience, Chang has often resorted to bullying during debates. This was on full display during the event held by the Winnetka and Lake Balboa Neighborhood Councils where he interrupted Schmerelson at least five different times. At one point he was so insistent on talking over everyone else he had to be muted by the moderator. Is this the type of behavior that should be modeled for children who may have been watching?
The LAUSD maintains a goal of graduating students who are "Ready For The World." This includes interacting with an increasingly diverse workforce, a skill that they should be learning on the playgrounds and classrooms of the District. In addition to Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic, we hope they will have learned a sense of morality that includes honesty and standing up to bullies. For the District to be successful at this it must show that the adults of the LAUSD embrace these values. We, as voters, must demand that those who wish to serve on the School Board adhere to these values when running for office.
Carl Petersen is a parent advocate for public education, particularly for students with special education needs, who serves as the Education Chair for the Northridge East Neighborhood Council. As a Green Party candidate in LAUSD's District 2 School Board race, he was endorsed by Network for Public Education (NPE) Action. Dr. Diane Ravitch has called him "a valiant fighter for public schools in Los Angeles." For links to his blogs, please visit www.ChangeTheLAUSD.com. Opinions are his own.
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