What matters in the millage vote

Before we vote (or don’t) in May 9’s Little Rock School District millage election, let’s stipulate for the record that whether one votes yea or nay, it’s for the kids. It’s always for the kids.

Whenever we want to assuage our guilt for how we’ve screwed over kids in the past, we do something for the kids. Often when adults want to advance an agenda that might be a little self-serving, it’s for the kids. Sometimes we even do things for the kids that might actually help them.

So, there’s no question that the May 9 vote is for the kids—and that everything we do is always only for the little ones. When the state took control of the Little Rock School District and dismissed its democratically elected board, it was for the kids—those adorable little child-shaped pawns so often sacrificed in political maneuvers. Even though at the time there were charter schools in Little Rock that were performing much worse than the handful of LRSD schools that were used to justify the takeover, the state’s response so far has been to rapidly expand charter schools. Why? Silly Billy, for the kids of course! Every $6,600 cherub they can get their hands on.

I recently attended a meeting in which LRSD superintendent Michael Poore addressed the coming election and the future of the district. (I like Mr. Poore and have no reason to doubt that he is an honest and honorable man.) He reported that after actions taken during the most recent legislative session there are now three ways that local control could be returned to the Little Rock School District. Yay! After the question was asked, Mr. Poore conceded that all three ways still depend on the state making the final decision. Awww. Well, if the state is going to do so much for the kids, it’s only fair that we be treated like kids in the process.

In the same meeting, Mr. Poore told the parents (I’m the parent of an LRSD middle schooler) that we’d just have to hold him accountable if, after the millage refinance passed, the renovations and improvements on the current wish list were not done. He didn’t offer how we might go about holding him accountable since he serves solely at the pleasure of one man: Johnny Key, the governor-appointed state Board of Education chair and current Board of One for the LRSD.

During a Twitter storm that same week, Arkansas Learns, the Walton Family Foundation-backed charter school champion, tweeted from its official account: “With 7 board zones, @ lrsd voters have had ‘one’ board member each. Disagree with other six? Too bad. Governor elected by all. 1 for 1.”

In other words: Democracy schemocracy, who needs it?

I’m not telling you to vote for the millage or against the millage. I am telling you that there are other issues more important with far-reaching consequences to consider. So please, no matter where you come down on this millage question, don’t be distracted from the bigger long-term issues. Namely: Who will lead? How will they lead? What kind of voice will constituents and patrons have in the process? Will we accept or abandon the call to serve all of the children within our district without preference or prejudice? Money won’t fix those issues. Only courage, wisdom, humility, fairness, and “a long obedience in the same direction” will.

Public education is about serving the whole community and in so doing, strengthening the whole community. That’s the idea anyway. But there’s always a workaround. And those workarounds are—you guessed it—for the kids.

James Eastland, former U.S. senator from the great state of Mississippi and chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, proclaimed to an all-white audience in Tennessee one evening in 1956, “People are starting to realize that we’re not mistreating the Negro in the South. And they’re realizing we can make more progress with separate [educational] institutions.” This was after Brown v. Board of Education but before anyone got serious about enforcing it. Well, we banished “separate but equal”—which never was and was never going to be equal—and replaced it with slicker, stealthier, more sanctified versions of just plain separate.

If this is all really about the kids, we have to start thinking as a community about kids other than just the ones who live under our own roofs. I care about my kid. I care about your kid(s). I hope we all care about kids whose parents don’t have the luxury of school choice and kids who maybe don’t have enough people looking out for them. “For the kids” shouldn’t be code for my kid or kids like my kid. “For the kids” should mean all the kids. My son is going to come up in a better community if his opportunities and fortunes are interdependent with the opportunities and fortunes of sons and daughters from all walks of life.