School boards in suburbs feel heat
Bullied, badgered and scorned as they weigh COVID-19 closings
When Brad Paulsen heads out on his regular walks through his Wheaton neighborhood these days, he dons his face mask, pulls on a golf cap and keeps his fingers crossed he will remain incognito.
Paulsen, an architect, father of two and school board president in Community Unit School District 200, is not typically antisocial. But since the district’s decision Wednesday that surging COVID-19 rates demanded a return to remote learning at the district’s middle schools and high schools, Paulsen has been bombarded with angry email messages from parents. One suggested if a student were to die by suicide, Paulsen and the school board would be to blame.
Just a few weeks earlier, when schools reopened for in-person instruction, Paulsen’s LinkedIn account was hit with a menacing message from an anonymous sender warning if their relative, a District 200 teacher, died from COVID-19, it would be Paulsen’s fault.
Social media rants lambasting the superintendent and the school
board are even worse, he says, especially when the ballistic comments are posted by parents in his own neighborhood.
“I’m up for reelection in the spring, and people are saying, ‘We’re going to vote you out; you don’t believe in kids,’ which has been really emotionally difficult for me, because I’m a volunteer, and all I wanted to do is make the school district better for kids, and give back to the community,” Paulsen said.
Now, as the latest deadly surge of the virus is breaking records across the Chicago region, local school board members like Paulsen are being targeted by frustrated parents in towns including Wheaton, Deerfield and Naperville who are demanding that schools reopen and contending that the virus itself is far less dangerous to their kids than the devastating impact of shuttered schools.
While some parents have gone out of their way to show support and appreciation for their work, school board members are also getting pressure from teachers unions who feel in-person instruction places their members’ and members’ families’ health at risk.
“Parents are really interested in keeping students back in school, and the administration and school board seems to be doing everything they can to keep students out of school,” said Deerfield resident James D’Angelo, a father of two children.
“Deerfield (School District 109) has been one of the holdouts, even though (most) parents are in favor of reopening schools,” D’Angelo said. “But what’s different about us from our neighboring communities?”
Though elementary school districts in Wilmette and Winnetka still are offering some in-person instruction, several other north suburban districts made the call in recent days to move classes online through mid-January amid the current coronavirus surge.
D’Angelo said he is especially disappointed that buildings were not reopened earlier this fall, when the COVID-19 rates were low.
“We just lost all of that time when everything was relatively safer,” D’Angelo said. “The numbers are going up. But there’s mounting evidence that schools are a safe spot, where kids are following all of the rules. When everything’s remote, the kids are spending a lot of time hanging out with friends, without masks, which is much riskier.”
Libertyville resident Evan Williamson said his mounting vexation with the COVID-19-related decisions made by School District 70 has prompted him to run with a slate of like-minded parents for seats on the school board in the April 2021 local elections.
While the district launched a hybrid plan in the past week that includes in-person, half-day instruction for students, Williamson said he remains concerned about the school board’s “flip-flopping.”
“All summer, we were told the plan was to start full steam ahead, but then the board reversed course,” Williamson said. “I’m running for the school board because I think parents should have had a choice. I’ve spent a lot of time gathering information, and the data and analytics pretty clearly articulate there is a low risk to the safety of students and teachers in schools.”
Short of a state-ordered shutdown such as the one Gov. J.B. Pritzker issued in March, decisions related to school reopenings and closings are in the hands of local elected officials, alongside more mundane matters, including passing budgets, signing transportation contracts and purchasing laptops, said Ben Schwarm, deputy director of the Illinois Association of School Boards.
Unlike some elected village or township board members, Schwarm said those who serve on school boards rarely view their position as a stepping stone to future political aspirations.
On the contrary, the state’s 6,000 school board members serving at 850 school districts across Illinois are by and large parents and other community residents who are already enthusiastic volunteers at their neighborhood schools and take on the role as a civic responsibility.
And while issues such as attendance boundaries changes can certainly become heated, Schwarm said the pandemic marks the first time in recent U.S. history that local boards of education have been tasked with decisions of this magnitude.
“School board members are in a tough spot, and while it’s understandable that parents and teachers are voicing their opinions and having rallies, things can become really uneasy as the tensions escalate, especially with the whole social media aspect,” Schwarm said.
Some school boardmembers have been so traumatized by the turmoil that they might opt out of running for another term, he said, while others may find their reelection bids are thwarted by newcomers.
“I think in the coming year, we’re going to see a lot of school board member turnover, and a fair amount of superintendents leaving, too, especially those who did not see eye-to-eye with the board,” Schwarm said.
Township High School District 214 board member Bill Dussling, 78, said the job has always been fraught with challenges, from facing the wrath of parents over the cancellation of a high school show choir to fending off a conservative group’s attempts in 2006 to ban classic American novels they considered too risqué for teenage readers.
But nothing in his more than two decades of service can compare to the critical decisions the Vietnam War veteran and his fellow school board members are making in the wake of the pandemic.
“It’s a real struggle, because everyone — the school board, the superintendent, educators, parents and students — we all want kids to be back in school, but we have to look at the science, and follow the directions of the governor and the department of health,” Dussling said.
“People have come to the board meetings and gotten really vocal, and sometimes, even mean, but you can’t take it personally,” Dussling said. “Parents are stressed out, and they’re trying to care for their children while working out of the house. … I feel sorry for them. I am just trying to stay positive, and hope the end of this will come very soon, andwe can get a vaccine out to the people and get this behind us.”
After enduring the rage of those in the community who are critical of his positions on COVID-19-related school issues, Nick Begley, Deerfield School District 109 board president, said he has come to the conclusion that “there is not only no easy answer, quite frankly, there is not an answer.”
“A decision to reopen schools that may be right for a 24-year-old teacher might not be right for a 55-yearold teacher with a heart condition,” said Begley, a father of four who has served on the school board for 14 years. “There’s a lot of hyperbole and emotion, and I understand why people are upset. But this is not where any of us want to be.”
Nevertheless, Begley said he does not take the criticism personally, and instead, has become even more determined to lead his hometown school district through these dark times.
“People care about their kids, and we may not always agree, but I have to be responsible and follow the facts and the data,” Begley said, adding: “I’ve been viciously attacked by parents who say, ‘Who the hell do you think you are telling me whatmy child can do?’ I just don’t think they get it that it’s not just about their child, and that we’re making decisions for all 3,000 children of Deerfield.”
“School board members are in a tough spot, and while it’s understandable that parents and teachers are voicing their opinions and having rallies, things can become really uneasy as the tensions escalate, especially with the whole social media aspect.” — Ben Schwarm, deputy director of the Illinois Association of School Boards