The Washington State School Directors’ Association (WSSDA) is a state organization that convenes school board directors, who then vote on position items for WSSDA to use in speaking to the state legislature and making recommendations on policy items that affect the schools. Part of WSSDA’s process on determining position statements is to allow any school board in the state to bring a proposed position, which will then be voted on at their annual meeting by all state school board directors. That vote determines if that proposal is adopted or rejected.
Last year, there was a bylaw change at WSSDA which removed weighted votes, so now, instead of school boards with high enrollment like Spokane and Seattle getting a proportionate amount of votes, each school district gets one vote. This means rural districts, which greatly outnumber large school districts but serve fewer students, will have a disproportionate say in determining priorities and position statements, a move that was celebrated virtually by statewide Moms for Liberty chapters.
At Monday’s Central Valley School District (CVSD) board meeting, Anniece Barker —a new board member whose campaign page said two of her core issues were ensuring the board operates with transparency and restoring parental rights, a term describing a movement by conservatives fighting to protect their children from things like vaccine mandates and “critical race theory,” — proposed an amendment to WSSDA’s current position on “Local Board Adoption of Core Instructional Materials.”
Barker’s proposal made some minor changes to language in the first part of the position, which originally said the school board was responsible for course design, selection and adoption of instructional materials. Barker changed the sentence structure to further emphasize elements of “local control” and added qualifiers — the decision on “all” instructional material rests “solely” with the board.
She also added a long sentence describing the merits of local control, writing, “Local control empowers community and parents, giving them greater influence and participation in the decision-making process, reflecting the values and needs of their respective district, and ensures each district the opportunity for experimentation, innovation, and a healthy competition for educational excellence.”
At first, board members spent time debating the nuances of whether the addition of the word “all” would require the board to review every single decision made in the classroom, and whether the sentence on local control should be added, considering WSSDA already has an entire policy on local control.
Then, the discussion turned. Director Cindy McMullen, who survived a tight race this fall and was the only one of three incumbents to maintain her seat, asked Barker what this position was in response to. Barker went on a lengthy monologue, stating it was in response to some bills that passed the legislature recently, including a bill about sex ed curriculum. When Barker finished, McMullen asked, “So you drafted this?”
There was a short pause. Then, Barker admitted: “I did not draft this, there's other school districts in our state who are looking at this same type of proposal.”
When McMullen pressed on who exactly drafted it, Barker just replied “Another legislative committee member inside of WSSDA.”
McMullen responded that it was important the board be aware of “who it is that’s truly proposing these [positions],” especially when some of them are very political, and said she’d asked Barker at previous meetings if someone else had drafted the position.
“When that’s kept from the board, it’s very disappointing to me, especially with the repeated calls for transparency that have come from you yourself, director Barker, and also from the community,” McMullen said. “It's important that we have the full context of what we're being called upon to vote on.”
Barker responded that she hadn’t lied when pressed on this previously.
“When you asked me that question, I told you that I didn't know what other boards were going to be using this position, but I also said that it would be our own and whatever we decided to do with this and make it our own as a board, that's what we were going to do,” Barker responded. “It was just a proposal and we can amend and change it however we want so that it reflects our board, and whether or not other school districts are looking at the same language, our board will do what our board is going to do, and it will reflect us and not necessarily anybody else's board.”
McMullen said she found it “unfortunate,” that Barker hadn’t clearly identified where the language had originally come from. It’s not the first time language proposed at local school boards has been drafted by outside entities, a move that has become increasingly common among conservative-run school boards.
A quick Google search of the original position proposed by Barker reveals that Mead School Board also proposed nearly identical language.
McMullen did not respond to a phone call requesting comment. Barker provided a written statement:
“As the current Legislative Representative on the Central Valley School Board, one of my opportunities is to help our board submit amendments to existing permanent or legislative member-adopted WSSDA positions or develop and submit new positions. WSSDA’s proposal preparation documents provided to school boards encourage board members to, “Consider sharing your board’s proposal with other boards to also approve and submit.” Accordingly, I followed WSSDA’s guidance and introduced a proposal adopted by another Washington school board (obtained by networking with other WSSDA members from various WA school districts) to the CVSD board for discussion in a public meeting.”
After some debate, the position statement passed with some amendments from McMullen, including cutting the qualifiers of “sole” and “all,” and the sentence lauding the value of local control. This means it will be proposed at the annual meeting of WSSDA for a vote on whether or not the body should adopt the position statement.
