The candidate filing period for the 2010 Texas elections opens on Thursday (December 3), but many candidates for the Texas State Board of Education are already off and running – and early indications are that far-right incumbents on the state board will face stiff challenges for re-election. Let’s look first at the most interesting Republican Primary […]
State Board of Education
What Are They Afraid Of?
Today far-right members of the Texas State Board of Education made it clear that they no longer want input from teachers, academic experts and other community members who have been helping revise the state’s social studies curriculum standards. Republicans Pat Hardy of Fort Worth and Bob Craig of Lubbock (neither of whom are liberals) as well as Democrat […]
Far-right Activists Descend on Texas SBOE
The Texas State Board of Education has made clear that it will hold a public hearing on proposed social studies curriculum standards in January. But far-right pressure groups apparently decided to preempt that hearing today. Despite no prior public indication from the board that there would be extensive testimony on the standards today, nearly two […]
Money and Politics at the Texas SBOE, Part II
(Click here for Part I of this series.) The Texas Freedom Network and other observers have long been puzzled about why Rick Agosto, a San Antonio Democrat, has often sided with the State Board of Education’s far-right faction since his election in 2006. He has done so even when all other Democrats — and even […]
Money and Politics at the Texas SBOE, Part I
Earlier this year the Texas House voted overwhelmingly to shift authority over the Permanent School Fund (PSF) from the State Board of Education to a panel of financial experts. Senate Republican leaders, however, let the measure die without even a hearing. Now they may have good reason to regret that decision. On Sunday the Dallas […]
