A few of the many election results that dealt with public education…

• Jeb Bush crony and anti-teacher, anti-labor, pro-education deformer Tony Bennett was upset, losing his race for Indiana’s state education commissioner.  This was a race with national implications.
• Large sums of out-of-state money contributed to the passing of an amendment to Georgia’s constitution that would allow the governor to create a commission to approve charter schools while bypassing local school boards.
• In Bridgeport, CT, voters shot down the mayor’s anti-democracy bill that would have taken control of the school board away from the citizens and given it all to the mayor’s office.  This was the campaign that Michelle Rhee contributed $100,00o to get passed.  It was the campaign that brought former NBA star, husband of Michelle Rhee, Sacramento, CA mayor, and accused sexual deviant Kevin Johnson to Bridgeport to campaign for.  That was when another former NBA player, John Bagley, himself a member of Bridgeport’s Board of Education told Johnson, “KJ’, don’t come into my house and mess with my right to vote!”
• Idaho voters voted to repeal the Luna Laws in their state.  Diane Ravitch on the Luna Laws: “The Luna Laws imposed a mandate for online courses for high school graduates (a favorite of candidates funded by technology companies), made test scores the measure of teacher quality, provided bonuses for teachers whose students got higher scores, removed all teacher rights, eliminated anything resembling tenure or seniority, turned teachers into at-will employees, and squashed the teachers’ unions.”
• The ballot initiative in Washington that we covered here, was purchased by Bill Gates, Paul Allen, and Wal-Mart’s Walton family passed in a close race.
• Finally, the anti-public ed, anti-labor Mitt Romney, who often complained that teachers unions were the problem with our education system, was defeated by President Obama, whose Race to the Bottom Top has eviscerated public education.

There were other elections that impact public ed.  These were only some of them.  Overall there were victories, there were defeats.  Hopefully the full membership of the PJSTA exercised their right to vote last week.