Cultivating Democratic Spaces in our Schools and Communities — The Purpose of School Boards
Mr. Adam Dauksas is a Partner with Himes, Petrarca, & Fester Law Firm. His practice includes advising and counseling school districts on a range of employee issues, compliance with their collective bargaining agreements and work rules/policies, the Illinois School Code, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993, the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, and other federal and state laws. Adam also regularly negotiates and drafts employment and separation agreements. He has also taught an education law class at Elmhurst College.
The interview was completed in person on December 2, 2021. The questions were conducted and prepared by John Boumgarden. The interview was edited for length and clarity.
I really appreciate you taking the time to talk with me tonight. In your opinion, how would you describe a healthy, vibrant democratically elected school board?
I think that, in terms of a healthy democratic board, you get a range of perspectives, a range of different backgrounds, and professions. And you want to have, as diverse of viewpoints as possible, in my opinion, that is representative of the community at large. An elected body that is tied to the community, but that at the same time has the will to make decisions in terms of the best interests of the kids. And I think more often than not, you get that. I think that the cream of the crop kind of rises in an election and, for the most part, voters know who has the best interests at stake, and they run good campaigns and they’ve been known in the community for a long time. They’re not just some Johnny come lately, but they have a vested stake, and people know them and trust them and that they’re in it for the right reason.
So it kind of goes without saying that you want a diverse viewpoint, but you want people to have voices in the room. And I think it’s like any organization where you want some people to go against the grain. You want some people to push back in a healthy way. Not just to you know, be a contra to be a contra, but to say, ‘Hey, look, let me test that point. Does it really make sense?’ And then maybe we have to modify it as a board. I think that’s really healthy. If everyone just says yes, yes, yes…and they’re not reading what’s in the board packet, or they’re just going along because their friends are saying it…I don’t think that is beneficial for anyone.
So I think you just kind of have to find that and it’s a delicate balance at times, but I think you just have to find the people who are natural leaders and naturally willing to speak up and say, “Hey, look, I don’t know if that’s 100% right. Let’s think about this as well.’ I think that’s the healthiest board that you could probably have. And people who do it in a professional and respectful way, obviously. But I think those are the boards that work the best.
Super helpful and makes a lot of sense. So with regards to your ideal vision for a school board, where are we, the state of Illinois, with creating and cultivating these types of vibrant civic spaces that produce schools where students are able to be successful?
Oh, I think so. I mean, you see it throughout the state. We represent districts from essentially the border of Wisconsin all the way down to Kankakee, Joliet, and beyond. And I think that in each one of them, they’re really trying to do innovative things and trying to do right by kids. I can say that without a doubt that each one of the clients that I represent, they’re always looking to create spaces for kids where they can learn. There’s no question at board meetings, the things that the boards are most proud of are moments where a kid who’s going to go off to an Ivy League school, or a student who started a business or is in the community, you know, succeeding in sports or speech or whatever the extracurricular is like, and they’re there to foster that.
I don’t think there’s any doubt that boards see themselves as there to support the kids in the system and provide opportunities for what they want to do. And that takes its forms in a totally different way. Some places will develop an entrepreneurship course because kids are interested in business; we’re seeing that in a number of places. Or, sometimes communities want to have a better athletic field because their sports programs are good, they’re going to do that. They’re going to dedicate their resources and their time with the kids and where the community wants it. I think that they strive for it and I think they often succeed in it.
What do you make of the perception, and perhaps this is my misguided perception, that school boards, maybe not so much in Illinois, have come under fire and scrutiny. And very quickly, they’ve suddenly found themselves in the spotlight and not in a good way. Is this dynamic more representative of what the community thinks the role of the board should be versus what the role of a school board actually is? Where does that problem kind of emerge?
So I think that there are a couple of problems. I think that from what you’ve seen on the news in terms of anger and the hostility towards the board over certain COVID positions, at least in Illinois, a lot of the most recent anger is misdirected. In the sense that folks are really upset, at least in Illinois, about what the governor has done and what the governor has mandated these school districts to do. Communities are taking their anger out at these elected board of education officials, and while elected, they aren’t making these policy choices on a statewide scale. A local school district in Illinois, at this moment, doesn’t have any say in whether there’s a mask mandate. It doesn’t have a say in whether close contacts need to be excluded and doesn’t have a say in whether teachers need to be vaccinated. And so when those things hit, the community goes to the board because that’s who they’re closest to. They know some of the neighbors who may be on the school board. They often don’t know their state senator, they often don’t know their state representative. They don’t know the governor’s office and the folks who work there, it’s not going to those people. But those are the people who can make these choices or change them. And so I think that’s one of the problems — people are just misdirecting this anger or passion, or whatever you are going to call it, towards people who really can’t affect those changes on a scale they’re looking for.
The second thing is everyone knows that a public school board meeting is a forum where they can say their piece. There’s public comment, in Illinois, when you go to a board meeting, you get your three minutes or five minutes or whatever. So I’m going to get up there and I’m going to beat my chest. And they have that right, which is fine, but it’s a forum that they know they can go to. And I also think social media plays a role in it. People are locally tied into Facebook or Twitter or whatever it may be. And they’re posting about what’s happening locally. So there’s a lot of communication about the local school board. Community members know it, they’re hearing about it, and then they know they have access to and so then they’re going to go there and take out whatever feelings they have good or bad.
At the end of the day, school board hands are tied, at least in Illinois, and that creates and feeds that dynamic here. And that may be different than other states when there’s more there may be more local control on some of those issues. Yeah, like if someone has the say on a mask mandate or vaccine mandate, then you know, that’s probably the proper place. But in Illinois, in my opinion, I just think that you’re kind of barking up the wrong tree.
So with all of that said, what are the biggest challenges that superintendents and districts currently are facing in the school board arena? For example, is it that they have to respond to dynamics like this? Or perhaps a few other examples are more pressing right now?
Superintendents have a lot on their plate in normal time. But I think now on top of the normal job of meeting test scores, and community expectations, they’re now having to ensure safety measures are in place. Employee vaccine or testing mandates are being met. There’s a shortage of bus drivers. There’s a shortage of substitutes — all these things that keep piling up.
The multitude of it all, right — it seems so overwhelming. Many people may disagree, but I think we’re all stakeholders in public education. Whether we’re taxpayers, whether we have our own children in the system, or whether individuals are simply community members and watching from afar.
What’s your hope for how different groups or types of stakeholders should engage moving forward to foster this civic space? How do we kind of reframe to move forward in the next year? COVID is not going anywhere anytime soon, and I imagine the challenges or pursuits are probably going to remain.
That’s a really great question. I think we all need to improve on just learning to live with some form of disagreement. I think so often folks want something to be straightforward right or wrong. And I think in order to move forward, there just has to be some peace with the following type of sentiment:
‘Hey, look, you may not agree with me one hundred percent, but hear me out. And either maybe you agree with me fifteen or twenty-five percent, whatever it may be, but at least be respectful and hear the other side’s position.’
I think that goes a long way in the dialogue. Too often, we just shut people out. Whether it’s at the bargaining table, whether it’s at public comment, and I think you have to hear someone out. They may not articulate their ideas in the best way. And you may disagree with what they’re saying — and that’s okay. But just learning to live with that is the first step in having a harmonious relationship. Something like, ‘Okay, I disagree with one hundred percent of what you just said. But thank you for sharing. Thank you for coming to the board meeting. Thank you for being engaged.’ That’s okay. The next time we might agree, or we might agree fifty percent. And you need as many allies as you can in this business. And if you’re just going to start shutting people out, I think you’re just gonna have a rough go of it.
Yeah — I like that answer. I’m a firm believer that finding how to healthily disagree is something that I think should be really emulated and taught in public education. Yeah, like in civics in general. I don’t think we have done a great job of that during the last forty to fifty years. So I think this is our own reaping of what our nation has sown. We have divested our schools from that process of how to have a healthy disagreement, how to have a healthy debate, and how to be okay with the end result of possible disagreement at the end of the day. I think that’s a huge shortcoming, right? But I digress — two more questions for our time tonight. In your opinion, what should a school board focus on versus topics that should not be tackled by school boards?
I think that I’ll just answer the question in the sense that you know, what should they focus on. First and foremost, the kids’ education — but that’s an easy answer. I think that honestly, it’s what your community needs. There are some districts where the school is more than school. Where schools are providing social services to a large extent. They are providing two meals a day that kids might not otherwise be eating. They are providing transportation and providing a safe place after school. And so you do have to focus on more than education and that’s okay. I think so long as they are responding to their community’s needs, and their most immediate needs, then that’s okay. I don’t think it should just strictly be education.
Because to your point, you know, whether you like it or not, almost everyone in every community is connected to their public school district. Whether as a taxpayer, whether as someone whose child, son, or daughter goes to school there, whether they’re employed there, or whether they’re a family member or employee, they’re most oftentimes the biggest employer in a community by far. And, for some communities, you might just need to educate, because they have the resources. The parents have the resources, the park district has the resources, but that’s not always the case. And it’s going to look different.
Your local school districts are going to look different in a place that doesn’t have the resources as opposed to a place it does. When you talk about learning loss, and when we talk about the effect that the pandemic has had, people realize that kids might need everything. And districts are oftentimes the places that can meet those compounding needs.
I think the federal government realizes that. And the way they rolled out ESSER funding was they tied it to Title I. And so they realize that it’s not just education, that we need to provide these things, whether it’s Wi-Fi to the community, right, whether it’s more meals or extended summer programs for kids. It is crucial to respond to the needs of the community, and that’s why local control matters.
The last question I have is, are there any unusual or atypical board configurations that you’ve seen in your work across northern Illinois? Ones that make you stop and note that should have more models like this versus your typical elected amount of officials? Maybe they include student voice or some other structure beyond the usual configurations?
It’s pretty typical, in Illinois, that it’s a seven-member elected school board. I mean, some have residency requirements. Or some might have districts where you have to be from a certain residency — almost like a district within a district. Some boards will have a student representative. Some have a student board themselves that provides input, but they’re not really making decisions. I think it’s a good civics lesson for kids, no doubt.
But at the end of the day, I think it’s just having, community members who are talented and who kind of have this extra sense of empathy and grace, and they’re saying, ‘Look, I’m willing to give back and I’m willing to dedicate my time.” Because it’s a huge time commitment for no money. I think you just have to admire that.
Thanks so much for your time and energy tonight. I really appreciate your thoughts and willingness to share.
