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It was a campaign that focused as much on a man who wasn’t running as it did on the eight who were, but in the end the race for three open seats on the Des Moines Public School Board went to the incumbents.
Lincoln High School in Des Moines, one of three high schools in the district called a "Dropout Factory" by a Johns Hopkins University study.
Dick Murphy, Ginny Strong and Jeanette Woods were victorious despite challengers backed by their most vocal critic, and their fellow board member, Jonathan Narcisse, who had said publicly that he hoped adding new members would make him the board’s president and help spotlight what he describes as a board hamstrung by incompetence and collusion.Â
The three challengers backed by Narcisse (Mike Pike, Steve Flood and Kristine Crisman) also received the backing of the Christian conservative group Iowa Family Policy Center, which called the race in an e-mail to supporters “a rare and wonderful opportunity to reclaim the school system.â€Â In what is supposed to be a non-partisan election, many people — from elected officials to community activists — said this struck them as odd.
So the usually low-key, low-turnout school board election turned into something much more: a referendum on Narcisse and a key battle between those who believe religion has a place in public schools and those who don’t.
The nasty election culminated a nasty year for the board.
Former School Board President Marc Wrad launched a Web site earlier this year attacking Narcisse and his candidates, calling it “Attack of the Narcisse Clones.†Narcisse then published a newsletter, delivered door to door by volunteers, that accused board members past and present of collusion and financial ineptness. At one meeting in February each of the board members, and District Superintendent Nancy Sebring, confronted Narcisse about his criticism of the board in local media.
With the election finally complete the question remains: Can this fractured board move forward? The Des Moines School District has a $400 million budget and 32,000 students, not to mention real problems with graduation rates and poor student achievement. A recent report by Johns Hopkins University listed three Des Moines high schools as “dropout factories.†Only 45.9 percent of district eighth-graders performed at a “competent” level on standardized tests in the 2006-07 school year.
It’s now up to a board that hasn’t always gotten along to try to make education in the state’s capital city stronger.
Des Moines School Board results (top three vote-getters are victorious)
Ginny Strong (I), 8,017 votes
Dick Murphy (I), 7,863 votes
Jeanette Woods (I), 7,200 votes
Kittie Knauer, 6,979 votes
Steve Flood, 5,699 votes
Mike Pike, 5,504 votes
Kristine Crisman, 4,385 votes
Larry Barrett, 1,741 votes
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