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Make Me Smart

The rise of outside money in local school board elections

Make Me Smart

Marketplace

Business, News

4.6 • 5.5K Ratings

🗓️ 9 November 2022

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

School board races have become some of the most contentious elections of the 2022 midterms. These used to be mostly local affairs, with candidates typically raising less than $1,000 from friends and family. But now it’s not uncommon for big national political action committees to sink tens of thousands into a single race. It’s a trend that goes back more than a decade and has been supercharged by culture war issues and the pandemic.

Today, we talk with Rebecca Jacobsen, a professor of education policy at Michigan State University, about the implications of outside money in school board elections for education policy and local democracy.

In the News Fix, we’ll discuss what’s being done to address voter intimidation at the polls. Plus, two cryptocurrency giants are joining forces.

Then, we’ll hear from a listener who wonders if the universe is sending us an Election Day message, and a mathematician who has thought a lot about “How Not to Be Wrong” answers the “Make Me Smart” question.

Here’s everything we talked about today:

    • This hotline is ready to troubleshoot your voting related issues

    • Meet the mathematician who answered this week’s “Make Me Smart” question

We want to hear your answer to the “Make Me Smart” question. Leave us a voicemail at 508-U-B-SMART. You can also email makemesmart@marketplace.org.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

I'm Tignotaro and despite my request that you stop asking me questions

0:04.8

We're back with new episodes of my podcast don't ask Tig. I can't promise good advice, but it will be a good time

0:12.6

Listen wherever you get podcasts

0:16.4

Sorry, I heard you I heard you tap tap taping away. I figured you were ready. Yes. I'm here. I'm ready. That's what I thought

0:21.3

But that thorp guy will wake up in time for the show that's all the thing

0:29.7

Hey everybody. I'm Kyle

0:33.3

That's the way to do it. Got to make fun of the engineer then be late make me smart as the podcast if I could just remember to start talking on time

0:39.1

Oh my god. Oh boy

0:42.6

And I'm Kimberly Adams. Thank you for joining us today on this election day

0:48.2

So the midterms are here after

0:52.4

unbelievably long run up and ads and ads and more ads and ads and then some ads and

1:00.1

So while there is a big focus on who's going to get control of Congress the House the Senate and

1:07.0

Maybe even in your local elections

1:09.0

Who's gonna control your state legislature or your city council or all the other types of voting that you can do today

1:16.9

Or maybe have already done in early voting one of the things that we've been kind of stuck on here at make me smart is

1:25.0

School board races

1:27.0

Because with all this money that's being spent on election something like 16.7 billion dollars

1:33.9

According to the group open secret

1:36.4

But you know some of the races that really caught our attention this year were school board races

1:42.8

Voters are taking their grievances over public schools to the ballot box this midterm cycle parents who are frustrated by how schools

1:50.1

Handle the pandemic are now running for these boards candidates raising ideological issues with some accusing schools of

1:57.6

indoctrinating children with political beliefs

...

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