With Dr. Diane Ravitch in Sept. 2013 when she spoke in Seattle, on tour with her new national best-selling book, "Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America's Public Schools"
Dr. Diane Ravitch included the School Board victories of Steve Zimmer, Monica Ratliff, candidates in Bridgeport, CT, and myself among her “Best of 2013” list:
“9. Some of the candidates opposed by the “reformers” managed to win their elections, despite being overwhelmingly outspent by corporate funders (in many cases, the corporate funders lived thousands of miles away). Among the winners who fought off the “reform” money machine were Steve Zimmer and Monica Ratliff in Los Angeles, Sue Peters in Seattle, and the winning candidates who took control of the school board in Bridgeport, Connecticut, signaling the end of the Paul Vallas era in that small city.”
The Garfield High School teachers’ stand against the MAP test also made many Top Ten and Best Of lists for 2013.
With the momentum for a $15/hour minimum wage, a socialist City Council member, a gay mayor, progressives on the School Board, and courageous teachers, Seattle continues to make both local and national news! (The inauguration of Councilmember-elect Kshama Sawant and Mayor-Elect Ed Murray at City Hall on Jan. 6 is promising to be a standing-room only event.)
Through Jan. 8, the public has the opportunity to review new K-5 math instructional materials under consideration for adoption, currently on display in the school district headquarters library.
A final two or three options will then be made available to the greater community for review at select locations throughout the city, resulting in a final recommendation which will come before the School Board for a vote. The new materials will replace the controversial Everyday Math textbooks which are overdue for review.
Those who are interested in bringing solid math to our elementary students should weigh in. If you can’t make it to the JSCEE, you can have a look online for information, sample texts and input from others.
New Seattle School Board: (front row L to R): Stephan Blanford, President Sharon Peaslee, Vice President Betty Patu, Harium Martin-Morris; (back row: L to R): Sherry Carr, Sue Peters, Marty McLaren – December 3, 2013 (Source: Seattle School Board web page)
Taking the oath of office, Sue & her father, Dec. 3, 2013 (photo by Melissa Westbrook)
I will hold my first community meeting in January 2014. I will also host meetings specifically for students. Please check my district web pagefor updates.
Since Election Night, our margin of victory has grown steadily.
On Nov. 5, we led by 51-48 percent.
As of Nov. 19, the results are 55-45% (54.76% – 44.86%)—a 10-point difference! (Current vote total: 92,197-75,538).
Save the Dates!
Newly (re)elected school board members — Betty Patu, Sue Peters and Stephan Blanford — will be sworn into office on Tuesday Dec. 3, 5-6 p.m. at the John Stanford Center for Educational Excellence (district headquarters).
First board meeting with the new board: Weds. Dec. 4.
[CORRECTION: Please note correct date for oath of office is Dec. 3, not Nov. 3, as originally posted.]
School Board Director-Elect Sue Peters Celebrating Election Night with award-winning* Garfield High School teacher (& friend) Jesse Hagopian
We did it! With fantastic, community-wide support, we managed to win an historic election for Seattle School Board.
Election night, we led by 51-48 percent, and with each day’s new ballot tallies, our margin has grown. As of this afternoon, the results are 53-46—a 7-point difference. Wednesday night, my opponent, Suzanne Dale Estey, conceded.
[UPDATE: I have just updated the results to reflect the new numbers posted by King County Elections at 4:30 p.m. today. My margin has grown to 7 percent.]
[FURTHER UPDATE: As of Nov. 8, my margin has increased to nearly 9 points, 54-46, an 11,492-vote difference.]
Why Our Win Matters
This is a victory not only for my campaign, but for communities, families, and educators everywhere who are the key stakeholders in public education, but whose voices are not always heard in the current national debate over education reform, or in our own local school district policies.
This is also a victory for authentic, grassroots democracy. Seattle voters did not allow a small group of moneyed interests to buy this election. My opponent’s campaign and political action committee (PAC) spent a record-breaking $240,000+, a good portion of it on negative campaigning. This amount of money and such tactics are unprecedented in Washington State for a school board race. Yet voters were not fooled by the distortions and diversions of the PAC which attempted to smear my candidacy.
I am proud of my fiscally responsible, volunteer-driven campaign. I am also grateful to everyone who helped us stand up to this barrage of misinformation, and to those of you who promoted my candidacy personally. I want to particularly thank Dr. Diane Ravitch, who recognized that my campaign represented a national battle over the integrity and future of public education. Her support gave important legitimacy to our campaign and to my effort over the years to engage on education issues, as both a journalist and parent.
I have already begun to reach out to my opponent’s supporters. To those who share my commitment to public education, I welcome both discussion and action on the issues raised by my campaign, and I am committed to work together to meet the needs of all our students without resorting to privatization models.
Thank you for giving me this opportunity to serve as your elected representative. I promise to be engaged on the issues and represent all of my constituents who share the goal of strengthening our public schools. I am committed to serving the best interests of all our district’s 51,000 diverse students, families and school communities.
It is a dark time for rebellious liberals. Although they won the mayor’s office and school board in elections past, wealthy forces seek to drive the interlopers from City Hall. Mayor Mike McGinn, Council Member O’Brien, and brave school board hopeful Sue Peters are running formidable campaigns to maintain their progressive foothold. But state senator Ed Murray, the rabidly conservative police guild, and grazzilionaire Nick Hanauer—obsessed with the politics of division and a scourge of crime—have deployed wealthy PACs to stop the insurgency and reclaim the government.
KUOW reporters are on the ground at several campaign sites in Seattle, sending back snapshots from the scenes as the ballot countdown nears an end.
8:15 p.m. School Board Candidate Sue Peters Ahead With 51 percent Seattle School Board candidate Sue Peters is wearing her lucky blue feather boa tonight, and it appears to have paid off.
When King County released its first round of vote results, she was ahead of opponent Suzanne Dale Estey. Estey received 48 percent of the vote.
At Peters’ party, it’s a mostly middle-aged crowd milling about the room, drinking wine and cocktails. There are purple balloons, sandwiches and cured meats. It’s a festive mood.
It’s less festive at Estey’s campaign party, where there’s a sparser crowd and most of the guests appear to be drinking water.
–KUOW’s Ann Dornfeld
Kind words from a friend: “Mazel tov, Sue. Your campaign reflected your values and it resonated with the voters. “
In a recent Seattle Weekly article, my opponent’s political consultant, Christian Sinderman (pictured), accused my campaign of ‘insinuating’ that Suzanne Dale Estey supports charter schools.
But the fact is, many people, both inside and outside my campaign, locally and nationally, have asked this legitimate question: If Suzanne Dale Estey opposes charter schools, as she claims, why have all the major proponents of charter schools, the wealthy individuals who also bankrolled last year’s state charter schools Initiative 1240 (which 60 percent of Seattle voters rejected), and other corporate ed reform agenda items, invested a record amount of money into her campaign, and into the political action committee (“Great Seattle Schools”) they created on her behalf? (For an unprecedented total of $240,000+) And why did they attack my candidacy repeatedly, if she and I are both opposed to their main agenda item?
What are we to believe?
Often, all we have is a candidate’s word on an issue. But what if someone’s words don’t add up? During the course of the last six months, on the campaign trail, both of us have had many opportunities to speak the truth on issues.
So at a forum in September, when we were asked by an audience member to identify our top five donors, many were surprised when my opponent claimed not to know who her top contributors were. Yet, Dale Estey’s top donors include the CEO of one of the biggest corporations in the world, Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer and his wife Connie, the CEO of one the largest foundations in the world, the Gates Foundation’s Jeff Raikes, real estate developer Matt Griffin, and former Microsoft executive Christopher Larson (and now venture capitalist Nick Hanauer) who currently have contributed a combined total of $83,000+ to Dale Estey’s PAC and campaign.
HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE 37th District Democrats endorsement meeting, Sept. 9, 2013 (resulted in sole endorsement for Sue Peters)
Q: from the audience: Will you please tell us who your the top five contributors are?
SDE: You know, honestly, perhaps I should know that, but I don’t. I’ve received over 400 contributions, many, in fact the last time I checked and run the numbers, I haven’t run them recently, I have more contributors below $50 than my opponent has in her entire…. A senior citizen handed me $7 in cash the other day. I value each and every contribution. But no, I can’t name my top contributors. I could probably take a guess. My parents signed up right away. I have quite a few people who are absolutely fed up with the status quo of the school district and I’m very proud to have all of their support.
Sue P: Well mine is very much a community based campaign and I’m funded by a wide range of people and so my top contributors are teachers and parents and families who support me.I can help my opponent out a little bit. Here are your top contributors: Steve and Connie Ballmer, I think they both contributed the max; Jeff Raikes, from the Gates Foundation and his wife. And then Matt Griffin and Christopher Larson, as you know, created a political action committee whose goal is to elect you and Stephan. They’ve already spent $32,000 in the primary to help you, and during that time they went negative against me and spent $16,000 on two negative mailers against me. So these are the contributors to my opponent’s campaign.
I am very proud of my campaign. We are grassroots, community based one. I represent the people. I believe in representing all the community. I believe the school board should be a democratically elected body representing all the people, elected by the people, not by the people with the most money.
In the last month of the campaign, my opponent started to claim in public forums that she “ran Governor Gary Locke’s D.C .office.” But there is no mention of this significant role on her resume. I checked, and was unable to find any record of Suzanne Dale Estey being on Governor Locke’s payroll.
Education blogger and activist Melissa Westbrook researched this and other related issues and discovered that Dale Estey worked in Governor Locke’s office for just three months, as a paid summer intern from June-August 1998. Nowhere on Estey’s resume or in those public forums does she mention the word “internship” or mention the brevity of her experience there. Instead, she has said:
“(…) I’ve got significant public affairs experience in working in education policy at every level of government, from the Clinton White House, when I ran the conference on mayors on public schools, Governor Gary Locke, where I ran his D.C. office, and I’ve worked on education and human services issues for both the City of Seattle and King County Executive Ron Sims….” – Suzanne Dale Estey, Eastlake Community Council forum, Oct. 15, 2013
And then The Stranger has reported that, in 2004, while serving as a lobbyist for Washington Mutual, Dale Estey sent an email to 9,000 employees urging them to vote against the Monorail, while at the same time, serving as a member of the Transportation Choices Coalition, a pro-Monorail organization. Did she support or oppose the Monorail? Both? Who knows.
Why does all of this matter?
Because one of us is going to be elected to the Seattle School Board. And I believe that honesty, integrity and the truth matter.
As a professionally trained journalist, I am committed to facts and the truth. I will bring such scrutiny to my role as your school board director. I will aim to oversee and safeguard our resources and help steer our district in a positive direction that corresponds to the needs and realities of our communities, and to the facts.
I have a proven history of researching and standing up for issues, and being on the right side of them. In 2009, I spoke up against the school closures. Eight months later, the district had to reopen schools at a cost of $48 million. In 2010, I advocated against the weak Discovering Math textbooks. The court agreed and declared the district’s decision to adopt these books “arbitrary and capricious.” In 2010, I analyzed the MAP test in a blog post called “15 Reasons Why the Seattle School District Should Shelve the MAP Test–ASAP.” In 2013, Garfield High School teachers spoke up about the flaws of the MAP, informed by my article. Their courageous action made national news and led to the discontinuation of MAP at the high school level.
Even the so-called “conspiracy theory” that Dale Estey’s PAC accused me of in a clumsy (but expensive) smear attempt last week, merely highlighted my focus on facts and commitment to understanding the bigger picture of education policy, reform and funding.
I will bring such insight and oversight to my role on the board.
As my campaign predicted, the political action committee (PAC) created to get political lobbyist and consultant Suzanne Dale Estey elected to the Seattle School Board, has stooped to yet another low, and attacked my candidacy yet again.
Their latest dishonest mailer arrived in mailboxes citywide Wednesday.
This is the third time the PAC for Dale Estey has launched a smear attack in this campaign, unprecedented for a Seattle School Board race. (See: My Opponent’s Side Goes Negative: My Response.) It’s also very disappointing.
Demonstrating the negative influence of excessive money in political campaigns (a hot topic in Seattle right now, where we have two initiatives addressing campaign funding on the current ballot), the “Great Seattle Schools” PAChas amassed over $100,000 from a small group of wealthy individuals (with no children in Seattle Public Schools) who are apparently desperate to buy the election for my opponent and will resort to any means they think necessary.
What’s more, their latest claim is absurd. They refer to a factual flow chart created three years ago by Seattle Education Blogco-founder Dora Taylor and myself, in which we illustrate the flow of money from two of the largest private funding sources in public education: The Gates Foundation and the Broad Foundation.
They label it a “conspiracy theory.”
It is neither. In fact, the primary source of the information for this chart was the Gates Foundation itself.Its informative online database of awarded grants lists where it has invested its money. It’s no secret that education is one of the foundation’s key areas of focus.
Called“The Lines of Influence,”when we posted our diagram three years ago, we received an overwhelming positive response nationwide, for it connected various dots. It documented the role and influence of private foundation money in public education.
If this is nothing more than a “conspiracy theory,” then the New York Times is also a conspiracy theorist. See: Behind Grass-Roots School Advocacy, Bill Gates –– by Sam Dillon, May 21, 2011, The New York Times
Rick Wilking/Reuters Bill Gates’s foundation spent $373 million on education efforts in 2009, the latest year for which its tax filings are available.
(…) For years, Bill Gates focused his education philanthropy on overhauling large schools and opening small ones. His new strategy is more ambitious: overhauling the nation’s education policies. To that end, the foundation is financing educators to pose alternatives to union orthodoxies on issues like the seniority system and the use of student test scores to evaluate teachers.
In some cases, Mr. Gates is creating entirely new advocacy groups. The foundation is also paying Harvard-trained data specialists to work inside school districts, not only to crunch numbers but also to change practices. It is bankrolling many of the Washington analysts who interpret education issues for journalists and giving grants to some media organizations.
“We’ve learned that school-level investments aren’t enough to drive systemic changes,” said Allan C. Golston, the president of the foundation’s United States program. “The importance of advocacy has gotten clearer and clearer.”
The foundation spent $373 million on education in 2009, the latest year for which its tax returns are available, and devoted $78 million to advocacy — quadruple the amount spent on advocacy in 2005. Over the next five or six years, Mr. Golston said, the foundation expects to pour $3.5 billion more into education, up to 15 percent of it on advocacy.
Given the scale and scope of the largess, some worry that the foundation’s assertive philanthropy is squelching independent thought, while others express concerns about transparency. Few policy makers, reporters or members of the public who encounter advocates like Teach Plus or pundits like Frederick M. Hess of the American Enterprise Institute realize they are underwritten by the foundation.
“It’s Orwellian in the sense that through this vast funding they start to control even how we tacitly think about the problems facing public education,” said Bruce Fuller, an education professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who said he received no financing from the foundation. (…)
Bloomberg is in on the “conspiracy” too
And apparently Bloomberg BusinessWeek is a “conspiracy theorist” as well. See: Bill Gates’ School Crusade,July 15, 2010.
(…) Now a new generation of philanthropic billionaires, including Gates, homebuilding and insurance entrepreneur Eli Broad, members of the Walton family that founded Wal-Mart Stores (WMT), and former hedge fund manager Julian Robertson, want public education run more like a business. Charter schools, independent of local school districts and typically free of unionized teachers, are one of their favorite causes. “We don’t know anything about how to teach or reading curriculum or any of that,” Broad said last year at a public event in Manhattan. “But what we do know about is management and governance.”
Already I have gotten responses from people around the city who received this mailer, ranging from utter disgust with the Estey campaign (always the risk with negative campaigning), to compliments for the informative flow chart.
Clearly Dale Estey and her backers are worried that they cannot win this race on her own merits. In fact, there is increasing evidence that my opponent’s alleged merits are not all that they seem, as her credibility has come into question on various counts.
Disappointingly, Dale Estey’s supporters are apparently not interested in discussing the real issues facing our schools, families and students, like serious overcrowding, class sizes, policies that are out of touch with the realities of our communities, curriculum, excessive testing, and equal resources and opportunities for our district’s 51,000 students, just to name a few.
I urge voters to sort through the facts themselves and not be swayed by the distortions of a small group of wealthy special interests (and a candidate who fails to denounce them) who are desperately trying to buy this election, by any means necessary.
I believe the Estey PAC has underestimated the intelligence and integrity of the Seattle electorate.
As a trained journalist and public education advocate, I remain committed to facts and the truth, as I have demonstrated in the past, and will continue to demonstrate this commitment if I am elected to serve on the school board.
Thank you for your support. Please remember to vote. Clearly the stakes are very high in this election.
–Sue Peters
UPDATE: The Dale Estey PAC mailed yet another dishonest flyer to Seattle voters on Friday, for a total of four such attacks on my candidacy since July. This one is truly bizarre. It falsely attributes to me words and images that were posted on the Seattle Education Blog last year from, I believe, the No on 1240 (anti-charter schools) campaign. The title is “Evil Doers” and it is truly tabloid-esque. My opponent has yet to denounce the mendacious tactics of her supporters. Sadly, some people will say or pay anything to win an election. 11/3/13
Real estate developer Matt Griffin and his wallet. Is he trying to buy a Seattle School Board election?
There was an interesting article in The Stranger recently by Cienna Madrid about the role of wealthy individuals in local political campaigns and the effort to limit that influence with
The article caught the eye of my campaign because Griffin has also gotten involved in the Seattle School Board race this year, creating a political action committee (PAC) with the purpose of getting my opponent, Suzanne Dale Estey, and in District 5, Stephan Blanford, elected. His PAC, “Great Seattle Schools,” is also funded by former ex-Microsoft millionaire Christopher Larson, neither of whom have children in SPS, and CASE (Civic Alliance for a Sound Economy), the PAC of the Chamber of Commerce (the parent organization of the Alliance for Education).
At a total of $32,300 (so far), Griffin’s financial contribution to my opponent’s candidacy adds up to more than the total contributions of all my supporters combined.
This year, for the first time, there are campaign finance limits for the Seattle School Board race, an idea I have supported for a while. Each individual or organization can contribute a maximum of $900 per candidate, per race (primary and general). But PACs have no limits, effectively offering an end-run around campaign finance reform, and arguably, an end-run around democracy, for it allows individuals with the most money to have greater influence.
Food for Thought
When asked about the behavior of the “Great Seattle Schools” PAC on her behalf, my opponent told the Seattle Times’ Linda Shaw that she is “not going to illegally try to inhibit their freedom of speech” of people like Griffin and Larson. (Independent group enters school board campaign with negative ad, Seattle Times, August 1,2013.)
Well, here’s the question: Are we really talking about free speech — or undue influence? Democracy — or something else? Should our elections be won by those with the most money, or those with the best ideas and qualifications?
My race is a clear example of this choice.
In fact, the primary has revealed a clear distinction between my opponent and myself. I am backed by progressive, Democratic and labor organizations, community leaders and educators, and my top contributors are retired teachers, parents and friends. I am the only candidate in this race endorsed by every Democratic Legislative District (except the one that held its endorsement the day before I joined the race!), and have the sole endorsement of the SEA (the teachers’ and paraprofessionals’ union), M.L. King County Labor Council and the King County Democrats, community leaders like Kay Bullitt, Estela Ortega, elected officials including King County Councilmember Larry Gossett, City Councilmember Nick Licata, State Senators Maralyn Chase and Bob Hasegawa, State Representatives Sharon Tomiko Santos, Gerry Pollet and Cindy Ryu.
My opponent’s top contributors include Microsoft CEO Steve and Connie Ballmer, Jeff Raikes, the CEO of the Gates Foundation, businessmen Matt Griffin, Christopher Larson — who support controversial and discredited ed reforms like charter schools, merit pay, and an emphasis on standardized, high-stakes testing. The person who put I-1240 (the charter school initiative) on the ballot last year has also endorsed my opponent (Tania de sa Campos, of DFER).
As I said to the audience at the Horizon House forum this past Monday, “To quote the late, great Molly Ivins: You gotta dance with them what brung ya’ — and that’s who’s bringing” my opponent, the backers of corporate ed reform.
UPDATE: On Oct. 11, Seattle Mariners co-owner Chris Larson added $15,000 to the“Great Seattle Schools” PAC, pro-charter ed reform PAC Democrats for Education Reform (DFER), added another $10,000, and venture capitalistNick Hanauer added $10,000.
On Oct 14, Hanauer added another $10,000,bringing the total cash amount in the political action committee to elect Suzanne Dale Estey to an unprecedented $96,000. Combined with Estey’s campaign funds of nearly $100,000, this is on track to be the most heavily funded School Board candidacy in Seattle history.
Chris Larson, co-owner of the Seattle Mariners ($30,000)
Venture capitalist Nick Hanauer ($20,000)
Democrats for Education Reform – DFER ($10,000) (DFER WA State Director, Lisa McFarlane)
If you believe that a few wealthy individuals should not decide who our school board members should be, and have undue influence on our elected officials and legislative bodies, please support and contribute to my campaign. And please remember to vote by November 5.
With Dr. Diane Ravitch in Sept. 2013 when she spoke in Seattle, on tour with her new national best-selling book, "Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America's Public Schools"
Sue Peters - Seattle School Board & Beyond 