Day: <span>November 8, 2018</span>

Texas teacher elected to state Senate in Oklahoma

 

At least two new governors were among educators or former educators elected to public office this week, according to Education Dive. The successful candidates also include David Bullard, a Denison (Texas) ISD history and government teacher, who lives across the state line in Oklahoma and was elected to the Oklahoma Senate.

Bullard, a Republican, was Denison ISD’s Teacher of the Year in 2016.

Both of the educators-turned-governors, Tony Evers in Wisconsin and Tim Walz in Minnesota, are Democrats and have been in politics for a while.

Evers, a former science teacher, currently is Wisconsin’s superintendent of public instruction. He unseated Republican Scott Walker, a union-busting governor who was no friend of educators and other public employees.

Walz is a former high school teacher and current member of Congress who won the governor’s race in Minnesota on an educational platform opposing vouchers and calling for universal pre-K and stronger recruitment efforts for minority educators.

Jahana Hayes, the 2016 National Teacher of the Year, became the first black Democrat from Connecticut to be elected to Congress.

Five other Oklahoma teachers, Democrats and Republicans, were elected to that state’s House of Representatives. Unlike Bullard, they all teach in Oklahoma.

The Education Dive list includes more than 40 educators who were elected or reelected to public office around the country. It may not include everybody since estimates of educators or former educators who ran for office totaled as many as 1,800.