She said the issue’s growing influence in the campaign shows how education can be more potent as a state and local political issue than as a truly national one. Nevertheless, Youngkin’s tactic of making schools a rallying cry for discontented or uncertain voters makes sense, given that President Joe Biden won the state by 10 percentage points last year, said Kristen Soltis Anderson, a founding partner of Echelon Insights, a polling firm based in Virginia. In addition, it’s hard to know whether the issues and events playing a role in the Virginia race will factor into voters’ opinions a year from now. Ralph Northam’s past appearance in blackface, have created a particularly tense environment in Virginia that has influenced the political climate for school leaders, Pianta noted. The 2017 white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., that riveted the nation, along with controversy about things ranging from Confederate monuments to Democratic Gov. “In other states, at other times, parents are asking for the opposite.” “They’re asking for influence around a particular set of policies,” Pianta said of parents in Virginia protesting local school board actions related to curriculum and other matters. In his view, the call from Youngkin and his allies to support parents really refers to a particular group of parents unhappy with what they see as the liberal political agenda of northern Virginia school officials, not parents in general. Youngkin’s appeal to parents relies much more on emotion and not on a detailed policy platform, said Robert Pianta, the dean of the University of Virginia’s school of education. Virginia has a unique role on the political landscapeĪs a swing state where the gubernatorial election falls the year after a presidential one, and where incumbents are barred from seeking a second consecutive term, Virginia is often viewed as a national political temperature check. But the combination of 2022 midterm politics and increased attention to divisive local education issues, in short, might prove to be a potent combination. Virginia’s move to overhaul math instruction earlier this year generated some controversy, and Youngkin criticized a previous state-mandated school closure in the early stage of the pandemic. State policy issues haven’t been off the political radar. Other state and local officials, if not federal politicians, could look to leverage education in their own races next year using Youngkin’s strategy, especially in swing states where COVID-19 rules and curriculum concerns have divided the public or made headlines.

“He wants to bring his personal culture wars into our classrooms.” “Glenn Youngkin uses education to divide Virginia,” McAuliffe said at a rally. And McAuliffe’s remark during a late September debate with Youngkin that downplayed the role of parents in determining school curricula has become a touchstone for the campaign. Stories stemming from local school districts in voter-heavy northern parts of the state-including controversy over a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about slavery, and a case of sexual assault at a high school -also have played an outsize role in the campaign. These divisions are not new, but they could fuel an evolution in how politicians use schools in campaigns, at least for the short term. The close election, pitting Democrat Terry McAuliffe against Republican Glenn Youngkin, has highlighted national tensions about what schools teach, parental control, and COVID-19 protocols. Virginia’s gubernatorial campaign, through a combination of default, design, and political energy, has become both a focal point for national angst about schools and a showcase for how local education issues can fuel high-profile political campaigns.

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