Updated: Sarasota County School Board delays vote on Hillsdale-tied consulting firm

The Sarasota County School Board postponed Tuesday's scheduled vote on two proposed contracts with Vermilion Education, a consulting firm whose founder worked at the conservative Hillsdale College, following considerable public opposition.

The vote was rescheduled for the next board meeting on April 18. No public explanation was offered for the delay. During a meeting recess, board member Robyn Marinelli told the Herald-Tribune that the board moved the vote because it needed more time.

There was no competitive bidding process for consulting services, and the first mention of the firm came from Board Chairwoman Bridget Ziegler near the end of a three-hour workshop on March 21.

Proposed contracts with the firm then appeared on Tuesday's meeting agenda when it was posted last week.

In a workshop Tuesday preceding the board meeting, the School Board had a Zoom presentation from Jordan Adams, Vermilion's founder, which was not posted on the board's workshop agenda. "Vermilion Education Brief" was only listed under "Member Comments" for the end of the workshop.

Adams, who worked as a civic education specialist at Hillsdale College, was previously consulted by the Florida Department of Education to review textbooks and worked with the small, private Christian college in Michigan to expand its charter school network with the controversial Hillsdale 1776 Curriculum.

The two draft contracts with Vermilion Education, one for consulting services to the board and another for a "District Improvement Study", would include a broad review of the district. Under the consulting contract, Vermilion would examine proposed policies, programs, curriculum, and sit in on external candidate interviews for district administrative, support and classroom positions, among other responsibilities.

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Ahead of the meeting, about 100 people rallied outside of the board chambers against the proposed contracts. The protesters also signed up to speak during the board's public comment period, which lasted nearly four hours.

The vast majority of the people who spoke urged the board to reconsider partnering with Vermilion. Most speakers expressed concern about the lack of transparency surrounding the contract with Vermilion, a perceived lack of credentials because the firm is only a few months old, and the fact that Sarasota is already a high performing "A" rated school district.

"Bulldozing a contract approval by Vermillion, a new, politically biased company with no track record, by Bridget Ziegler shows her push for political agenda, ignorance of best practices for quality education for all our children, and mismanagement of our tax dollars," said one speaker, whose name was not immediately clear from the meeting audio.

Several speakers also expressed concern with Vermilion's ties to Hillsdale College, and said Vermilion could push a classical, Christian education onto public school students. Some even likened the hiring of Vermilion to the conservative transformation of New College of Florida initiated by Gov. Ron DeSantis.

"Most Sarasota parents do not want public schools that exclude diversity of academic thought or enact a narrow-minded right-wing Christian nationalist agenda on all of us," said Seth Stottlemeyer, who described himself as a political moderate and a Christian.

Three people spoke in support of the Vermilion, including Melissa Bakondy, who for the third consecutive School Board meeting started her comments with attacks directed at board member Tom Edwards, who is gay. The audience members stood and turned their backs to Bakondy in a show of disapproval toward her comments.

Bakondy asked the board to direct Vermilion to look into the district's policies on gender identity and the current book challenge process.

Another woman, Barbara Vaughn, usually spends her allotted comment time praying at the lectern. However, on Tuesday she started by reminding the audience that conservatives succeeded last year in electing a Republican majority to the board.

"Now that you're losing, you all show up and you can't imagine what has happened. Because you're no longer in power. You're no longer winning. And you're not going to," Vaughn said.

Follow Herald-Tribune Education Reporter Steven Walker on Twitter at @swalker_7. He can be reached at sbwalker@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Sarasota School Board delays vote on Vermilion Education consultant