State Board of Education, District 15: Incumbent Johnson emphasizes conservative views
Two Republicans are vying for the District 15 seat on the State Board of Education. One-term incumbent Jay Johnson of Pampa is being challenged by Midland's Aaron Kinsey. There is no Democrat in the race.
The Reporter-News spoke with each about the public school education in Texas and why each wants to be involved at the state level.
District 15 is expansive
PAMPA - Jay Johnson was on the road Wednesday, but didn't have to go far. As Texas miles are measured.
He had been in Amarillo, 55 miles away, to meet with both current and former superintendents in Region 16.
He is District 15 representative on the State Board of Education. Whoever has that job in 2023 will serve 87 counties, up from the current 77. The district, which contains 234 school districts, lost three counties but picked up 13.
"About a third of the state of Texas," said Johnson, who is running again because redistricting after the 2020 Census mandated elections for SBOE districts. Education board terms normally are for four years.
He faces a challenger, Midland's Aaron Kinsey, in the Republican primary. There is no Democrat in the race.
Johnson succeeded Marty Rowley, the Amarillo-based member who had served District 15 since 2012. Johnson did not have an opponent in 2020.
Like his opponent, Johnson has a tie to Abilene. He served on the Pampa ISD board of trustees when in 2012 they hired David Young as superintendent and went to Waco Midway ISD to scout their future education leader.
Young, a Cooper High graduate, returned to Abilene in August 2015 to be superintendent of the Abilene ISD.
"We're friends," Johnson said, noting he and his wife and high school sweetheart, Linda, attended the same Sunday school class as the Youngs. "I think Abilene has a good man."
Why run for the SBOE?
Johnson stops short of calling District 15 a "rural" district. It has larger cities, including Lubbock, Amarillo, the Midland-Odessa area, Abilene, San Angelo and Wichita Falls.
But, he said, there is a rural feel and residents are more similar than not.
"And that's what I love about it," he said. "We are a lot alike. Pampa and Abilene ... our locations aren't that close (260 or so miles) but as far as community values, most of my area is very similar. I think this is the best of Texas to live in.
"I think a lot of good people live in our neck of the woods," he said, laughing because there are no woods in the Panhandle.
His nearly 17 years on the Pampa board sparked his interest in the statewide office, he said.
"I was interested in education. Public education has been really good for me and my family. My sisters have all been successful, largely because of public education," he said.
"As a Christian and a conservative, I think it's imperative that conservatives lead the way in establishing educational standards in Texas."
Johnson said he tried to do that at the local level, including as a parent, and now at a state level. He said he was the chairman of the citizens group that backed a successful 2006 bond vote.
"My children are grown now. There came a time that I had just retired and I had time to devote to hearing from parents and leaders in education to serve at a state level and try and maintain conservative values," he said.
His opponent is campaigning as perhaps a more conservative candidate.
"It's laughable to think to think I'm not conservative. I think if you visit with the people on the State Board of Education they may think I'm the Barry Goldwater of the group," Johnson said. "I don't think of myself as a far right-wing conservative."
He has been re-elected in Pampa, "one of the most conservative voting counties in the state of Texas, Gray County," he said. "They know me best. I think you can be a true conservative and still support public education. I am a common sense, Christian conservative.
"I can promise you I've never been called a liberal."
He was one of three who voted against instructional material that came before the board in November, he said.
"I thought (the materials) had too much information that wasn't necessary. I thought that they had invasion of privacy. Some of things were not age appropriate. Some things just weren't appropriate," he said.
What else bothered Johnson was the materials suggested to students "to share these problems with a trusted adult. To me, there is no reason they shouldn't have said parent.
"I think those are conservative views."
Meet the candidate
Johnson practiced dentistry in Gray County for 43 years before retiring.
He served as president of the Panhandle District Dental Society and was selected by his peers as a fellow in the American College of Dentists and International College of Dentists.
He was born in Pampa and has resided there all his life, except to live in Lubbock to graduate from Texas Tech University, then Dallas to get his next degree from Baylor College of Dentistry.
For more than 16 years, he served on the Pampa ISD board , and was president for two years.
He was a founding member of the Pampa Education Foundation.
He has been inducted into the Pampa High School Hall of Fame.
He also was elected to the Pampa City Commission in the early 1980s, serving one term, and the city's Planning and Zoning Commission. For 38 years years, he was on the Pampa Youth and Community Center board, leading that group for the past 10 years.
Johnson is a Lion, serving in all local offices and awarded the Jack Wiech Fellowship by Texas Lions Children's Camp in Kerrville.
Is he an 'ISD guy'?
Johnson's opponent made it clear that he is not an "ISD guy," and that the state board is full of them.
Is Johnson.
"I would say yes," he said. Being called that, "I accept that as a compliment."
Johnson said the Legislature "makes the laws and spend the money. We help with policy."
He said those interested in public schools need to also vote for state representatives and senators.
"They make the laws we live by. Fifty percent of the laws they come up deal with education," he said. "There are several things I hope they will address."
But control also falls to local school district, hence "the 'i' in ISD ... independent," he said.
"Local control can never be replaced by any outside interests, including private companies. I think it's the responsibility given to each community by the authority of the state constitution," he said. "If that's what it takes to be a public school person, I am proud to be an ISD guy."
Some have said for years that the public system in Texas is broken. How does Johnson see it?
"You'll rarely find anything that's perfect," he said. "There are lots of things that frustrate me about the public education system but I don't know what is better."
Start from over again? Can't do it, he said, because the years of transition would be costly.
"There may be a better model out there, but I haven't seen it," Johnson said.
Johnson's charter school votes
The incumbent has been called out by his challenger on votes regarding two proposed charter schools.
Specifically, OKing one tied to critical race theory curriculum.
First, Johnson said, the board spent 48 hours in interviews, testimony and discussion on proposed schools. He said Morath eventually recommended seven to the board.
Three recommendations were passed.
One was a "slam dunk" - a tuition-free Magnolia school focusing on autistic students, he said.
But Kinsey singled out Essen Prep in San Antonio
"My opponent calls it the more liberal one," Johnson said. "They actually found some critical race information in their application."
However, he said, board members were told that lawmakers, through House Bill 3979, would take effect Sept. 1. Board Zoom discussion, about 24 hours, was in May with in-person interviews and testimony covering another 24 hours in June.
"If anyone had inclinations toward anything with critical race in it, it would be illegal. It didn't apply just to them but all seven applicants were made aware during that discussion."
Johnson said other elements in the application, such as geographical boundaries and finance plan, were studied. That included the impact on public school districts in the area, he said.
The vote was 11-3 to approve the commissioner's recommendation of Essence Prep. Only one of three voting against the application was a Republican, Johnson said, calling the board a "pretty conservative group."
"I certainly wasn't a renegade, going rogue, by voting for that after we determined the need," Johnson said, adding residents of that area testified they had no luck with the local school district.
"It's a more complicated process than saying these guys have a wart, and these guys don't," he said.
Critical race theory — racism is inherent in the law and legal institutions of the nation because they create and maintain social, economic and political inequalities between whites and nonwhites — was "not a part" of a "long and thorough process, Johnson said. "At that point, it was established that it would be illegal."
He said the board was promised that if CRT evolved at Essene Prep, it would be removed by the charter school.
"Which doesn't make me happy," he said, "but sometimes you have to hold your nose and do things things.
"I don't feel bad about that vote. Knowing the things I knew at the time, I wouldn't change my vote."
Good stuff happening
On the upside, the board is reviewing the social studies element of TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills), which determine "state standards for what students should know and be able to do, "according to the Texas Education Agency.
"I am happy we're doing it because there has been so much controversy about indoctrination in the news ... this is a great time to do that," he said.
And, Johnson said, the board is looking with TEA Commissioner Mike Morath at "reworking the STAAR test."
"We need to make that assessment exemplary for students," he said. Some students are bright but their life experiences may hold them back while taking a test, he said.
Johnson said there is a plan to limit multiple choice questions to 75% of testing. More "open-ended" questions, he said, may give students a better opportunity to express themselves.
He believes assessment, or "achievement tests" when he was in school, are needed. But not the pressure.
"I think the teachers get keyed up, the kids get stressed and everyone in the system gets worried about performing rather than just taking a snapshot to see how the kids are doing," he said. "It's a high-stakes thing" now, he said.
"I want it to be important and I want people to learn from it. What their weaknesses are. What they need to improve. You can't dosomething without having an assessment. I don't think anybody should complain about having some form of assessment. I don't want it to be something that terrorizes the children and stresses out the teachers."
After battling through the pandemic, "I just think we need to give our teachers and all of our educators a little more love," Johnson said.
Greg Jaklewicz is editor of the Abilene Reporter-News and general columnist. If you appreciate locally driven news, you can support local journalists with a digital subscription to ReporterNews.com.
This article originally appeared on Abilene Reporter-News: State ed board, District 15: Incumbent Johnson touts conservative view
