Control of the State Board of Education is on the line this November, with crucial issues on the horizon. This election is genuinely important.
We recommend Jane Goff in the 7th Congressional District and Henry Roman in the 3rd.
In the 1st Congressional District, Val Flores, a Democrat, is running unopposed.
Goff, the Democratic incumbent, deserves re-election based on her continued support for the rigorous Common Core academic standards, her commitment to implement a controversial teacher evaluation law, and her sensitivity to licensure issues and the need to recruit talented teachers. The 7th CD includes parts of Jefferson and Adams counties.
Goff is a retired educator from Arvada and has been a reliable vote favoring efforts to reform and improve the state’s education system despite pressure to preserve the status quo.
Her challenger, Laura Boggs, a Lakewood Republican, wants to reopen the debate about Common Core, among other priorities. But the state, which had a lengthy conversation years ago about the standards, needs to move forward with implementing them, not continue to argue about them.
In the 3rd CD, incumbent Republican Marcia Neal of Grand Junction calls Common Core an intrusion of the federal government, despite the fact the standards movement was started by governors — including Republicans — and voluntarily adopted by Colorado.
She also expressed concerns about Advanced Placement history curriculum that has a “tendency to emphasize the negative.”
While we respect Neal’s six years of service on the board, voters in the 3rd CD, which includes most of the western half of the state, would do well to give the nod to Roman, a Pueblo Democrat.
He is a longtime educator, having spent time as a superintendent, and has a background in leading charter schools. Roman supports Common Core, as well as the associated test that measures whether students are learning the standards as intended.
In the coming years, the State Board of Education is likely to face , the test to measure them and issues centering on the faithful implementation of a teacher tenure bill that uses student testing as part of evaluations.
Goff and Roman are best suited to the job.
