George,

Last fall we heard a lot from opponents of an elected school board about how an elected board would deprive the board of racial diversity. Not surprisingly -- at least for those who had carefully studied the city's recent electoral history -- Tuesday's election proved that this argument was unfounded. The city's voters are committed to diversity and eager to elect strong minority candidates to office.

Last fall we also heard the argument made that campaigning for the school board would be a distraction for potential canadidates. Yet the candidates with whom I have spoken have stated that the campaign was a valuable (two-way) learning experience. As proponents of an elected school board predicted, campaigning for the school board exposed the candidates to a broad range of views in the community. Because of this campaign, lines of communication between the school board and the community will be stronger.

Although most of their concerns were misplaced, opponents of an elected school board were right about one thing: information about the candidates was not as widely disbursed as it could have been. In the future, the city needs to persuade a nonpartisan organization such as Charlottesville Tomorrow to distribute a voter guide on school board candidates. (Charlottesville Tomorrow's voter guide on the city council candidates has been widely praised as invaluable.) Voter guides will be especially useful because future local elections will be held in November, when state and federal candidates also compete for voters' attention.

One area of continuing debate is whether the city should implement an all-ward or mixed ward/at-large system for school board elections. The success of Tuesday's election suggests to me that the current at-large system is fine insofar as it resulted in the election of a strong and diverse group of school board candidates.

Overall, I think we can all agree that Charlottesville 's first election for the school board was a success. Charlottesville's voters made the right decision last November when they voted overwhelmingly for an elected rather than appointed school board.

Jeffrey Rossman (electronic mail, May 3, 2006)