My Trick for Voting for School Board Candidates

Polls don't vote. News coverage doesn't vote.  People do.  Get out there and make your voice heard.

Last day of early voting is Monday 11/7.  Last day to vote is Election Day on Tuesday 11/8. 

The Minnesota Secretary of State's website has all the information you need to vote, including how to register on the day you vote, if you haven't already gotten yourself registered.  Minnesota makes it so easy to vote, so please do.

The "What's On My Ballot?" tool shows you everyone running for each office that's on your ballot where you live and vote, and if there are candidate websites, it gives you the link to them to learn more about them.  It's amazingly helpful for doing your homework on who to vote for (and who NOT to vote for).

School board is hard to find information on sometimes.  News coverage can be scant.

So I rely on candidate websites and the one thing I look for is an endorsement from either Stonewall DFL or Outfront MN or both.

If a candidate took to the time to seek out that endorsement, I know they're not some wackadoo candidate who is terrified of trans kids participating in sports or generally unsupportive of queer kids in school.

Since all three of the candidates who had campaign websites got those endorsements, and I could only pick two (and I wasn't going to vote for the fourth candidate about whom there wasn't any information), I went with the two candidates of color - one was a parent of kids in the Minneapolis school system, and the other was a teacher (who also happened to be gay, with husband and dog). Nothing wrong with the white female candidate, she could just as easily also be fine.  My vote just tends to go toward putting more BIPOC faces in positions of power.

So I voted for Kerry Jo Felder and Collin Beachy for the 2 at Large seats on the School Board for which I can vote.

And there was only one candidate on the ballot for the District 3 for me to vote for - Fathia Feerayarre - and she's got the Stonewall DFL endorsement (plus Rep. Ilhan Omar and others), so I felt OK voting for her as well.

Be careful, do your homework, and let's try to keep the crazies off the school board.