Kansas Board of Education rejects commissioner’s resignation, suspends him without pay
Kansas Education Commissioner Randy Watson on Friday received a vote of confidence from the state Board of Education, which rejected calls to fire him over a disparaging remark he made about Native Americans.
Watson, who leads the Kansas State Department of Education, had offered to resign after video emerged of the comment, in which he recounted telling out-of-state cousins in childhood to fear “Indians raiding the town at any time” when they visited Kansas. Native American leaders and Gov. Laura Kelly demanded he go.
Instead, the 10-member board voted unanimously during a special meeting to reject the resignation and suspended him from his $230,500-a year post without pay for 30 days.
“We believe that this particular incident was serious and needed to be addressed, but we didn’t feel like it was career-ending,” Board of Education Chair Jim Porter said. “We believe in restorative justice. We believe that it’s absolutely critical that we view this as a learning and teaching opportunity. And we felt strongly that we are better able to do that under his leadership.”
The board met for an hour behind closed doors before voting publicly to suspend Watson, who didn’t attend the public portion of the meeting. Porter said Watson was briefly part of the closed session.
Watson hasn’t commented publicly, though Porter said he had apologized privately. Board members indicated they won’t release his letter of resignation.
The quick-moving controversy, which erupted after the board on Wednesday scheduled the meeting, pitted concerns about “cancel culture” against the offense taken by Native Americans and others at a derogatory and racist comment. The chairman of the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation and three Native American legislators, in addition to Kelly, publicly called for Watson’s resignation.
KSDE released video of the remark on Thursday. In a recording of a Zoom call during a virtual education conference, Watson talks about how Kansans often go outside and look up during tornadoes instead of hunkering down — part of an extended metaphor about about how schools in the pandemic are simultaneously dealing with hurricanes and tornadoes.
“I had some cousins from California. They were petrified of tornadoes. They’d come visit us, you know, in the summer and they’d say, ‘Are we going to get killed by a tornado?’ and I’d say, ‘Don’t worry about that. But you’ve got to worry about the Indians raiding the town at any time’ and they really thought that, you know. Grow up in California, I guess you don’t know much of the history of Kansas,” Watson says on the recording.
In the wake of the board’s decision, Kelly spokesperson Lauren Fitzgerald said the Democratic governor has requested a meeting with Watson and Porter “to discuss what has transpired and how to move forward now that the Board has acted.”
“There is an opportunity to build on this moment to ensure that all Kansas school children are treated with dignity and respect,” Fitzgerald said.
Rep. Stephanie Byers, a Wichita Democrat and Native American who had called on Watson to resign, called the board’s action frustrating. Byers recounted receiving emails and social media posts defending Watson.
“If you were to take that quote of his and take the word Indian out and substitute any ethnicity, any race into that, does it then become something just to forgive, something to just step aside with?” Byers said.
But Porter said board members, who are elected, received overwhelmingly positive messages about Watson, who has been commissioner since 2015. They also expressed confidence there are no other inappropriate comments that could come to light.
“I have never received one complaint regarding Dr. Watson on any issue,” board member Janet Waugh said.
‘Cancel cultured out’
Some board members said that they had received several emails from superintendents and school officials throughout the state in support of Watson. Board member Melanie Haas tweeted that a “dedicated servant in education made a mistake and immediately expressed remorse for his telling of an event 40+ yrs ago.”
“Each email, imploring to let him make it right. After all he’s done for #ksde it’s the least we can do,” she wrote.
Tim Hayden, principal of Amelia Earhart Elementary School in the Goddard district, said in a tweet that Watson is the “Best education commissioner in the country hands down. … Will get cancel cultured out for the one mistake he has made in his tenure as commissioner and the students and teachers of Kansas will be the ones hurt.”
Board members and school officials also praised Watson’s leadership, saying he has helped transform the state’s K-12 public school system.
Earlier this school year, Watson and top leaders completed a weeks-long tour around the state, marking five years since the education department began implementing an overhaul of the state’s education system. At that time, the department began a redesign under Kansans Can — an initiative aimed at rethinking what makes a student successful and prepared for postsecondary education or the workforce.
The initiative places less emphasis on assessment scores and more on preparing students with the social-emotional skills needed to join the modern workforce and become active citizens. Kansas has been one of the most aggressive states in moving toward this new approach, experts say.
“The type of leadership he’s provided is, frankly, long overdue,” board member Deena Horst said Thursday. Horst said she feared that losing Watson would mean, “that we’ll settle back into things that are easy instead of making the changes that need to be made.”
In an interview with The Star in September, Watson touted rising graduation rates, falling dropout rates and a higher number of students seeking education after high school. At the same time, he acknowledged that some state test scores were flat or down over the five-year time period, and that the average statewide ACT score has also fallen. But he attributed that to more students taking the test.
Watson said that the coming years for KSDE will be focused on further executing the new model throughout the state.
“We need to see our Kindergarten readiness numbers go up. We need to see academic scores increase,” he said in the interview. “We need to see the number of kids graduating high school and going on to some sort of postsecondary training dramatically increase. And I think we’ll see those metrics really start to move.”
This story was originally published February 25, 2022 at 11:54 AM.
