Schmidt pledges to sign bill giving parents more control over public school materials

Republican nominee Derek Schmidt says he wants to sign a “parents bill of rights” in his first 100 days as governor to make it easier for Kansas parents to challenge school materials they find objectionable.

Schmidt, now attorney general, said parents should play a more hands-on role in determining what public school materials are and aren’t appropriate for their children.

He is running against incumbent Gov. Laura Kelly, a Democrat, and independent Dennis Pyle.

“Laura Kelly and the teachers’ unions that bankroll her campaigns believe they are in charge of our schools but they’re not. Parents are responsible for their children,” Schmidt said at a Friday campaign stop in Wichita.

In April, Kansas lawmakers approved a version of the parents bill of rights that instructed districts to establish processes for parents to challenge classroom content. Kelly vetoed the bill, deeming it the “teacher demoralization act,” and lawmakers failed to gather enough votes to override the veto.

Schmidt said Kelly, who often refers to herself as the education governor, “has done more damage to more of our children than any other governor in the history of this state.”

In an email response, Kelly campaign spokesperson Madison Andrus defended the governor’s record and said the real threat to public education is underfunding.

“Parents can only be involved in their children’s education so long as their schools aren’t underfunded. Derek Schmidt spent millions in taxpayer dollars defending unconstitutional cuts to our schools, and he’d take us right back to the days of Brownback’s extreme cuts to schools,” Andrus said.

In March 2020, Kelly became the first governor to close public schools across the state for the remainder of the school year — a tough decision amid the COVID-19 pandemic that she says she stands by. Schmidt contends that lockdowns, intended to stop the spread of the deadly virus, were devastating for students’ mental health and educational outcomes.

Enrollment in Kansas public schools has dropped by 15,000 students since the start of the pandemic, state data shows. Kansas is also experiencing its worst teacher shortage in state history.

Schmidt was joined Friday by several Republican leaders with a background in education, including state Sen. Renee Erickson, vice chair of the Kansas Senate Education Committee, who said parents she hears from are “increasingly shocked by the inappropriate content students are being exposed to” in public schools.

“When parents want to know what’s being taught in their child’s classroom, we make curriculum access easy. Having the ability to inspect school curriculum is a fundamental tenet of the parents bill of rights,” said Rep. Kristey Williams, who chairs the House K-12 Education Budget Committee.

Red states across the country have pursued similar policies as Republican candidates campaign on parental anger over COVID-19 restrictions and conservative criticism over what schools teach children about race and sexual orientation.

Schmidt’s announcement comes days before he is scheduled to hold a campaign event in Olathe with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. Earlier this year DeSantis signed a parents bill of rights that was swiftly labeled the “don’t say gay” bill by critics. The bill barred instruction related to sexual orientation through third grade and allowed parents in older grades to challenge the content if they felt it wasn’t age appropriate.

Contributing: Katie Bernard of The Star

This story was originally published September 16, 2022 at 12:30 PM with the headline "Schmidt pledges to sign bill giving parents more control over public school materials."