When Tim Walz When he was announced as Kamala Harris's running mate earlier this month, his rise helped elevate the idea of educators holding public office.
Walz, who served several terms in Congress before becoming governor of Minnesota in 2018, is a former high school social studies teacher and football coach who, to this day, keeps those identities closeIn January 2025, depending on the outcome of the election, he could move to Washington, DC, to serve as Vice President of the United States.
While Walz is clearly in the spotlight during this election, many other educators are seeking public office this year, many of them for the first time.
In many ways, politics is an obvious and natural progression for educators, teacher candidates, and political scientists.
This summer, EdSurge spoke with five people running for office—three classroom teachers, one superintendent, and one early childhood advocate—about their motivations and the skills and experiences that would prepare them for success in office, if elected in November.
Once a public servant, always a public servant
Today, many former educators hold public office, including at the federal level, such as Senator Patty Murray of Washington State, a former preschool teacher, and Representative Jahana Hayes of Connecticut, a former high school history and government teacher.
The transition from public professor to public servant is, for many, intuitive, says Kelly Siegel-Stechler, a senior researcher in the Department of Public Policy at Tufts University. Information and research center on civic learning and participation.
“They are already public servants,” Siegel-Stechler says. “They have a lot of insight and experience in how to deal with some of the challenges that come with large public institutions and the processes that make government possible.”
Jonathan Collins, an adjunct professor of political science and education at Teachers College at Columbia University, adds that people who prioritize public service and volunteering are more likely to participate in civic and political organizations.
“It’s participation in those networks that tends to catapult people into the process of running for office,” Collins says. “Think about teachers and teachers unions, about what a teacher does on a daily basis. Arguably the highest form of service is teaching every day.”
Chad King Wilson Sr. is an alternative education and social studies teacher at Montgomery County Public High Schools in Maryland. He is running for a seat on the Frederick County Board of Education in November.
Teachers, Wilson says, understand that their role — with students, with families, in a community — carries a certain power, and with that comes a certain responsibility.
“In today’s politics, the decisions our elected officials make affect our lives, sometimes in small ways, sometimes in big ways,” she says. “Educators have a service mindset and a duty of care in everything they do. That’s very helpful in any elected office, because you’re already serving. You’re a public servant asking yourself, ‘How can I help you? How can I get you where you need to be?’”
Education is inherently political, and even more so today
Between the pandemic, which led to divisive and prolonged school closures, and the increasing politicization of education — from book bans to debates over gender identity to legislation on what can be taught or said in the classroom — many teachers feel vilified.
“In recent years, faculty have been under intense scrutiny, and that has turned them into real advocates,” says Tufts’ Siegel-Stechler. “When you feel like you’re being asked to justify and defend your values, it can lead you to want to make big changes.”
Columbia's Collins adds that for someone to run for office, certain conditions must be met. Once access to resources and connections are taken into account, the most important factor is motivation.
“You could say that no professional has had reason to be as enthusiastic in recent years as teachers,” he says. “Teachers have been showing for quite some time that they are fed up. It is those who have had enough who also tend to see politics as the next step.”
Especially when teachers feel that the conversations being had and decisions being made about them and their students do not reflect reality, that can inspire some to apply.
Numerous candidates noted that their school boards and state legislatures lack representation from people who have knowledge and understanding of current schools.
“There aren’t many people (in public office) who are still in front of students, working inside schools, who know this because they live it every day,” Wilson says. “That gave me the push to cross the line: ‘I have to step up.’”
Sarah Marzilli is an elementary school art teacher who ran for a seat on the Volusia County, Florida, school board but recently lost in the primary. She feels that with the pace of change in schools today (from social media and cell phone use to the growing challenges around mental health), school boards need representation from current educators.
“We need to make sure we have someone who is in the trenches, so to speak,” Marzilli says, “not someone from the outside looking in.”
Sara Elizabeth CottrellA longtime Spanish teacher and current substitute teacher running for a seat in the Kentucky state legislature, he notes that because many lawmakers are lawyers, they may have unrealistic expectations about how quickly changes occur in education.
“When they talk about education, they talk like you can snap your fingers and accomplish something,” Cottrell says. “As educators, we know how much time it takes. We know more about initiatives that look good on paper but don’t actually make a difference. … We are results-oriented.”
While listening to a recent public hearing by a committee on the growing population of English learners in Kentucky schools, Cottrell was horrified by committee members’ ignorance of basic education codes. “I wanted to jump through the screen,” she recalls. “Nobody knows what they’re talking about… They’re not even asking the right questions.”
Susie Hedalen She is currently the superintendent of Montana’s Townsend Public School District and is running to be Montana’s next superintendent of public instruction. Hedalen has worked as a teacher, principal and superintendent in districts of varying sizes in Montana.
“I live it every day,” Hedalen says. “I know what our challenges are. I know what school leaders feel they need and how the state could support leaders and teachers. I work with students and families every day and I really have my finger on the pulse of what’s happening in Montana education right now.”
A set of transferable skills
Educators tend to possess a set of skills that make them well suited for public office, many people said.
First, teachers are often effective communicators with a variety of audiences, whether students, families, or administrators. They can communicate well individually, but also with large groups.
Teachers are also experienced decision makers.
“They make a lot of difficult decisions every day,” Siegel-Stechler says. “Alone, in a class of 20 or 30 students, they have to be able to make good decisions on the fly.”
Educators tend to be good listeners, trusted members of their communities, get along well with people of different personalities and opinions, are comfortable speaking in public, and tend to be disciplined. These are all qualities that emerged during the interviews.
Educators are also often empathetic, Collins says, noting that empathy is a quality missing from our current politics.
“To be an effective teacher, you have to be able to empathize with students, not judge them based on preconceived notions, understand the humanity and dignity of each child and how to maximize their potential,” she says.
Educators take a seat at the table
The two candidates running for seats in their state legislatures—Cottrell of Kentucky and Safiya Jackson from North Carolina — both said the electoral system is stacked against people like them.
“If you’re an educator with educator friends, or a Black woman with Black friends, fundraising becomes very difficult,” says Jackson, an early childhood advocate and chief strategy officer for the North Carolina Partnership for Children. “If you’re a lawyer with lawyer friends, boom! It’s a system designed to deliver exactly what it delivers.”
According to Cottrell, it takes a lot of time, money and social connections to run and win a campaign, but that's not very practical if you're a full-time employee earning a fixed salary.
“I would love to see more teachers running for office and having the capacity to do so,” Cottrell says, “but it’s very, very difficult given the workload they have.” (Cottrell is not teaching full-time at the moment.)
The result, he says, is a body of legislators that does not include many people “with on-the-ground work, who get their hands dirty on the job.”
Cottrell understands that not all educators can or want to run for office, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't get involved in the political process in some way. They might consider alternatives such as asking to testify before a committee or offering to work with their representatives on education-related legislation.
“The more teachers are involved in the process, the better the relationship between parliament and schools will be,” says Cottrell. “That can only benefit children.”
