A Letter from the Champs

Now that we’ve had our website out for a couple of weeks, we thought it might be nice to introduce ourselves & our mission. Actually, we had a board of education member ask us to make sure we let you know that we do not represent USD 469. Our first thought was to ask that board member to go first: acknowledge they don’t represent USD 469 & then we would follow suit. We had a good laugh over that. But then we decided it actually is a great idea to tell you a little bit about us.

We are a group of Lansing community members, mostly parents, who became concerned with the direction the newly elected Board of Education (BOE) members were taking our schools. We did not like the tone of the last election or the political interference. We started to speak up as individuals & found we had common goals to hold the board accountable for policies we feel undermine our educators & our students’ educational opportunities. So, we started communicating with each other. And we found more people who felt the same way. And people found us, too. We started hearing from teachers who appreciated our efforts. Our teachers feel like they do not have a voice, and they feel powerless to help our students navigate these tumultuous times. So, we kept speaking up.

The Parents’ Bill of Rights (PBR) was the catalyst for our action. Both sides of this issue know that what is contained in the PBR already exists. How can we all know it, but know it in such different ways? We feel the PBR grants rights to parents at the expense of the rights of our students & teachers. Then, we had the Classroom Displays policy. Our LGBTQ+ students & teachers watched their sense of security be stripped from them, with no regard from our BOE. Next, a curriculum challenge that banned an entire theme from our schools. One parent didn’t like the theme, refused several options for working around the theme, and forced their views onto everyone else in our district. Most recently, Kansas Policy Institute (KPI) was welcomed in to our district by board members. KPI is relentless in its pursuit of stripping funding from public education. We love public education!

Champions for Lansing Education promises to use our voice to promote all of the good that is going on in our school district; defend the rights of our students, parents, teachers, and administrators (all of them, not a select few); and continue to monitor the actions of our board of education and hold them accountable. We invite you to join us.