In the sprawling bazaar of Texas education, where young minds should be forged into instruments of reason, a venal syndicate holds court, peddling influence while piously cloaking itself in the garb of public service. The Texas Association of School Boards (TASB), in a sordid pact with the Texas State Teachers Association (TSTA), Texas American Federation of Teachers (Texas AFT), Texas Classroom Teachers Association (TCTA), and the Association of Texas Professional Educators (ATPE), has perfected the art of fleecing democracy. This cartel not only strips elected school board trustees of their rightful authority but sacrifices students on the altar of collective bargaining, market monopolies, and political aggrandizement. The result is a grotesque betrayal of Texas’ children.
TASB, a bureaucratic leviathan born in 1949, lords over nearly every school district with an arsenal of policy templates, legal services, training programs, and—most insidiously—a purchasing cooperative that wields a monopolistic stranglehold on district procurement. This co-op, dressed up as a cost-saving miracle, coerces districts into exclusive contracts, smothering competition and funneling a king’s ransom into TASB’s coffers while shackling local budgets. Hand-in-glove with TSTA (68,000 members, tethered to the National Education Association), Texas AFT (66,000, yoked to the AFL-CIO), TCTA (a teachers’ clique with a lobbying addiction), and ATPE (a cynical catch-all for educators), TASB presides over a shadow regime. Their annual TASA/TASB Convention is less a conference than a carnival of collusion, exalting administrators and superintendents while trustees—those inconvenient emissaries of the electorate—are patronized into irrelevance.
The assault on democracy is breathtaking. TASB’s training sessions, dripping with bromides about “collaboration,” are a masterclass in neutering trustees, while its purchasing monopoly ensures districts kneel before its financial altar. TSTA and Texas AFT, with the smug audacity of seasoned racketeers, push “exclusive consultation” schemes—collective bargaining by another name, defying Texas’ right-to-work laws—to let educators dictate terms, leaving boards as impotent spectators. TCTA and ATPE, ever the loyal foot soldiers, bolster this administrative fortress with teacher protections, their crowning jewel being the Term Contract Nonrenewal Act — a legal bludgeon that renders trustees toothless against entrenched interests.
The cartel’s greed is matched only by its cunning. TASB’s procurement empire and service sprawl bind districts in a web of dependency, while TSTA, Texas AFT, TCTA, and ATPE dangle baubles like liability insurance to hoard members, guarding their fiefdoms with feudal ferocity. Their political action committees—TSTA-PAC and TASB’s lobbying juggernaut—stuff the pockets of compliant candidates, ensuring a legislature that genuflects to their whims. This is not advocacy; it is a protection racket, executed with the sanctimonious smirk of those who claim to “serve education.”
And the students? They are mere pawns in this sordid game. TASB and its minions profess devotion to schools, yet their energies prop up ideological fancies—TSTA’s Black Lives Matter at School posturing, Texas AFT’s community schools hustle—while classrooms languish. Trustees, elected to safeguard the public’s trust, are reduced to ceremonial props, their authority pilfered by a cabal that prizes power over pedagogy. Texas’ children deserve schools, not a syndicate. Until this cartel is brought to heel, the state’s education system will remain a monument to adult avarice, not youthful promise.
Brandon W. Hodges is the SREC SD 31 committeeman and president of the MISD Board of Trustees. This article represents his perspective and does not represent the body corporate of either entity for which he serves.