School boards in session: 2014 elections by the numbers
Though 81.37 percent of school board incumbents who ran for re-election in 2014 won another term in America's largest school districts by enrollment, new members were sworn in alongside them as school boards re-organized across the country. Newcomers took 38.24 percent of the school board seats on the ballot in 2014. A majority of them, 64.16 percent, won seats left open when incumbents did not run, but over a third defeated those who previously held seats to take their turn serving as leaders in U.S. schools.
A total of 2,190 school board seats were up for election in 671 of the country's largest school districts in 2014. Those school board elections were held in 37 states.
A variety of school board election methods were used in 2014. Some states mandated that all school board elections be nonpartisan; others allowed school districts to hold partisan elections. Some school districts held one at-large election in which all candidates ran for all of the open seats. Other school districts held multiple elections where the race for each seat was based in a different geographic district.
In 2014, 91.34 percent of the top 1,000 largest school districts with board seats on the ballot held nonpartisan elections, while 8.66 percent held partisan elections that required candidates to run under a political party designation. By-district elections were more common than at-large elections in 2014. A total of 415 school districts, 61.94 percent, held by-district elections. Only 255 school districts, 38.06 percent, held at-large elections.
This report looks at overall numbers from the 2014 school board elections in the largest school districts by enrollment in the United States related to unopposed seats, candidates per seat and the rate of newcomers elected. For information on incumbency success rates in the 2014 school board elections, please see our incumbency analysis report.
Note: The Anne Arundel County Public Schools Board of Education only holds retention elections. Though the district held a retention election in 2014, it is excluded from the statistics below.
Methodology
In 2014, Ballotpedia's school board team covered school board elections in the top 1,000 school districts in the United States by enrollment. Of those districts, 670 held school board elections that year. These elections took place in 37 states. The 13 states where the largest districts by enrollment did not hold elections in 2014 were Colorado, Hawaii, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Vermont and Washington. These states are not included in this report.
The elections in the 2014 scope were not equally divided across states. The range runs from a high of 409 school board elections in California to a low of one in Illinois. The comparisons made in the report are not representative of each state as a whole; rather, they demonstrate the relative election trends among the largest districts of each state, with varying sample sizes in each location.
Unopposed seats
A total of 107 school districts, 15.97 percent of the top 1,000 largest school districts by enrollment with elections in 2014, held races in which every seat was unopposed. Overall, 713 seats, 32.59 percent of those up for election, had only one candidate running. A majority of those seats, 83.03 percent, went to incumbents. The remaining 16.97 percent, a total of 121 seats, were left open for newcomers to win after facing no competition. A total of 35.81 percent of all incumbents who sought re-election ran unopposed.
By state
South Dakota, with only two districts in the nation's top 1,000, had the highest percentage of unopposed seats in the 2014 school board elections, with two-thirds of seats up for election going to candidates who did not face competition. Oklahoma had the second-highest percentage, with 62.50 percent of its seats going unopposed.
The following five states had no unopposed seats in their 2014 school board elections: Connecticut, Idaho, Illinois, North Dakota and Wyoming. None of these states had more than eight districts included in the nation's top 1,000 by enrollment.
The chart to the right shows how many seats were left unopposed in each state in 2014, including how many went to incumbents versus newcomers. The map below depicts the percentage of unopposed seats by state. The states with the highest percentage of unopposed seats are colored red, those with the lowest percentage of unopposed seats are shown in blue, and the ranges between the two extremes are shown in varying shades of purple. A table listing the percentage of seats that were unopposed in each state, as well as how many of those seats went to incumbents or newcomers, follows the map.
| Unopposed candidates in the 2014 school board elections | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| State | % of seats that were unopposed | Total number of unopposed seats | Number of unopposed incumbents | Number of unopposed newcomers |
| Alabama | 44.00% | 11 | 10 | 1 |
| Alaska | 42.86% | 3 | 3 | 0 |
| Arizona | 38.57% | 27 | 15 | 12 |
| Arkansas | 54.55% | 6 | 3 | 3 |
| California | 25.18% | 103 | 90 | 13 |
| Connecticut | 0.00% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Delaware | 33.33% | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Florida | 21.77% | 27 | 26 | 1 |
| Georgia | 46.56% | 61 | 53 | 8 |
| Idaho | 0.00% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Illinois | 0.00% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Indiana | 40.96% | 34 | 29 | 5 |
| Kentucky | 31.03% | 9 | 7 | 2 |
| Louisiana | 56.25% | 126 | 106 | 20 |
| Maryland | 7.14% | 3 | 2 | 1 |
| Michigan | 20.78% | 16 | 11 | 5 |
| Minnesota | 21.21% | 7 | 5 | 2 |
| Mississippi | 20.00% | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Missouri | 15.79% | 9 | 8 | 1 |
| Montana | 33.33% | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Nebraska | 46.15% | 6 | 6 | 0 |
| Nevada | 44.44% | 4 | 3 | 1 |
| New Jersey | 15.52% | 9 | 6 | 3 |
| New York | 23.40% | 11 | 8 | 3 |
| North Carolina | 22.22% | 28 | 19 | 9 |
| North Dakota | 0.00% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Oklahoma | 62.50% | 10 | 7 | 3 |
| Rhode Island | 30.00% | 3 | 3 | 0 |
| South Carolina | 44.21% | 42 | 38 | 4 |
| South Dakota | 66.67% | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Tennessee | 36.78% | 32 | 23 | 9 |
| Texas | 37.61% | 85 | 76 | 9 |
| Utah | 26.00% | 13 | 11 | 2 |
| Virginia | 15.63% | 5 | 5 | 0 |
| West Virginia | 10.71% | 3 | 2 | 1 |
| Wisconsin | 46.67% | 14 | 13 | 1 |
| Wyoming | 0.00% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Candidates per seat
| What's the difference between at-large elections and by-district elections? |
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There are two primary methods of conducting school board elections: at-large elections and by-district elections.
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With 4,145 candidates running for the 2,189 school board seats up for election in the largest school districts by enrollment in the United States in 2014, there was an average of 1.89 candidates for each school board seat. School districts that used at-large elections had a higher average, with 1.97 candidates per seat. School districts that used a by-district election method had an average of 1.85 candidates run per seat.
By state
When the candidates-per-seat averages were broken down by state, Oklahoma had the fewest candidates per seat, with an average of 1.31. South Dakota, with only two districts in the nation's top 1,000, followed with the second-fewest candidates per seat, having an average of 1.33.
Maryland had the highest average, with 2.67 candidates running per seat. Nevada had the second-highest average, with 2.56 candidates seeking each seat up for election. Only 10 states out of the 37 that held school board elections in 2014 had an average of more than two candidates run per seat.
The map below depicts the states with the largest number of candidates per seat in yellow and the fewest candidates per seat in blue. The districts that fall between the two extremes are shown in varying degrees of green. A table detailing the number of seats up for election in each state and the number of candidates who ran follows the map.
| Candidates per seat in the 2014 school board elections | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| State | Seats up for election | Total candidates | Candidates per seat |
| Alabama | 25 | 40 | 1.60 |
| Alaska | 7 | 13 | 1.86 |
| Arizona | 70 | 114 | 1.63 |
| Arkansas | 11 | 16 | 1.45 |
| California | 409 | 780 | 1.91 |
| Connecticut | 3 | 6 | 2.00 |
| Delaware | 6 | 10 | 1.67 |
| Florida | 124 | 289 | 2.33 |
| Georgia | 131 | 243 | 1.85 |
| Idaho | 3 | 7 | 2.33 |
| Illinois | 1 | 2 | 2.00 |
| Indiana | 83 | 142 | 1.71 |
| Kentucky | 29 | 56 | 1.93 |
| Louisiana | 224 | 342 | 1.53 |
| Maryland | 42 | 112 | 2.67 |
| Michigan | 77 | 161 | 2.09 |
| Minnesota | 33 | 66 | 2.00 |
| Mississippi | 5 | 9 | 1.80 |
| Missouri | 57 | 106 | 1.86 |
| Montana | 3 | 5 | 1.67 |
| Nebraska | 13 | 19 | 1.46 |
| Nevada | 9 | 23 | 2.56 |
| New Jersey | 58 | 116 | 2.00 |
| New York | 47 | 95 | 2.02 |
| North Carolina | 126 | 273 | 2.17 |
| North Dakota | 8 | 17 | 2.13 |
| Oklahoma | 16 | 21 | 1.31 |
| Rhode Island | 10 | 17 | 1.70 |
| South Carolina | 95 | 159 | 1.67 |
| South Dakota | 3 | 4 | 1.33 |
| Tennessee | 87 | 169 | 1.94 |
| Texas | 226 | 421 | 1.86 |
| Utah | 50 | 114 | 2.28 |
| Virginia | 32 | 69 | 2.16 |
| West Virginia | 28 | 52 | 1.86 |
| Wisconsin | 30 | 42 | 1.40 |
| Wyoming | 8 | 15 | 1.88 |
Newcomers elected
- See also: Incumbency analysis by state
A total of 836 newcomers were elected to school boards in the largest school districts by enrollment in 2014, winning 38.24 percent of seats that were up for election. Nearly a quarter, 24.53 percent, of the school board seats on the ballot were left open for newcomers to win when incumbents did not seek re-election.
By state
Illinois had a 100 percent newcomer success rate in 2014, but only one of its districts in the top 1,000 by enrollment held elections that year. Montana, which also had only one of its districts included in the top 1,000 in 2014, came in second, with newcomers winning two-thirds of the seats. By contrast, no challengers won a seat on school boards in Delaware or South Dakota in 2014, both of which had five or fewer school districts included in this study.
The chart to the right gives a breakdown of the percentage of incumbents and newcomers who were elected in each state that held school board elections in 2014. The map below depicts the states with the highest percentage of newcomers elected to school boards in red and those with the lowest percentage of newcomers elected to school boards in yellow. Varying shades of orange depict the states with percentages in between the two extremes. A table detailing how many newcomers were elected to school boards in each state follows the map.
| Newcomers elected in the 2014 school board elections | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| State | Seats up for election | Total newcomers elected | % of seats won by newcomers |
| Alabama | 25 | 10 | 40.00% |
| Alaska | 7 | 1 | 14.29% |
| Arizona | 70 | 35 | 50.00% |
| Arkansas | 11 | 6 | 54.55% |
| California | 409 | 156 | 38.14% |
| Connecticut | 3 | 1 | 33.33% |
| Delaware | 6 | 0 | 0.00% |
| Florida | 124 | 45 | 36.29% |
| Georgia | 131 | 41 | 31.30% |
| Idaho | 3 | 1 | 33.33% |
| Illinois | 1 | 1 | 100.00% |
| Indiana | 83 | 26 | 31.33% |
| Kentucky | 29 | 11 | 37.93% |
| Louisiana | 224 | 67 | 29.91% |
| Maryland | 42 | 22 | 52.38% |
| Michigan | 77 | 27 | 35.06% |
| Minnesota | 33 | 13 | 39.39% |
| Mississippi | 5 | 2 | 40.00% |
| Missouri | 57 | 23 | 43.86% |
| Montana | 3 | 2 | 66.67% |
| Nebraska | 13 | 1 | 7.69% |
| Nevada | 9 | 3 | 33.33% |
| New Jersey | 58 | 24 | 41.38% |
| New York | 47 | 19 | 40.43% |
| North Carolina | 126 | 64 | 50.79% |
| North Dakota | 8 | 4 | 50.00% |
| Oklahoma | 16 | 7 | 43.75% |
| Rhode Island | 10 | 2 | 20.00% |
| South Carolina | 95 | 33 | 34.74% |
| South Dakota | 3 | 0 | 0.00% |
| Tennessee | 87 | 40 | 45.98% |
| Texas | 226 | 86 | 38.05% |
| Utah | 50 | 20 | 40.00% |
| Virginia | 32 | 16 | 50.00% |
| West Virginia | 28 | 12 | 42.86% |
| Wisconsin | 30 | 7 | 23.33% |
| Wyoming | 8 | 5 | 62.50% |
See also
- School board elections portal
- School board elections, 2014
- Ballotpedia's 2014 school board election coverage plan
- Analysis of incumbency advantage in the 2014 school board elections
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