State Board of Education keeps pro-charter school bent after Republican wins 8th District race

Republican Yazmin Navarro, a substitute teacher from Johnstown, defeated incumbent Democrat Rhonda Solis in the race for the seat on the State Board of Education representing Colorado’s highly competitive 8th Congressional District.

The Associated Press called the race Sunday at 9:43 a.m.

Navarro’s victory maintains a majority on the board who are more willing to side with charter schools when school districts reject their applications.

Navarro was winning with 52.5% of the votes compared to Solis’ 47% on Sunday afternoon.

Navarro held a slight lead over Solis, who lives in Greeley, throughout the race. In a Facebook message Solis posted to Navarro’s campaign page at about 2 p.m. Wednesday, she wrote, “Congratulations on your win. There are lots of little people depending on you so never forget where you came from and I will be cheering you on.”

Solis noted that Navarro represents the fourth Latino to ever serve on the board, writing, “we are slowly making progress.”

The 8th District was created during the state’s 2021 redistricting process and includes parts of Adams, Larimer and Weld counties. The race became pivotal to the future of charter schools, with the outcome poised to influence their ability to open and expand in the future.

Charter schools are public schools managed by nonprofits that establish a performance contract with a school district, which serves as the authorizer. The contract gives charter schools more flexibility than traditional public schools over how they educate children, but they are still subject to the same standards and assessments as traditional public schools.

When school districts reject applications for new charter schools, the state board is central to the appeals process. A charter school can appeal a school district’s rejection and the state board has the authority to override the decision.

The outcome of the Democratic primary in June for the 2nd Congressional District seat on the State Board of Education set the stage for a high pressure election in the 8th District.

Former Boulder Valley School Board President Kathy Gebhardt, who has been critical of charter schools for adopting admissions policies that discriminate against certain groups of students, won the primary against Education consultant Marisol Lynda Rodriguez. Gebhardt was elected despite close to $1 million pouring in from charter school advocates in support of Rodriguez.

No Republican ran against Gebhardt in the general election.

If both Gebhardt and Solis had won in the general election, the board’s current 5-4 majority open to overturning local school districts’ charter rejections would have flipped.

With Navarro in the seat, the board majority is more likely to shoot down a school district’s rejection of a charter school.

Navarro takes a different approach to charter schools than Solis, who was elected to the seat in 2022, the first board member to represent the 8th District.

Navarro campaigned on a vision to expand school choice options for families and told The Colorado Sun that she would vote in favor of charter schools during the appeals process so long as they were giving students a quality Education. She won the support of CLCS Action, an affiliate nonprofit of the Colorado League of Charter Schools.

“As long as it’s being effective, any type of education will always have my support,” she said Wednesday afternoon. “My hashtag is ‘all education matters.’ It does not matter in which way it comes as long as it’s being effective, as long as it’s helping our children become productive members of society and become globally competent.”

Navarro added that her top priorities as she takes her seat will focus on ensuring kids reach “academic excellence,” protecting parental rights and making sure the state better supports “our educators who are always on the frontlines.”

Solis, who was backed by the Colorado Education Association, previously told The Sun that she wanted to make sure charter schools are transparent and accountable with the information they give the state and worries that many charter schools are not enrolling a very diverse set of students.