Listen, my Texans, and you shall hear

Of the midterm face-off that's growing near!

On the sixth of November of 2018,

From El Paso to Houston to Abilene

Teachers are getting their ballots in gear.

The teachers are coming! The teachers are coming!

Unlike the British in Longfellow's poem, Texas teachers are the ones defending their turf from invasion. Educators and their supporters are pledging to block vote across party lines during the coming midterm elections.

And the results from the primary races gave us all hope.

Hands sticky with sunscreen this past summer, I texted back and forth with a fellow teacher. We were following the agenda of the Texas 85th legislative session, followed by the sexy summer special session. Indeed! Between taking my girls to the beaches of Galveston and passing out to episodes of "Stranger Things," I actually had time to follow my elected officials!

My bud texted about this Facebook group that was gaining steam. This coalition has since grown into a headquarters of sorts for the battle ahead.

Texans for Public Education, founded by Troy Reynolds, began with three teachers. I can see the scene Troy described clearly, as every teacher has starred in it. Probably a packed restaurant — just three teachers on a Friday after school with beers, lamenting about education.

This time it was over the 82nd legislative session. Everyone felt the sting of the State that year.

"We lost good teachers," Troy explains. "So we decided we could take it, or we could do something about it. We formed the Facebook group, and it grew to a steady few hundreds. Eventually we reached 1,000!"

By July of last year when I jumped in, the group was up to 10,000 members. They rallied in Austin. They researched every candidate on virtually every Texas ballot and rated them "friendly," "neutral," or "unfriendly" based on the incumbent's voting record or the challenger's campaign platforms concerning public education.

The group's extensive spreadsheets track the names we would support. They got a website. They got behind the #blockvote hashtag. Then a YouTube channel.

Today, their membership has reached 23,000.

While there's no way to truly measure the impact of block voting, one thing is clear: Teachers showed up!

Privatization and consolidation

"Politics is not religion, and the government is not God."

We must show the voters all parties are flawed.

And together, bound by love of our nation,

We shall rally around those who support education!

The teachers are coming! The teachers are coming!

Troy and I chatted recently about the issues we're tackling. He tells me over the phone that we will face two monsters if we lose this fight: privatization and consolidation.

Privatization through vouchers, inaccurately framed as "school choice," threaten our public schools.

At the state level, Governor Greg Abbott and Lt. Governor Dan Patrick wear their yellow voucher scarfs with pride. "Every parent deserves a choice about where they will send their child to school," Abbott professed at the Capitol last year.

Lt. Governor Patrick chimed in. "I am going to fight for school choice session after session after session."

In the great state of Texas, parents have a choice to send their kids to public or private school. Parents can send their kids to charter school or homeschool. Did I miss something? How is choice denied?

What Abbott and Patrick want is for public dollars to pay for the private choice of some. In Texas, the state invests between $8,000 and $10,000 a year for each student. With that money, districts hire certified teachers and provide our children with a plethora of resources, including free transportation and special education supports and services.

Private schools averaging $12,000 and $15,000 in yearly tuition do not guarantee these services. They are not tested by the State or held to any other accountability standard. They are also under no obligation to accept any child who does not meet their application standards.

We let in every child. We have no application.

"But it's our money!" voucher advocates bemoan.

No, it's not.

I've read Article Seven of the Texas Constitution, and that money belongs to the children of Texas.

I don't have the right to demand "my money" back from my local police department if I happen to feel they aren't keeping me safe to my standards. I can't petition for my taxes to hire a private security guard.

But Patrick expects you and me to pay for the private "choices" of others.

Isn't that the very definition of entitlement, something the Republican Party used to stand against?

WHAT CHOICE?: Dan Patrick to Texas schools: Starve.

My friend Shannon, a teacher in Louisiana, tells me of what happens when this is allowed.

"Families take money from our public schools and go to a private school. If the student gets kicked out, the public school system has to take them back, without their allotted funding, and educate them."

Patrick vows to pursue these vicious vouchers "session after session after session." Despite six "no" votes from our Republican legislature. Despite the defeat of the bill again during the special session. Despite the difference in cost. Despite the basic flaw in voucher logic.

The teachers are coming! The teachers are coming!

The old "economy of scale" justification will be used to consolidate small districts. And Troy knows that will devastate places like his old hometown.

"I grew up in Madisonville. Rural districts will lose their very identity if they are asked to consolidate."

But large districts aren't safe either.

My daughters will grow up in Humble ISD, a booming district which has maxed out what they're legally allowed to ask property owners to contribute. Conversely, I work for Houston ISD, a property-rich district which serves many economically disadvantaged students. HISD is facing a $115 million cut next year due to "recapture" payments. Essentially, the property-rich district I work for will be paying for the cash-strapped district I live in.

When I presented criticism of this system on Patrick's Facebook page this summer, he shot back in response to my post.

"Fact: We spend 52 percent of all state revenues on education," he retorted, even though we know that figure includes all education costs, including support for colleges and universities. This figure also includes selective wrap-around services.

Ross Ramsey from the Texas Tribune exposed the half-truths of Dan Patrick and other lawmakers just last month. He explains that while the state spending in the budget has gone up, the spending per student has fallen. "They don't say, however, that the state's share is sliding from 43.7 percent of the total Foundation School Program spending in 2016 to 38 percent in 2019. Or that the state covered 48.5 percent of the total as recently as 2008 — 10 years ago."

Increasing property tax values doesn't result in more money to that district. It merely puts more local property taxes to fund the outdated formulas, resulting in a savings to the State.

Sparknotes Summary: The state contributes less; you and I contribute more.

OFF TO NYC: HISD Superintendent Richard Carranza hit the right notes but missed the mark

And this isn't the only time Patrick misrepresented the truth. He continues on my Facebook post. "What we need to do is make sure as much of those dollars go to teachers as possible as they are the most important aspect of education."

Patrick's current campaign ads for the midterms echo this statement. He criticizes districts for spending money on "fancy stadiums" instead of teacher pay.

This outrageous statement reveals one of two things about him: He's either spent 12 years in the Texas legislature misunderstanding the basic difference between how stadiums are funded (through bonds, which our local voters approve) and teacher pay (operations funding), or he's misrepresenting.

Which is it, fool or liar?

He promises a teacher raise of $10,000, but he withholds the truth: He expects the money to come from cuts to district budgets. That would mean cuts in the arts. That would mean cuts to valuable support staff.

No teacher wants a raise at the expense of music and librarians and security guards.

The teachers are coming! The teachers are coming!

Seeing is believing

After the divisive 2016 election, and certainly in 12 years of teaching, I never thought a movement like this was possible. I was resigned to the fact that my daughters would grow up in a country divided.

Science tells us that even when presented with facts, we reject challenges to closely held beliefs. This tribalism has been studied since the 1950s, often referred to as "confirmation bias."

We know this echo chamber well. No one pretends our Facebook and Twitter feeds aren't a hall of mirrors, endlessly reflecting our own ideas back at us. Jack Gorman and his daughter, Sara Gorman, wrote in "Denying to the Grave: Why We Ignore The Facts That Will Save Us," that we actually experience a rush of pleasure when our brains process information that confirms our beliefs.

How, then, could a block vote movement accommodate for our biological and psychological nature? Will die-hard Democrats really vote for Republicans on the ballot? Will Republicans really back Democratic candidates who are friendly to education come November?

Is coming together really possible?

OPEN QUESTION: Will magnet schools survive the HISD budget crisis?

Matt Feinberg from the University of Toronto and Rob Willer from Stanford University collaborated on a study surrounding this question. Moral Foundational Theory studied whether liberals and conservatives could break through the divisive dissonance.

Feinberg and Willer published that, in fact, Americans can experience a "moral reframing" if commonalities can be specifically crafted between deep-held values, in our case education.

And Troy has worked hard to foster that unity.

"The State takes care of infrastructure and education," he clarified. "If we can stay away from the federal races and the federal issues, which are more divisive and which our state can at best only tweak, we can stay focused. We can come together."

The teachers are coming! The teachers are coming!

The hundreds upon hundreds of pictures filling the group's Facebook page every day leading up to the election made me a believer. It wasn't just teachers in the photos proudly showcasing their "I voted today!" stickers.

It was teachers with sons and daughters voting for the first time. Teachers with their spouses. Teachers voting with neighbors. One teacher brought a group of 22 from her church to vote with her.

Wednesday morning

Block voting produced mixed results. But with 74 percent of our candidates winning elections and 5 percent heading to run-offs, the group is feeling optimistic!

Our candidate for Lt. Governor did not win. Scott Milder, who ran a humble four-month campaign on $40,000, stole 370,292 votes from Patrick. In fact, Patrick earned 228,347 fewer votes than Gov. Abbott.

ONE EXCEPTION: Republican Scott Milder endorses Democrat challenger to Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick

Most significant is the revelations that more Texans voted against Dan Patrick than for him. If we count up the teachers who block voted for Milder and the votes Mike Collier and Michael Cooper pulled in, 1,326,457 Texans don't want Patrick's policies. Patrick pulled in 1,164,521 votes by comparison.

So the numbers are there.

If we can maintain our binding commonalities, if we can explain to our friends and neighbors the flaws of vouchers and current school financing, if we show up again in November, we can take back Texas from the invaders.

One vote in hand

Two kiddos with me

And I in the voting booth will be

Ready to vote and finally disarm

Any candidate threatening schools harm.

The teachers are coming! The teachers are coming!

Gaby Diaz is an English teacher in Houston. This article originally appeared on Medium.

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