On April 1, 2011, the Dallas ISD Board of Trustees adopted a resolution for cancelling the May general election because all trustees up for election drew no opponents. There was barely a public murmur about this cancellation – a sure sign of illness for the democratic process.
School Boards in Texas serve a critical role in our education system. School Boards are elected with five major job responsibilities. It’s their job to:
set the vision for the school district,
hire a Superintendent to achieve that vision,
hold the Superintendent accountable for achieving that vision through goal setting and accountability monitoring,
set local policy and adopt a budget each year, and
serve as a community liaison for the public while making decisions in the best interest of all students.
While trustees may not be very well known by the general public, the discussions and decisions that they make at the board table cascade down into schools and classrooms across our entire system and impact every single student who attends school in Dallas ISD.
In 2013, I moved to Dallas to take over as Principal at Dallas ISD’s School for the Talented and Gifted (TAG Magnet). In my first conversation with Mike Satarino (TAG’s legendary outgoing principal who would soon become my friend and mentor), he said something that changed my perspective and would, eventually, lead me to run for the Dallas ISD School Board.
Mike said “I know that you have a lot of ideas and energy around what you believe your job will be here at the school with the teachers, families, and students. All of that is great, but it is only half the battle. Pay attention to what is happening at the policy level with the school board. If you’re not paying attention there, by the time you hear of changes , it’ll be too late to advocate for anything from the educator perspective or prepare yourself or staff to make the most of any upcoming changes.”
This gemstone of advice transformed how I thought about the principalship. I got to witness its wisdom in action before the end of my first year. Up until then, Dallas ISD board policy required every high school student to be ranked from first to last in their class. For schools like TAG, where even our last ranked student would take an average of 11 AP courses, this created a huge disadvantage. Students would get automatically declined from colleges simply because they were not ranked high enough.
When this policy came up for discussion again at the board level, we were ready for it. Through a collaborative effort of multiple schools and stakeholders, the Dallas ISD board was able to learn about the unintended negative consequences this policy was having on seniors across our system and make a necessary, positive change that would benefit students across the system.
Over my six years as principal in Dallas ISD, I was able to witness many other examples of this. The decisions that were made at the board level would always, inevitably, end up impacting our work on the campuses.
After I ended up accepting a job outside of Dallas ISD in the winter of 2019, I decided to run for election to the Dallas ISD school board. I had lived the experience of board policy consequences impacting the work at a school level and believed that it would be important to bring a current educator perspective to the Dallas ISD school board. Thankfully, voters agreed.
I am proud to have been elected to serve as the Dallas ISD School Board Trustee for District 7, which includes parts of Oak Cliff, West Dallas, and Cockrell Hill. In this role, I am now able to leverage my experience as a teacher and principal to ensure that the discussions and decisions that we make at the school board level yield positive impact for students across our entire city.
I am proud of the progress that Dallas ISD has made over the last decade since 2010. I look forward to helping to ensure that we continue that trajectory for the next decade but that cannot happen without your help.
It takes all of us, working together, to continue that progress. That means continuing to do the tireless work you do as educators every day. It means paying attention to what is happening at the school board level each month. It means reaching out to your current school board representatives and getting to know them. It means giving those school board members feedback as constituents and educators. It means voting in local elections. It means getting others to vote in local elections. And one day, perhaps, it means running for a seat on the school board yourself!
Ben Mackey currently serves on the Dallas Independent School District Board of Trustees. Ben represents District 7 which is the largest Dallas ISD district by number of students, serving over 23,000 students from North and Central Oak Cliff, Cockrell Hill, and West Dallas. Before being elected to the school board in May, Ben served as the principal of Dallas ISD’s School for the Talented and Gifted (TAG) from 2013 to 2019. Over those six years, TAG was been named as the #1 high school in the nation four times by U.S. News and World Report.
During Ben’s tenure, TAG revamped its application process with a focus on equity and access, resulting in TAG becoming federally recognized as a Title 1 school for the first time. During this same time frame, academic achievement at TAG soared with the school reaching all-time highs in SAT, ACT, and Advanced Placement (AP) achievement, proving what is possible for students regardless of the background that they come from.
Ben currently works as the Chief of Research, Evaluation, and Design in DeSoto ISD where he manages data, innovation, technology, special programs, and organizational redesign. Ben earned his masters degree in school leadership from Harvard University and his bachelors degrees in finance and history from the University of Florida.