Endorsements: Noland, Owens, Smith for Elgin Area School District U-46 board

In recent years, Elgin Area School District U-46 has seen a shift toward more conservative voices on the board.

Jeanette Ward and Cody Holt were endorsed in 2015 by Joe Walsh, the Tea Party member and former 8th District congressman who has a conservative radio talk show. Both were elected.

Ward's term isn't over until 2019, but Holt ran for a two-year term and finds himself running now for re-election. Joining them is 19-year-old Enoch Essendrop, who attends Providence Baptist College in Elgin and espouses the same conservative values.

They are squaring off against board President Donna Smith, who's been on the board since 2001; one-term board member Veronica Noland; and Melissa Owens, a member of U-46's Citizens Advisory Council, long considered a proving ground for U-46 school board candidates.

Smith has seen the district through some tumultuous times, including transitioning among four superintendents and a federal discrimination lawsuit. The district is in better shape today, thanks in part to her.

Noland was elected four years ago as an angry parent and since then has become a solid contributor to the board.

Besides gaining insight to the workings of the board through the CAC, Owens adopted a 4-year-old from China, which gives her valuable insight into the specific needs of students who were not born here.

U-46 for decades has searched high and low for teachers of color to better reflect and connect with its diverse student population. Holt does not support going out of the country to recruit, and we find that very shortsighted.

Holt and Essendrop have earned Walsh's full-throated endorsement for their positions on issues of taxation, transparency, curriculum and the district's policy on the use of locker room and bathroom facilities by transgender students, something Holt called "outrageous."

Our position: Students ought to be given equal access to facilities that match their gender identity, and school boards should not micromanage curriculum decisions for which they rely on well-prepared expert administrators.

Holt, at 25, is a student of government policy. He is a fiscal conservative who says that board members must courageously ask themselves if what they are approving is a want or a need. With that we agree. But with much of his vision for U-46 we don't.

Smith, Owens and Noland are endorsed.