COS SUCCESS: Transparent Florida school board candidates win BIG

The Convention of States grassroots army worked tirelessly for months to provide Florida voters with straightforward answers from local school board candidates, which ended in a major success for students and parents this week. 

In an effort to allow voters in both Sarasota and Indian River Counties to adequately understand who they were electing into office, the COS Florida team began a Get Out The Vote (GOTV) campaign earlier this year to conduct candidate surveys.

The survey consisted of five questions, which were intended to allow candidates to be upfront and honest with their community. Five school board candidates chose not to respond, while eight provided responses to the COS Florida team.

The efforts ended in 100% success. See the questions and responses in the charts below:


In the Sarasota County race, all three open seats were sweeping victories for the candidates who maintained complete openness on their ideologies.

In the Indian River Country race, all three candidates who gave clear answers to the public won their races. However, the District 2 winner is now part of a runoff race in the general election because no candidate won over 50% of the vote. 

The overwhelming success of this GOTV shows the effectiveness of the COS approach: when voters know where candidates stand on issues, they respond accordingly at the polls.

“This is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of what we can accomplish with our grassroots efforts nationwide using this approach focusing on school board elections,” said COS Regional Director Brenda Karlin.

Americans must demand transparency in elections, no matter the size, scope or position at stake. The GOTV efforts of COS are nonpartisan, and offer an opportunity for candidates to give direct responses on how they plan to operate in office.

“This is about transparency of the issues and allowing parents and voters in general to understand where school board candidates are on issues that are important to them,” Karlin added.

The power of the grassroots is evident, as seen in the Florida race. COS volunteers coordinated efficiently in creating timelines, candidate surveys, over 5,000 GOTV phone calls, emails, and of course, sharing the results far and wide with Florida voters.

These targeted efforts stand as a model for future elections and will only further the COS grassroots initiatives across the country.

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