LEESBURG, Va.—Independent school board candidates are trying to carve out their niche in Fairfax and Loudoun counties. These two top Virginia school districts, with over 250,000 students combined, have also been under the national spotlight for fights over race- and gender-related school policies, with differing views overlapping with party lines.
As a result, though officially nonpartisan, most school board candidates in the two counties are politically endorsed. Out of a total of 43 candidates, the two independents, one in each county, are betting on the communities’ belief that school board positions should be free of party lines or that candidates endorsed by either party lack the credibility to focus on academics and academics only.
