School board incumbency analysis: 2016 in brief
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Methods of election Opposition Non-incumbent success rates |
Success rates |
2015 incumbency analysis 2014 elections by the numbers 2014 incumbency analysis |
School board elections, 2016 |
Incumbents won a higher percentage of seats than non-incumbents in school board elections in America's largest school districts by enrollment in 2014, 2015, and 2016. With help from name recognition, experience in office, and the ability to tout any accomplishments they achieved while serving, school board incumbents held advantages over their non-incumbent candidate counterparts.
A total of 82.39 percent of incumbents who sought additional terms on board in the largest school districts covered by Ballotpedia won re-election in 2016. That percentage was slightly lower than the 82.66 percent of incumbents who won re-election in 2015, and slightly higher than the 81.31 percent of incumbents who won re-election in 2014.
Those success rates were lower than the success rates for state and federal offices. In 2016, 96.69 percent of incumbents seeking re-election to the U.S. House kept their seats, and 93.10 percent of incumbents seeking re-election to the U.S. Senate kept their seats. In state legislative races, 95.19 percent of incumbents who sought re-election won additional terms, and in state executive races, 86.27 percent of incumbents who sought re-election won additional terms.
Ballotpedia conducted the following study using data from the 2016 elections to investigate the advantages of incumbency in school board elections.
Overview
2016 elections
The following list details how incumbents fared overall in the 2016 school board elections:
- A total of 1,397 incumbents ran for re-election to 1,959 school board seats in 648 school districts in 38 states.
- 71.31 percent of incumbents whose seats were on the ballot ran for re-election.
- 39.08 percent of those incumbents ran unopposed.
- 82.39 percent of incumbents were re-elected.
- 71.09 percent of incumbents defeated challengers to retain their seats.
- 58.75 percent of all seats up for election were kept by incumbents.
- 0.29 percent of incumbents ran as part of a candidate slate.
- Seven states had a 100 percent incumbency success rate: Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Louisiana, Montana, Rhode Island, and Wyoming.
- No incumbents ran for re-election in Illinois or Iowa.
Comparing to past elections
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Incumbents in the 2016 school board elections saw similar success rates to those seen in the 2015 and 2014 school board elections. In 2016, 82.39 percent of incumbents who ran for re-election won additional terms. In 2015, 82.66 percent won additional terms, and in 2014, 81.31 percent won. Incumbents who ran against challengers in 2016 had a higher contested success rate than those who ran against challengers in 2014 and 2015. In 2016, 71.09 percent of contested incumbents won re-election, while 70.88 percent of contested incumbents won re-election in both 2014 and 2015. |
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Details on incumbency analysis from each election year can be found in the table below.
Methodology
In 2016, Ballotpedia covered school board elections in the top 1,000 school districts in the United States by enrollment. Of those districts, 648 held school board elections. These elections took place in 38 states. The 12 states where the largest districts by enrollment did not hold elections in 2016 were Colorado, Hawaii, Kansas, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Washington. These states are not included in this report.
The elections in the 2016 scope were not equally divided across states. The range ran from a high of 382 school board seats on the ballot in California to a low of one seat on the ballot in Iowa. The comparisons made in the report are not representative of each state as a whole; rather, they demonstrate the relative election trends among the largest districts of each state, with varying sample sizes in each location. To mitigate the unequal representation by state, this report also looks at election trends by enrollment size. School districts were compared by eight enrollment ranges, with the largest enrollment size at or above 100,001 students and the smallest enrollment size below 10,001 students. Click here for a spreadsheet of our data analysis.
This report looks at overall numbers from the 2016 school board elections related to election methods, opposition, incumbency advantage, and the rate that non-incumbents were elected. To calculate the percentage of unopposed seats and the average number of candidates who ran per seat, this report counts only formal candidates. Candidates were considered formal if they completed the regular filing process required for school board elections in their state. Write-in candidates were not considered formal candidates because of the extreme variation in election filing laws across states. While some states require write-in candidates to file formally, other states do not require write-ins to file at all.
Because write-in candidates were not calculated as formal candidates, any incumbent or newcomer who faced only write-in challengers was considered unopposed. No write-in candidate beat a formal candidate to win a seat in 2016; they only took open seats.
Candidates were not considered unopposed if they faced any challenge throughout the election process. For example, if they saw opposition in a primary but not a general election, they were not considered unopposed.
Note: Anne Arundel County Public Schools in Maryland only holds retention elections. Though the district held a retention election in 2016, it was not included in this report. District of Columbia Public Schools was also not included in this report.
Success rates
Success rates for incumbents in 2016 varied depending on the method by which elections were conducted. Incumbents were more likely to seek re-election, run unopposed, and win when they ran in by-district elections compared to when they ran in at-large elections. The same was true when incumbents ran in partisan elections compared to when they ran in nonpartisan elections. When separated by type of election, incumbents had a higher success rate when they ran in runoff elections compared to when they ran in primaries, primary runoffs, or general elections.
For more information on incumbent success rates by election method in the 2016 school board elections, check out our incumbency success rates page.
Analysis by state
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Seven states—Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Louisiana, Montana, Rhode Island, and Wyoming—saw 100 percent of incumbents who ran to retain their seats win re-election. The incumbents re-elected in Montana won additional terms unopposed, but incumbents who won in the other six states defeated challengers to win. No incumbents ran for re-election in Illinois or Iowa, which left the seats open for non-incumbents to win. The lowest success rate for states with incumbents who ran to retain their seats occurred in Maryland. A total of 57.14 percent of incumbents won re-election in that state. The map to the right details the overall success rates for incumbents by state. States depicted in gray did not hold school board elections in 2016. More details about incumbency success rates by state can be found in the table below. |
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Analysis by enrollment
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Incumbents saw a higher success rate in school districts with an enrollment between 80,001 and 100,000 students than in any other enrollment size in 2016. A total of 90.48 percent of incumbents who ran for additional terms won re-election in those districts. That enrollment size also had the highest success rate for incumbents who ran in contested elections, with 81.82 percent of them winning re-election. School districts with an enrollment above 100,001 saw the second-highest incumbency success rate. A total of 87.72 percent of incumbents won re-election overall in those districts, and 80.56 percent of incumbents who ran in contested elections kept their seats. |
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School districts with an enrollment between 40,001 and 60,000 students saw the lowest incumbency success rate. A total of 77.12 percent of incumbents who ran for re-election in those districts won overall, and 64.47 percent who faced challengers kept their seats. The second-lowest incumbency success rate was found in school districts with an enrollment between 20,001 and 30,000 students. Incumbents in those districts won 77.31 percent of seats overall and, 67.07 percent who faced challengers kept their seats.
More details on school board incumbency success rates by enrollment size can be found in the chart above and the table below.
See also
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