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Thanks to the defeat of Connie Bernard on Saturday, Democrats will make up a majority on the East Baton Rouge School Board for the first time in 15 years.

Katie Kennison, the 41-year-old first-time candidate who beat Bernard, is also something the School Board has not seen in almost as long: a White Democrat.

The last two White Democrats, Greg Baldwin and “Buckskin� Bill Black, left the board in 2010.

Kennison’s left-of-center politics, joined with the stances of the four African-American members of the board, all Democrats, could scramble the usual debates on the board.

The new five-member Democratic majority could mean renewed focus on issues important to school employees and educator organizations, such as pay and working conditions, as well as school-level issues that spark discontent among parents.

The new majority also could mean the new board revisits issues such as the on-hold redistricting of school board election districts.

This past spring, the board’s four Black members united behind a map that would have increased the total number of districts from nine to 11, likely shifting the racial balance on the board from White to Black. The board’s five White Republicans, however, agreed instead to a nine-member map that would likely have preserved the white majority on the board. Litigation led the courts to set aside that map and move forward with the fall elections using the old election map approved in 2014.

Democrats, however, differ on many education issues, including the merits of charter schools.

Outside interest groups united by their support for charter schools spent about 80% of the more than $2.2 million reported so far in the fall School Board elections. Four of the winning school board candidates, all Black Democrats, were endorsed by and received ample support from these groups.

Of the nine School Board races, eight were won by candidates supported by at least one big-spending charter-friendly outside group.

Kennison is the exception. She defeated Bernard to represent District 8 by a solid 53%-to-47% margin despite spending $0 on her race and doing little campaigning.

“I thought for sure I was going to lose,� confessed Kennison, a mother of two children in public schools.

That changed around 11 p.m. Saturday when she started getting calls and texts galore telling her she indeed had won.

District 8 has historically been conservative. Bernard made Saturday’s runoff after leading the voting in the Nov. 8 primary, despite having quit the race two months earlier. She did an about-face the day after the primary and resumed her campaign, banking on the district’s conservative voters to deliver her a fourth term.

Bernard’s penchant for controversy appears to have gotten the better of her, negating her partisan advantage.

For instance, in June 2020, Bernard said in an interview that Confederate general Robert E. Lee treated his slaves well — she later apologized for her “insensitive remarks.� Days later during the debate that led to the renaming of Robert E. Lee High School as Liberty High, Bernard was caught online shopping. All that led to widespread calls for her resignation and an unsuccessful recall effort.

When she takes office in January, Kennison will join five other newcomers to the board. They will be joined by the three lone incumbents who managed to be re-elected.

Like other newcomers, Kennison is now just starting to grapple with the many issues and challenges she will face over the next four years. She said she plans to sit down Tuesday for the first time with Supt. Sito Narcisse and his staff.

“In the next couple of weeks, I’m going to be meeting with a lot of people and learning lots of things,� Kennison said. “I’m looking forward to it.�

Kennison is one of four new board members with children in Baton Rouge public schools. The others are Carla Powell in District 3, Nathan Rust in District 6 and Patrick Martin V in District 9. The board they are replacing has no members with children currently in public school.

Incumbents have had a rough ride this election cycle.

Dadrius Lanus, re-elected to a second term on Nov. 8, is the only incumbent who won handily. Incumbent Mark Bellue won a third term that same day by just 21 votes. Due to term limits, Bellue can’t run again in 2026 for his District 1 seat.

In Saturday’s four school board races, all of them runoffs, the only incumbent to prevail was Mike Gaudet, winning by just 124 votes over challenger Cathy Carmichael.

Carmichael nearly became the fifth parent with children currently in public schools elected to the board. And like Kennison, she is a Democrat. Unlike Kennison, Carmichael ran a spirited campaign, backed by a passionate group of supporters.

After the election, Gaudet, a Republican, thanked Carmichael and fellow challenger Gloria Wall, who failed to make the runoff, for running “honorable campaigns despite the intrusion of outside groups into the race.�

“One more promise, NO MORE MAILERS IN YOUR MAILBOX!!!!� .

Although she came up short, Saturday’s results are a sign of progress for active parents like Carmichael. Carmichael is co-founder of the group Friends of Public Education and has been outspoken in trying to push the school district to do a better job of listening to and honoring the desires of its teachers and parents. Carmichael is the third consecutive active parent that Gaudet has faced since 2017, winning by narrower margins each time.

The fall elections also leave Supt. Narcisse in an uncertain place. He’s enjoyed the steady support of a supermajority of six or seven board members on most issues since he came to Baton Rouge in January 2021. Now, that is down to the three incumbents, Bellue, Gaudet and Lanus. Narcisse's contract expires in June 2024.

While none of the six newcomers openly called for replacing Narcisse, several campaigned on platforms that implicitly criticized Narcisse by attacking the status quo, particularly the low academic performance of many schools, and promised closer scrutiny of school spending and operations.