By Laureen Boll | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice
Douglas County School District (DCSD) board members will be deciding later this year whether to resume formal collective bargaining with the Douglas County Federation (a local affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers), and a primary deciding factor will be the results of a survey of teachers and staff.
This follows union pressure earlier in 2026 and comes after years of the federation advocating for a return to a contract model.
The political composition of the DCSD school board has shifted back and forth over the decades, reflecting the community’s own evolving priorities. In 2012, a reform-minded board allowed the long-standing collective bargaining agreement (CBA) to expire, moving the district to operate under board policies instead. This change brought greater flexibility, school-level innovation, and a sharper focus on students, contributing to DCSD’s strong academic performance as one of the higher-achieving districts in the Denver metro area.
Yet the teachers’ union has never ceased its efforts to regain formal bargaining power, repeatedly pressing for recognition and a new contract despite the district’s success without it.
This dynamic in Douglas County provides a timely local case study in governance. It stands in sharp contrast to how the drafters and signers of the Declaration of Independence approached a far more momentous decision 250 years ago—precisely the founding document the entire country is celebrating this weekend during the Semiquincentennial.
The Founders’ Principled Stand: Declaration Without a Survey
In 1776, the Continental Congress did not conduct a colony-wide poll or survey of popular opinion before declaring independence.
Support for breaking with Britain was far from unanimous. Historians estimate that active Patriots comprised roughly 30–45% of the colonists, with 15–20% loyal to the British Crown and a large neutral or apathetic segment. Many colonists were not on board; some actively opposed, others simply wanted to be left alone.
Yet a determined group of leaders, steeped in Enlightenment principles of natural rights, liberty, and just government, drafted and signed the Declaration.
They asserted self-evident truths about unalienable rights and pledged their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor; not because it was the most popular course at that moment, but because they believed it was the right one. They acted on principle first.
Support grew later through persuasion (Thomas Paine’s Common Sense, battlefield developments, shared purpose), events, and the evident justice of their cause. The Revolution succeeded not because it began as a majority consensus, but because principled leadership ultimately persuaded enough of the people why this path served the common good.
This was no accident. The founders drew from thinkers like John Locke (consent of the governed grounded in natural rights, with a right to alter government when those rights are violated), Edmund Burke (representatives owe judgment, not mere obedience to constituents’ momentary views), and James Madison (safeguards against factional capture in an extended republic).
They designed governance around deliberation, evidence, and enduring principles rather than snapshots of opinion or organized pressure.
Applying Revolutionary Lessons to DCSD’s CBA Evaluation
The contrast with DCSD’s current path is instructive. A staff survey, while useful for input, is not equivalent to the broad, enduring “consent of the governed.”
It samples one stakeholder group with concentrated interests—often amplified by union organizing—rather than reflecting the general will of the entire community: parents, taxpayers, students, and the district’s mission to help each student reach his or her individual potential.
Treating such a survey as a primary guide risks substituting factional voice for the principled deliberation the founders modeled.
A more principled board approach would flip the script: Begin with the district’s mission as the north star, demand rigorous evidence, exercise trustee judgment, and prioritize long-term outcomes over expediency.
This echoes how the founders persevered despite incomplete initial support. They held to principles, persuaded through reason and results, and built institutions that have endured.
Key elements of a principled CBA evaluation process include the following:
- Mission and evidence first: Explicitly test a CBA against the school district’s mission. Analyze pre- and post-CBA data, peer comparisons, and research on collective bargaining’s impacts. DCSD’s post-CBA flexibility has correlated with top metro performance, high graduation rates, and progress narrowing gaps. How will a CBA positively impact academic outcomes?
- Broad, deliberative input instead of narrow polling: Multiple public forums, parent/community surveys, expert testimony (pro and con), and transparent data review will build genuine consent through persuasion and understanding, much like the founders’ efforts to win hearts and minds.
- Address real concerns without structural capture: Teacher compensation and retention matter, and principled leadership tackles these issues directly via board policies, merit incentives, or community-supported measures. Defaulting to a full CBA risks importing national union political priorities, as evidence suggests that 90% of union spending is directed towards Democrat-aligned political causes.
- Preserve direct parental voice and elected accountability: A formal teachers’ union CBA introduces a powerful, organized third-party intermediary that negotiates binding terms on compensation, work rules, grievances, and related policies. This can circumvent or diminish parents’ direct influence, as key decisions become locked into contract language that limits board flexibility and responsiveness to family concerns (e.g., on curriculum implementation, school-level innovation, or resource allocation). The result is a shift in power away from elected representatives serving the broad public interest toward a concentrated interest group, undermining the chain of accountability the founders designed. Principled governance must actively safeguard and prioritize parental and community voices rather than allowing them to be mediated or diluted by union structures.
- Long-term persuasion and accountability: Like the founders, explain the “why” rooted in principles.
The political ebb and flow on the DCSD board reflects a healthy democracy. But when evaluating major structural changes like resuming formal bargaining, the board has an opportunity to rise above transient pressures.
The union’s persistent efforts are understandable from their perspective, but the board’s duty is to the whole community and the future of its students.
This July 4th weekend, as we celebrate the Declaration of Independence, Douglas County school board leaders can draw a powerful parallel.
The founders did not wait for a poll showing majority support; they acted on self-evident principles, persevered through opposition and uncertainty, and ultimately persuaded the nation of the rightness of their course.
A school board that emulates that spirit—prioritizing mission-aligned evidence, broad deliberation, and principled judgment—will best serve the district’s families and honor the revolutionary legacy of liberty through responsible self-government.
A Coloradan since the 1970s, Laureen is a dedicated parent and advocate for individual dignity and academic excellence in K-12 education, and she is passionate about preserving the independent spirit and values of her beloved home state.
Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in commentary pieces are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the management of the Rocky Mountain Voice, but even so we support the constitutional right of the author to express those opinions.