About Me
If you’re on this page, I’m guessing you’d like to know why this site’s here
During the 2022 school board election, a trio of candidates tried to take over our local school board so that they could push their political and social views on our kids. They used a misinformation playbook that was deployed in suburbs across the country. I took the lies spread by them and their supporters personally, as they were directly attacking my kids’ school, district and teachers, as well as our community at large. So I started a simple website to push back. It got some traction. The content from that site is archived here if you’re interested, under the 'CCS 2022 Election' category on the All News page.
A whole lot of other informed, angry parents and community members had already organized and been fighting back against the propaganda. Even more joined in. There were three great candidates to rally behind. In the end, sanity mostly prevailed. Two of three terrible candidates lost.
Unfortunately, now that I was paying attention, it was obvious the attacks would continue. Locally, we have Moms For Liberty and their accomplices actively spreading misinformation through social media and attempting to recruit new members to their cause. At the state level, the Indiana General Assembly geared up for a 2023 session of catering to special interests and trying to make public school education a wedge to divide our communities.
In late January, I decided there might be some value in launching a new site, dedicated to providing data and fact checking on various claims made about both Indiana public schools in general and our local schools specifically. Then, out of the blue, my dad caught COVID, had complications due to existing health conditions, and was gone a week later. The idea for this site receded far into the background.
By the time I started paying attention to the legislature again, some bad bills had failed and others had progressed. I decided to go to the Statehouse to offer narrow testimony speaking out against a very specific, very egregious expansion of voucher funding to wealthy families. Senator Liz Brown decided to push me to answer questions about charter schools, an issue I was neither knowledgeable on nor prepared to speak about.
For several weeks following that experience, I spent most of my free time digging into publicly available data on Indiana’s charter schools. I found enough interesting tidbits that I thought others might like to have them summarized in one place. The idea for this site resurfaced. So here it is, dedicated to Senator Brown for inspiring me to learn more.
If you clicked this page hoping for personal details, I just severely shortchanged you. Lest those people come away disappointed: I’m fortunate to have an incredible wife, kids and dog. I’ve worked in marketing for the past twenty-some years, almost exclusively focused on helping companies with highly complex products reach audiences with varied levels of technical knowledge. I have degrees from both Purdue and IU, so if you live in our great state, you’ve likely got a built-in excuse to like or dislike me, whichever you prefer.