Prior to 2020, local school boards were entrusted to make bipartisan decisions to direct the education of 80,000 students in Bucks County. The vast majority of these decisions were made on non-controversial topics and without much local attention or media scrutiny.

When school boards were forced to vote on the topic of school closures and COVID mitigation, everything changed. Local school districts found themselves front and center in national politics. Board directors were unprepared, and could never have been prepared, to make decisions that had such an outsized effect on the lives of children and families. The debate and deliberation over these decisions created intense division and dysfunction that remains to this day.

This strange new dynamic has been exacerbated by an overwhelming majority of Bucks County media publications offering only one side of the story, while masquerading as neutral observers. When information is disseminated by local media, the facts shared, and the sources consulted are cherry picked in support of progressive politics. Details are selectively omitted or included to paint republican board directors in a negative light. The goal seems to be political activism, rather than journalism.

Here in Bucks County, the unfair portrayal of our school boards is amplified by our importance in state and national politics. Consequently, there is an urgent and immediate need for honest, local reporting. The Bucks County School Board Bulletin exists to meet this need.

We seek to provide exclusive candidate interviews, in depth research, and the truth behind the most controversial local headlines. Our hope is to arm voters with the information necessary to make more informed choices, and to improve understanding of the issues that matter most in our schools.

Mara Witsen & Kyrie Hogan, Co-Founders