Boise High student challenges incumbent for school board. Here’s our pick

Race 4 for Boise school trustee presented our editorial board with perhaps its most difficult decision.

Both incumbent Steve Schmidt and challenger Shiva Rajbhandari are intelligent and thoughtful candidates who could serve the board well.

We were torn about whom to endorse. Schmidt, in his time on the board, has had a deliberative, measured approach to the job that has been welcome. We have no doubt he would continue to hear all sides of the issues if he were elected. Rajbhandari in many ways seemed to be the even stronger candidate — he would give students a measure of authority within the school district, and his intellect, passion and ethical commitment are undeniable.

But we had serious reservations as well. Rajbhandari, a senior who will graduate from Boise High at the end of this school year, has pledged to either find a suitable replacement for himself — if the board will agree to appoint another student — to attend board meetings virtually or to take a gap year before college to complete his term. Taking a gap year would be a tremendous sacrifice, and we are not sure it is fair to ask that of a high school student. And it does not seem entirely fair to voters to risk electing a candidate who may not serve the full term, but be replaced by another student they did not select.

In this context, Schmidt seems to be a safer pick.

It bears emphasizing that none of these are issues with Rajbhandari, but with the requirements of school board candidates. Candidates must be 18 and registered to vote in order to run, and that makes it nearly impossible for a student to serve on the board.

That’s a shame. It would be good to elect Rajbhandari this year, but it would have been better to elect him last year or the year before, when serving a two-year term would be more compatible with his schooling. (The board should consider making structural changes to allow this to be possible in the future).

For these reasons, we originally leaned toward Schmidt.

But we were strongly disappointed when Schmidt did not forcefully rebuke the endorsement of the Idaho Liberty Dogs, a group of extremists who have promoted library censorship and lob horrible rhetoric online. That is the type of endorsement a candidate has to disavow forcefully to demonstrate that they can stand up for what is right. Schmidt’s failure to do so tipped the scales. We have no fear that Rajbhandari would make a similar mistake.

We decided that our endorsement should go to Rajbhandari, though we were not unanimous in that decision.

No matter how he fares in this election, we expect we will hear more of Rajbhandari in the coming decades. He has the makings of a leader.

And Rajbhandari will immediately improve the governance of the board. When the election is finished, there are likely to be parents, educators, education experts and people with administrative experience on the board. There are no other students.

And it makes sense to put a student on the board.

Students don’t just deserve to be heard. They deserve a say, a share of authority in the structure that governs much of their daily lives.

The best way to accomplish that is to put Rajbhandari on the board. He has our endorsement.

This story was originally published September 1, 2022 at 4:00 AM.