Some Hamilton County school board members want to create a policy guiding the district’s decisions to provide eligible students with transportation to voting sites.
In October, Superintendent Justin Robertson told board members that students who were registered to vote would be able to participate in a field trip to an early voting site ahead of the November election. Some Republican school board members questioned the use of taxpayer resources, as well as whether teachers would influence students’ decisions.
As these were not overnight field trips, which the school board does need to approve, the trips to the polls were an administrative decision. Moving forward, if the school board wanted to prevent this from happening or set guardrails, Robertson said at the time he recommended the board create a policy.
(READ MORE: Hamilton County Schools to transport eligible students to early voting sites)
The topic was revisited Tuesday, when school board member Jodi Schaffer, R-East Brainerd, suggested amending the district’s field trip policy to include language that any voting and civic duty trips need to correlate with election commission rules around transportation.