TPR interviewed all 12 NEISD school board candidates and attended forums for the candidates hosted by the North East ISD Council of PTAs. Visit the NEISD website to input your address and find your single member district. To read about all 12 candidates, return to the main voter guide. Scroll down to the bottom of this story for links to guides on the other four races.
Interviews have been condensed for brevity and relevance.
Single Member District 4 — MacArthur High School cluster
Two candidates are vying to represent the MacArthur High School cluster. David Beyer was appointed to the seat in 2019 and won his first election in 2020. He’s one of only two incumbents on the ballot and the only moderate incumbent.
Jack Hoyle
Age: 71
Occupation: air purification business
Political affiliations: Texas Family Action PAC / San Antonio Family Association
Reason for running: “I saw what was going on. I talked to plenty of parents. A lot of them are disillusioned. A lot of teachers disillusioned.”
Priorities if elected: “The focus has gotten off of the students [and] what they should learn and [become] what people want them to learn.”
“When I was growing up, I was taught the three basics: reading, writing, and arithmetic. I've added a fourth one. I tell people they have to have responsibility.”
Would you have voted for NEISD’s new, more conservative, sex ed curriculum?
“I understand that a lot of teachers feel that they are the ones that need to teach these children that don't belong to them biologically.
“If you didn't birth that child, that child's responsibility belongs to the parents to teach them what they know. … When I was growing up. That [was] the parents’ responsibility.”
Many of the books NEISD pulled from school libraries in 2022 had LGBTQ characters or themes. Do you think LGBTQ books should have greater scrutiny?
“The libraries of the school should have books that the students in those grade levels need to be reading.
“If you're a child growing up and your brain hasn't developed — and nobody's brains develop prior to the mid-twenties anyway — then they shouldn't be reading things that make them like, ‘Why am I? What am I looking at?’ They can't comprehend their alphabet, they can't comprehend their math problems, and they can't read very well. And yet we're putting stuff in there that blows their mind.”
Would you have voted to allow chaplains to serve as counselors in NEISD schools?
“You want my answer to be for or against the question you presented to me. And what I'm saying to you is I will give you what I believe.
“Right now, we're full face evil pushing back on good. We didn't have these challenges when I was growing up. Why? Because people back then believed more in the good, and they weren't twisted in their thinking.
“Let's go back to 1962-63. There was a lady in Texas who had a law license. She did not pass the bar. She was an atheist. She decided that she didn't want prayer in the school. Got that prayer in the school? Up until that time, most schools — which back then were called public schools — they had a prayer, they had a Bible and they had the Ten Commandments usually somewhere in the school. We didn't have shootings. We didn't have muggings. We didn't have rapes. We didn't have violence running rampant. The school system.”
Are you in favor of school vouchers? Would you advocate against them if elected?
Editor's note: This was a question asked at the North East Council of PTAs forum. Jack Hoyle did not attend the forum.
NEISD, like many Texas school districts, is facing a budget deficit this year due to rising costs, the end of federal COVID relief, and flat state funding. What parts of the budget would you prioritize as a trustee?
“Well, I don't know enough about that. I only know what I've read and listened to from the videos that are out there about the board meetings or what have you. I don't have the inside scoop — you really can't make an educated answer to that. So, I'll leave that at the time. But if the question is 'do I have any ideas and know how to run budgets?' Yes, I do. Because you can't stay in business very long if you can't make money.”
David Beyer
Age: 49
Occupation: landscape architect
Political affiliations: Bexar County Champions for Public Education PAC
Reason for running: “We've got a lot of things that have been started under the last four years since I've been here. Things like budget. Teacher pay is always a big one. Just a lot of programs that we're starting that I feel like I want to be able to see through. And I think we are going to be in a really crowded educational marketplace in Bexar County, and I think having some continuity and having somebody that can look a little bit bigger picture [is important].
“I think what's at stake [in this election] is NEISD losing a foothold in this competitive marketplace. Kids going to other districts, going to private school. Homeschool has been one of the biggest things that have exploded over the last few years. Charter schools is another one, but we've been coexisting with them for several, several years now."
Priorities if elected: “We can get lost in a lot of things that you read on Facebook and you might see perpetuated in the news that become the big talking points. But there are very big things that we have to be careful of: budgets, keeping our teachers happy, making sure our students are graduating, going into careers, going into the military, going into college. Making sure that we're keeping property tax rates low."
Beyer said he wants the board to spend less time on controversial social issues and more time on things that enable student success.
“Some of those things that we talk about have touch points that elicit a very visceral response from people. I've lived it for the last four years. I just want to make sure that we don't let the proverbial tail wag the dog. That we [don’t have] a small vocal group that starts pushing policy and agenda for the entire district.
“There's a lot of people that want to get their kid to school, they trust that their teachers and administrators are teaching them, leading them down the right path. I've been a parent in the district for 12, 13 years now, and I have never felt unwelcome by a school. I've never felt unwanted or unappreciated.”
What do you think of NEISD’s new sex ed curriculum?
“The most recent one I actually voted against because I felt, and others that I had heard from my community felt, that we were being too soft.
“There was some discussion about language and whether or not an eighth grader or seventh grader could handle some of the wording in the curriculum, and my opinion was, 'let's not beat around the bush, let's tell them what it is. Because if we don't tell them, somebody else is going to tell them.'
“We need to say 'semen' or 'vaginal intercourse' or whatever it is. We need to say that because these kids need to learn it. And if they don't, they're going to find it somewhere else. And I would hate to put kids in a position to where they don't have the correct information.
“We have the ability to opt into things. So, if you don't want your child to do it, you're free to not let your child do it. Let's not hide that from the other thousands of students that might need that information.”
Many of the books NEISD pulled from school libraries in 2022 had LGBTQ characters or themes. Do you think LGBTQ books should have greater scrutiny?
“We have a very, very diverse district. And I think it's important that we make sure diversity of thought and diversity of approach is treated fairly.
“I know that books got pulled off the shelf. They're getting put back on the shelf, and we're putting a lot of trust in our librarians to be that first wave of reviewing, making sure they know what their community school, their neighborhood school wants. And so, I think that process that's in place, again, maybe not perfect, but I think we need to make sure we trust that process.
“And I think it's important for people to have access to things that represent them. And I mean, honest truth is I'm a middle-aged white guy, and I don't understand everything that everybody in the district is going through. I have my own perspective. And so, I'd like to hear from people that are not me, and that helps me understand what they might be going through. And so, I think we have to be careful and not silence any of those voices. Because then we're not the district that we say we are.”
You voted against allowing chaplains to serve as counselors in NEISD schools. Can you talk about that?
“I definitely heard very loud from our community that they did not feel that was appropriate. We heard from several different faith organizations, including chaplains themselves, that that was not appropriate. And I think it was rife with too much uncertainty, not only on how to write the policy, because we would have had to write that, but then what might potentially happen if the wrong situation occurs where somebody hears something that maybe the family doesn’t want them to, and then then where do we go from there?”
Are you in favor of school vouchers? Would you advocate against them if elected? (Question and answer from PTA forum)
“I'm very firmly pro public education. As a sitting board member, I helped support the resolution that we voted on to support our public schools. And I think taking anything away from those public schools is a detriment to 57,000 students that we have.
“There is choice in our district, and there is choice that people already have. You can go to charter schools. You can go to private schools. But we have a very solid, excellent program in our district that allows students to, even within our district, have a choice and a voice in where they want to go. There are magnet programs, there are career and technology programs.
“So, I'm not in favor of vouchers. And I think we in the district need to support what it is our students, our teachers, our staff are doing.”
NEISD, like many Texas school districts, is facing a budget deficit this year due to rising costs, the end of federal COVID relief, and flat state funding. What parts of the budget would you prioritize as a trustee?
“I think the last thing we for sure want to touch is staff. We're having a hard time finding custodians, nutrition specialists, bus drivers all the way up through teachers and administration.
“We've for the last five years been sort of trimming where we already know we're going to need to. And I think that [avoiding trimming staff positions], since it's the largest part of our budget, is going to be tough, but I think that's the one we want to [keep]. Obviously, we need to retain that as much as possible.”
