In 2019, Ballotpedia will cover regularly scheduled elections across 63 Texas school districts. Of these, 56 districts will hold their elections on May 4. The 56 districts have a combined 161 board seats up for election, and the remaining seven school districts are holding their elections on November 5.
Of the 161 seats up for election in May, 67 (or 42 percent) are uncontested. Thirty-nine districts have at least one unopposed candidate, and 13 of them have no contested seats on the ballot and may cancel their election entirely. The remaining 17 districts have contested seats across the board.
A total of 316 candidates filed for election, which is approximately 1.96 candidates per seat. This figure is higher than the 2016 Texas average of 1.79 candidates per seat and the 2016 national average of 1.90 candidates per seat. In all, 114 incumbents are seeking re-election, which means 47 races are open-seat contests.
These 56 school districts served a combined total of 1,817,124 students during the 2016-2017 school year.
Additional reading:
https://ballotpedia.org/School_boards_in_session:_opposition_in_2016
https://ballotpedia.org/School_boards_in_session:_2016_in_brief
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