Carmel Excellence started organizing almost immediately after the last school board election, officially filing as a statewide PAC on July 11, 2023.
There’s a reason Carmel Excellence is organized at a state level, as opposed to being local. Following the CCS board election, they plan to change their name to Indiana Excellence. These political aspirants intend to bury the CCS race in money, note what’s most effective and then use that to develop a playbook for attacking districts across the rest of the state. The group laid this out at their official fundraising kick-off event, which I attended in December 2023.
Carmel Excellence describes themselves and their supporters as founders of a movement.
At that December kick-off, a full six months before candidates could even file, Carmel Excellence was confidently telling their supporters that there would be only two ‘conservative’ candidates in this year’s election.
At that same meeting, Carmel Excellence claimed to have 15 functionally distinct teams working on aspects of their campaign to take over CCS.
Carmel Excellence says they will raise and spend $150,000 in their efforts to take over our schools.
For some comparison on that $150,000 figure:
In 2020, nine candidates ran for two CCS seats. Three of those apparently didn’t even raise money, as they have no campaign filings on record. The other six raised a total of $21,563. That’s $3,594 per candidate if you only count the six, or $2,396 per candidate if you spread it across all nine.
In 2022, nine candidates ran for three CCS seats. They raised a total of $165,817, or $18,424 per candidate.
So, for their two candidates, Carmel Excellence will raise and spend nearly as much as all nine candidates two years ago. It’s nuts.
Additionally, their insistence that there would only be two ‘conservative’ candidates six months before anyone could actually file is extremely creepy and ominous. Keep in mind the allegations of Greg Brown, Jenny Brake and Adam Sharp’s campaign trying to intimidate candidates into dropping out in 2022.
It’s also worth noting the level of organization going on. At their December 2023 kickoff, they spoke about having a team that would filter all communications to the public. In 2022, this movement ran very much with their views and opinions in the open. From what we’ve seen so far, it seems their plan this year is to avoid publicly saying anything meaningful about what they intend to change at CCS. This should be a huge warning bell to Carmel voters, given the incredible levels of money, time and effort they’re pouring into taking over our school system.
If not Carmel Excellence, then who?
If you're proud to live in one of the top school districts in the state...
If you appreciate and support our teachers...
If your kids have benefited or are benefiting from a world-class CCS education...
If you want our schools to stay welcoming to all students and their families...
I hope you'll join me in opposing Carmel Excellence and voting for Jon Shapiro and Kris Wheeler.
Disclaimer:
As mentioned on the homepage, this site contains both facts and my opinions on those facts. I believe the difference is quite obvious, but if you question which category any particular statement falls into, please reach out via the Contact page and I will be glad to clarify.