New Trier School District 203 Superintendent Linda Yonke has voted in four Democrat primaries since 2006, and no Republican ones, according to the Illinois State Board of Elections (ISBE).
Yonke and New Trier High School’s administration are under fire for alleged political bias, after organizing a mandatory “white guilt” seminar where students will be subjected to a day of lectures by leftist activists.
In response to criticism that the seminar’s subject matter is one-sided, Yonke, who lives in Northbrook, said she has heard from many in the New Trier community that the seminar “looks fabulous.”
Yonke’s leadership team is made up predominantly of registered Democrats, ISBE records show.
Of Yonke’s ten highest-paid staff members, eight are registered Democrats, one is a registered Republican, and one is registered but has no voting record.
New Trier Assistant Superintendent for Student Services Timothy S. Hayes of Glenview, leader of the “All School Seminar Planning Committee” which organized the event, has voted in four Democrat primaries since 2000, and none for Republicans.
Hayes told the New Trier District 203 School Board on Jan. 18 that the event was inspired by an essay, What White Children Need to Know about Race, written by “white privilege” promoter and University of Pennsylvania professor Ali Michael. It calls for high schools to “take a more proactive approach” in teaching their students “the ways that whites tend to benefit materially from systems of racism.”
Michael actively advocates that schools should teach all white students that they are racist en route to making them actively “anti-racist.”
Yonke will earn $419,380 and Hayes $238,566 in total compensation this year, according to district financial records. That’s not including annual pension contributions made for each of them by taxpayers, which aren’t calculated per-employee but amount to more than $100,000 per year.
In 2008, Yonke and Hayes led a public push to get New Trier taxpayers to build a new, $400 million high school. It would have been more than twice as expensive as the highest-priced public school ever built in Illinois (Chicago Whitney Young, $31 million in 1973, or $173 million in 2016 dollars).
The seminar is scheduled for Feb. 28.
New Trier District 203 Leadership Voter Registration & Annual Compensation
| Linda L. Yonke | District Superintendent | Democrat | $419,380 |
| George H. Sanders | Dir, Human Resources | Democrat | $272,727 |
| Christopher T. Johnson | Asst. Sup., Finance | Democrat | $248,051 |
| Timothy S. Hayes | Asst. Sup., Student Svcs | Democrat | $238,566 |
| Paul Sally | Asst. Sup, Curriculum | Democrat | $237,034 |
| Denise A. Dubravec | Principal | N/A | $229,800 |
| Linda Knier | Director, Academic Svcs | Republican | $226,781 |
| Gerald Munley | Assistant Principal | Democrat | $223,759 |
| Paul M. Waechtler | Principal | Democrat | $216,989 |
| Ellen W. Ambuehl | Director., Special Ed | Democrat | $197,280 |
| Peter W. Tragos | Assistant Principal | Democrat | $196,807 |
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