Gov. Sarah Sanders announced her second appointment to the state Board of Education on Friday: Leigh Keener, a former teacher at Episcopal Collegiate School in Little Rock and a close friend of the governor. Keener is godmother to Sanders’ son Huck, the governor said.
The appointment fills the remaining vacancy on the nine-member state board; members typically serve seven-year terms. In July, Sanders appointed former Republican legislator Ken Bragg, a longtime proponent of the school voucher programs championed by Sanders, to fill the seat vacated by outgoing board president Ouida Newton. Keener will take the place of Fitz Hill, whose term also expired last month.
Keener has been a teacher for two decades, Sander said today, and is a specialist in early childhood education. A National Board Certified teacher, she’s worked at Episcopal for many years, where her work included exposing young children to science and technology education. She received her B.A. and M.A. in early education from the University of Arkansas and earned a certificate in early education leadership from Harvard’s Graduate School of Education in 2021.
Arkansas Times editor Austin Bailey had the scoop back in July that Keener would soon be announced as the next state board appointee. It’s unclear why the announcement took another three weeks, but state law bars teachers (along with superintendents, elected officials and others) from serving on the state Board of Education.
Episcopal Collegiate confirmed Friday that Keener no longer works at the school, but declined to say when she left.
Sanders said she first met Keener more than 20 years ago. “We met playing softball in Hillcrest when I had just moved to Little Rock,” she said. (That would have been when her father, Mike Huckabee, was lieutenant governor.) They attended Central together and Keener became one of her “very best friends,” the governor said. Keener’s three children and the first family’s three children play together, she added.
Keener said she’ll bring her emphasis on early childhood education to the state board.
The governor and Keener shared a hug at today’s announcement.
