A indelible image lingers from the raucous, jammed election night party jointly thrown by four school board challengers this month in the basement of Seattle's Labor Temple. As emcee Curt Firestone announced the first substantive polling results of the night to a jubilant crowd--results that gave each challenger a lead that was only to widen as the night went on--each newly crowned board member came forward out of the crowd. And as the crowd erupted, two or three of the candidates, in her turn, actually blushed.

That's something one doesn't see too often on election night. But then, nobody present--candidates, campaign workers, or supporters--was much used to being on the good end of an election night win. Let alone a landslide victory, complete with a mandate for change. Let alone several of them. This was a singularly inexperienced crowd. Given the minimal TV coverage the races got, it is entirely possible that election night was the first time any of the four candidates had actually been on a newscast.

The four new school board members--Brita Butler-Wall, Darlene Flynn, Sally Soriano, and Irene Stewart--won on a night when their victory, combined with city council results, left media accounts focusing on voters' anti-incumbent mood and the "message" it sent. But in the council races, any such message was a muddle at best; all three winning challengers (David Della, Tom Rasmussen, and the clueless Jean Godden) have spent many years moving among the city's political movers and shakers, and each campaigned on different themes. Meanwhile, the significance of the school race was unmistakable. None of the four women had met before this year's campaign; their similar themes led to an organically developed slate when each survived the primary, and the slate was cemented as sitting board members, led by now-ousted board president Nancy Waldman, turned the search for a new superintendent into an embarrassing farce. The results were victories ranging from 12 to 40 percentage points.

The joint landslide was due to more than a common foe. Three of Seattle's four new school board members--Butler-Wall, Flynn, and Stewart--were politicized by their experiences as parents of Seattle public school students who became frustrated by dealings with the district. All four made transparency and public accountability a mainstay of their runs. They as with the public knew well enough that the myriad challenges facing the district will defy quick fixes. But having district leadership that listens to and respects the district's constituents was a change that could, and will, begin instantly.

All this is, hopefully, well and good for Seattle's schoolchildren and their families; but what gives the school board change wider resonance is less the new members than the people who ran their campaigns. While each campaign developed a small number of more experienced local hands it would run ideas by, all were run by relative neophytes and outsiders in the local political scene. Flynn was her own campaign manager. Several of Butler-Wall's inner circle were local Green Party stalwarts, marking the first time ever that Seattle's Greens have been central to a local candidate's victory. It bodes well for future Green electoral runs. Soriano, also helped by some Greens, was previously best known for her decade-plus of local fair trade activism, including a pivotal early role in organizing 1999's anti-WTO demonstrations--not exactly considered a resume-builder among either local power brokers or much of the public. All four campaigns relied heavily on unpaid volunteers. Flynn and Butler-Wall in particular waged remarkably well-organized, well-funded grass roots campaigns.

If there is to be a revolution, this would be how we do it: untelevised, but also well-organized, populist, inclusive, and responding organically to real (as opposed to pre-determined) issues that matter in our daily lives. The school board challengers' messages resonated because parents and others familiar with Seattle's schools knew the challengers had a far better grasp of the district and its challenges than the incumbent board members. And, as with any revolution, it never hurts that--as invariably seems to happen when opposition gels--the status quo shows itself at every turn as arrogant, incompetent, and clueless.

In many ways for these four, winning office was the easy part. What they've "won" is the chance to be part (with first-term board member Mary Bass) of a likely five (of seven) vote majority bloc on a school board charged with determining policy and providing oversight for a 42,000-child urban district bedeviled with myriad, often conflicting constituencies and a host of seemingly intractable problems involving funding, performance, disproportionality, and much more. It's easiest to please everyone before you've cast your first vote.

But in an era when the prevailing wisdom is that caring is futile because no one can make a difference, these four, and their supporters, have already made one. That was, and is, well worth celebrating.