Rebecca Mead writes in The New Yorker that the presidential campaign has almost entirely overlooked K-12 education. The subject never came up in the presidential debates (nor did climate change).
She writes:
Unsurprisingly, the candidates differ as much on their approach to education as they do on virtually every other issue, as the Washington Post outlined in a helpful analysis earlier this month. In September, Donald Trump delivered a speech at the Cleveland Arts and Sciences Academy, a charter school in Cleveland, Ohio, in which he offered his vision, though not before delivering an extended peroration about the perfidies of his Democratic opponent—e-mail, Iraq, the Clinton Foundation—unrelated to educational concerns. When he did get around to his own proposals, he spoke of expanding existing school-choice programs, promising that in a Trump Administration twenty billion dollars of federal education funds would be reassigned to provide a block grant enabling the eleven million students living in poverty to attend the private or public school of their parents’ choice. “Competition always does it,” he said. “The weak fall out and the strong get better. It is an amazing thing.” He advocated merit pay for teachers, stated his opposition to Common Core, and spoke in favor of charter schools and against teachers’ unions. “It’s time for our country to start thinking big and correct once again,” he declared, thereby failing to meet the second-grade Common Core standard 2.1.E. (“Use adjectives and adverbs, and choose between them depending on what is to be modified.”)
Clinton has a long-standing commitment to educational issues; as First Lady of Arkansas, in 1983, she headed a committee to improve academic achievement among the state’s public-school students. She has declared the intention of “preparing, supporting, and paying every child’s teacher as if the future of our country is in their hands,” and has given some suggestions as to how that estimable goal would be accomplished. She has said that she will provide funding to increase the teaching of computer science; she has also pledged to fund the rebuilding of school infrastructure, and to address the so-called school-to-prison pipeline, whereby African-American and minority students are disproportionately subject to overly punitive disciplinary policies, often involving law enforcement, within the schools they attend; she would fund interventions in social and emotional learning, to the tune of two billion dollars.
Clinton has left us all guessing about charter schools, but she has a balancing act: She needs money to run her campaign (think DFER), and she needs to satisfy the her strong supporters, the teachers’ unions, whose very existence is put at risk by the growth of the non-union charter industry (more than 90% of charter schools are non-union).
But of this we can be sure: Trump is 100% aligned with the far-right that hates public schools and unions. He loves charter schools and vouchers. He thinks he will “get rid” of the Common Core, but he doesn’t know that the president does not have the power to do so. His surrogate Carl Paladino of Buffalo, New York, said that Trump would not put an educator in charge of the Department of Education. The Trump campaign seems to look at public education as a cancerous growth on American society.
A vote for Trump is a vote to cripple and perhaps abandon public education.
A vote for Clinton is a vote for a candidate who has some good ideas and who knows that Obama’s education policies have been unsuccessful. Many think she will continue the status quo, but count me as one who expects that she will look for ways to improve public schools, not destroy them.
Jill Stein and the Green Party didn’t for get education, including K-12! Please disregard the bs that Jill is only polling 1%, especially after Hilliray’s upcoming 2nd criminal investigation from the FBI! Please read the Green Party platform on education: http://ontheissues.org/2016/Jill_Stein_Education.htm
Not sure what evidence you are basing the rejection of polling. Even if sampling methods are criticized, an averaging of polls gives Stein little chance to win. Protest votes are great and the time to do so was in the primary. There is too much at stake and too close a margin to risk having Trump elected, assuming you are not a Trump supporter.
Main Stream Media and the corporate set are in the tank for Hillary (for now until the full effects of the 2nd FBI CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION and yet more Wikileaks hit)! And as the MSM fixed the primaries against Bernie, they are doing so against Jill Stein! We have to risk endless Middle East conflicts and possible war with Russia, almost guaranteed with Hillary! If we get Jill Stein to 5%, at least we can have a better chance of “real” choice in the future! I prefer voting for greater good over the lesser of two very evil evils!
Paul,
Stein is polling at 1%. The dope Gary Johnson at 5%.
Do you absolve yourself of any responsibility for the outcome?
There’s little evidence for what you suggest for such a large-scaled conspiracy.
If you vote for Stein or Johnson, you risk electing the Evil that is Trump and his core supporters. Those of us who do not like Hillary, but know what a disaster Trump would be, are responsible enough and willing to take a gut punch, hold our noses, and elect Hillary. That may give those Stein and Johnson supporters enough cover that they have the luxury of “voting their conscious”.
You’re welcome.
Paul, Bernie is supporting Hillary and tells us to vote for her. I agree that the media did no favors for Bernie or Jill Stein. For decades, Bernie was mocked and/or ignored by the media until he caught on fire. I would disagree that the media actually rigged the primaries in HRC’s favor. I had no trouble voting for Bernie in NJ, no rigged elections here and Hillary won by a wide and undisputed margin over Bernie. At least Bernie and Warren are still in the Senate and hopefully Teachout will make it to the House.
Paul, I looked at those wish lists.
No president can single-handedly repeal a federal aw. That is an empty promise, whether from Trump or Johnson, or Stein or Clinton.
Congress is in charge on such matters. Courts may also play a secondary role.
Votes for Congressional candidates are important.
Candidates for governor and state legislative office are no less importanct, especially since ESSA gives states some “interpretive” attitude.
I think that the same lobbies and policy think tanks that produced NCLB and ESSA will continue their drumbeats for accountability and charter schools, with charters re-branded as “autonomous” and “innovative” schools. The same groups are likely to be active in making sure that provisions in the Higher Education Act, designed to stack rank programs, by cost effeciency, including earnings of graduates.
Stein and Johnson have escaped scrutiny of their policies. When pressed for details, both break down. The lack of scrutiny is their only advantage.
The problem with education in our country isn’t stupid kids…..it’s the stupid ADULTS.
Sorry to sound so negative, but it’s the conclusion I’ve reached after nearly 30 years of teaching.
Rebecca Mead’s piece cites a study done last spring that looked at the vocabulary and syntax of the candidates. Clinton clocked in at around a ninth grade level….Trump at sixth grade -though his off the cuff remarks are frequently more in the third grade or lower range.
But what I find to be even more disturbing in our political debate is the prevalence of nutcase conspiracy theories. And, in this regard, both conservatives and liberals are at fault. At fault for hatching these idiotic fantasies. And, for the candidates themselves -who continue to do stupid stuff that enables a belief in this crap. (Hillary, please never send an a e-mail again! In your life.)
Trump’s bogus conspiracy theories are more egregious -by far. The rigged election allegation makes me feel ill. Of course, for years Fox News commentators have been encouraging this sort of dangerous blather.
But I know people on the left who engage in this sort of nonsense, too. Twice in the past few weeks I’ve had a couple true liberals tell me that our own government let 9-11 happen. What??? They’ve got to be kidding me.
It’s time the adults in this country GROW UP.
Diane is correct. As she wrote above, we have got to vote for Clinton if just for the good of our Republic. But I won’t be feeling much joy on November 9, no matter which candidate wins. What have we done to this country??? (And, I say “we” because it is ALL l of us who are the adults -in charge.)
i was grading a government midterm this weekend and one of the 12th graders wrote very eloquently about this election. The idea was something to the effect that this election is so important not just because of the issues at stake, but because President Obama is the only president this student and his classmates have every really known. For younger students, that’s even more the case.
What a way to introduce our kids to the importance of voting and the greatness of our nation’s government. I feel bad for our nation. Not nearly as bad as I felt on September 12 and the weeks after that terrible day. But, bad in that same sort of way.
Perhaps we would do well to expose our students to information beyond the MSM.
Here is a more accurate portrayal of President Obama:
http://www.truthdig.com/avbooth/item/photo_of_the_week_president_who_let_citigroup_20161029
Obama is not running for president.
Vale Math, Obama is not running for president, but Hillary is looking to give us an Obamian third-term, policy-wise.
“When asked about whether or not she’d be the “third term of President Obama” at the CNN Democratic debate, Hillary Clinton responded that it would be ‘quite a change’ – because she’s a woman.
Hillary was even asked by Anderson Cooper if there was a policy change, and she replied that she’d ‘build on the successes’ of the Obama administration.
As far as “successes” in the sphere of public education, we all know who the “winners” are – and it’s not public school teachers.
http://ijr.com/2015/10/445630-hillary-clinton-is-asked-if-shed-be-the-third-term-of-president-obama-at-the-democratic-debate/
John,
A thoughtful comment, as usual.
My view of Trump grows darker by the hour. I think he has an authoritarian temperament that might easily be fascist. He knows no boundaries to his ego.
Clinton is a fairly traditional liberal. Not very different from Obama. Most of the horrible things said about her were started by the nutcases on the right, plus their terror of electing a female president.
Thanks, Diane.
What just kills me every time I hear it is the fact that Clinton got caught up in this crazy e-mail mess to begin with. After the 1990s, when the far right threw everything they could possibly think of at the Clintons (like the nonsense that they murdered Vince Foster!) wouldn’t Hillary have learned to be more careful? What was she thinking? And then all this Podesta stuff from wikileaks hits the fan…who puts these kinds of embarrassing comments onto office e-mails these days? I’ve read Cuomo certainly doesn’t. I don’t like the guy at all but I have to give him credit for realizing how high tech politics works in the 21st century.
But that’s water under the bridge at this point -just over a week before election day. Yup, these are dark times for the U.S. My patience with the vote for Stein or Johnson thing is near zero. That ain’t gonna happen. And, you know, If you were on a plane and it was about to crash, what would you do? I know I’d grab the controls and try to pull the damn thing up, that’s for sure. It wouldn’t look pretty, it certainly wouldn’t be nice but I wouldn’t sit around waiting for the plane to auger into the ground. And, that means pulling the lever for Hillary.
John,
My guess is that Hillary developed a passion for privacy after 25 years under the microscope of the crazy right, who always thought she was a radical. It was stupid to use a private server, but she was right that Colin Powell advised her to do so. He used a private server.
No one seemed to be upset when the George W Bush Administration lost 22 million emails showing the decision making before and during the Iraq War.
The outrage is very selective.
I hope you are right, Diane. And, that at least a plurality of American voters see it this way, too. BTW, what happened to the long list of women who say that Trump sexually assaulted them? I have to wonder what’s happened to that story? People complain about the short attention span of “kids today”. What about the fleeting attention span of so many adults? CBS news was just reporting that the presidential race has significantly tightened. That’s truly distressing news. How can that be?
John O., I love you.
Perhaps the lack of discussion about K-12 education and climate may be related to the degree of interference posed by corporate power. Corporations prefer to hang behind the scenes and pull strings out of sight. Corporations may have shaped the questions from the media during the debate in order to avoid exposing two issues that have passionate supporters on both end of the spectrum. Corporations may simply want to keep these issues under wraps until after the election when they will work to pull strings through the usual campaign contributions and various foundations, regardless of who wins. Of course, this is all pure speculation. But… we really have to ask why these prime topics of interest to millions of citizens have been ignored.
“In September, Donald Trump delivered a speech at the Cleveland Arts and Sciences Academy, a charter school in Cleveland, Ohio, in which he offered his vision, though not before delivering an extended peroration about the perfidies of his Democratic opponent—e-mail, Iraq, the Clinton Foundation—unrelated to educational concerns. When he did get around to his own proposals, he spoke of expanding existing school-choice programs, promising that in a Trump Administration twenty billion dollars of federal education funds would be reassigned to provide a block grant enabling the eleven million students living in poverty to attend the private or public school of their parents’ choice. “Competition always does it,” he said. “The weak fall out and the strong get better. It is an amazing thing.” He advocated merit pay for teachers, stated his opposition to Common Core, and spoke in favor of charter schools and against teachers’ unions. ”
I don’t know, Diane. Trump’s position is pretty standard in DC.
Read any of Arne Duncan’s speeches- other than opposing Common Core, ed reform aligns quite well with Donald Trump on public schools.
Trump actually gave a “shout out” top the for-profit operator /manager of that school, by the way. That was amusing because usually the for-profit managers are ignored- they’re invisible.
I am so, so sick of people who haven’t used a public school in generations pontificating on public schools.
Why doesn’t Trump reform the private school sector? That sector produced Donald Trump and a heck of a lot of other loudmouth idiots.
Chiara,
Trump said he would turn existing programs, like Title I for poor kids, and possibly special ed funds, into a block grant for charters and vouchers. Duncan never went that far.
Of course, Trump didn’t know what he was talking about but that’s nothing new.
Okay, but Trump went to the for-profit charter chain in Ohio and Obama goes to the non-profit charter chain in Ohio.
Both Parties are pushing privatization in Ohio. It’s all they talk about. It’s gotten to the point where I think these people are contractually barred from entering a public school.
They sometimes hold rallies in public high school gyms. That’s their sole “contribution” to the public system- we’re graced with their presence when they’re promoting their own careers. We’re a political rally venue provider.
‘ “The weak fall out and the strong get better. ” ‘
H-m-m-m.
That means, competition creates the survival of the fittest.
I thought our ideal was equality of educational opportunity. In Trumpworld, equality of opportunity is for losers.
It’s also standard practice for ed reformers to parachute into Ohio and visit exclusively charter schools, like Trump did.
I don’t think anyone has spotted anyone from the Obama or Kasich Administrations inside an Ohio public school in 6 years. The only reason they visit Cleveland is it’s a “portfolio” city where they’re replacing all the public schools with charter schools.
Public schools are actually rarely discussed in ed reform. Here’s a candidate surrogate forum that was held:
“Paladino said on Monday he has spoken several times with Trump about the presidential candidate’s education platform, though not specifically about Friday’s panel. Much of those conversations has focused on vouchers. He said he and Trump, who don’t disagree on anything, sympathize with children who are “held captive in the urban ghetto.”
“We’re sensitive to that child and the inability of that child to escape, because the cycle of poverty is not meant to be escaped from,” Paladino said. “The cycle of poverty is there for a reason, isn’t it? It’s there for a political reason — that is, to keep the voting base of the progressive liberal movement alive and well.”
On Friday, Otero, the Clinton representative, offered something of a reveal into a Clinton presidency, saying the Democratic nominee is “a big supporter of public charter schools,” though she remains skeptical of the for-profit education sector.”
Were public schools even mentioned at this thing, other than using them as a punching bag?
I’m not surprised Paladino is a Trump supporter. They are cut from the same mold.
I laugh at some of Paladino’s comments which conflict with his actions and voting record as a member of the Buffalo School Board. More than once speakers were removed from the public portion of board meetings for disagreeing with Paladino’s policies (or being members of the teacher’s union).
Ms. Mead’s clue may have been the recent endorsement letter (signed by 50 “influential” people, mostly professors, including Pres. Obama’s advisory economists) that let the two issues, pre-K and student debt, entirely, crowd out any recognition. of school privatization/corporatization in K-12 and higher education.
And Carl Paladino is on the school board of the Buffalo Publuc Schools. Luckily at the last board election many of his cronies were voted out so he is no longer part of the voting majority. After all, his company makes money purchasing property and selling it to charter schools. Even if it is a conflict of interest, this is not illegal, and luckily his plan of charter domination in the city failed miserably.
Buffalo dodged a bullet and with the new teacher contract (after 12+ years) which passed without the Paladino vote, things are starting to look up.
I had a different takeaway from Rebecca Mead’s article: http://wp.me/p25b7q-1BZ
I AM voting for HRC despite my deep misgivings and urge everyone in swing state to do the same…. and while you’re at it make sure that every Governor, State legislator and school board member shares the views expressed in this column… with ESSA on the books the action is now at the State level and, to a greater extent than before, in your own backyard…