Leonie Haimson explains here the significance–or lack thereof–of the Senate’s decision to kill former Secretary of Education John King’s highly prescriptive regulations to implement the 2015 federal law called Every Student Succeeds Act.
There were some who reacted with joy to see the King regs killed. King was known for his love of high-stakes testing.
Others worried whether the death of the regs meant that the states would be free to ignore the neediest kids because of the withdrawal of federal oversight.
I worked in the U.S. Department of Education for two years. What I learned is there are very few educators who work for ED.
The Feds have two important roles:
1. Supplying extra money for equity purposes
2. Protecting the civil rights of children
The federal government has zero capacity to direct or measure academic quality.
The people who work in the Department of Education are clerks, not educators.
THE ED has no capacity whatever to assure or ascertain quality of education. Very few people who work there have a view about what education is or should be. That is not their job. Most have worked for ED for many years, regardless of which party is in power. They do not express their views. They do their job. They write checks, collect data, review contracts. They can tell you how many students are served in which programs. They can determine how much money is allocated and spent. The Department consists of clerks and bureaucrats. I was there. Nothing has changed. Educators are in schools, not at the U.S. Department of Education.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Oh YES: “The people who work in the Department of Education are clerks, not educators.”
Thanks for the succinct explanation of what the Fed Dept of Ed does, Diane!
We’re still stuck with the regs in NY, and their teeth. Think the governor will agree to get rid of them?
Under G. W. Bush and Obama, the federal government was guilty of overreach. This overreach should have been challenged when the feds started to require annual testing of all students. They should have had to prove that testing or accountability is a civil rights issue. The policymakers adopted the language of civil rights in their “reform” agenda without actually having a shred of evidence to support this assertion. Privateers got a lot of mileage out of their false claims, and I still hear from team Trump that students stuck in failing schools is the “civil rights issue of our times.” The hypocrisy makes me want to barf.
The claim that privatization was a type of “reform” was always a hoax. The media fell for it. The Democratic party fell for it. Now that we hear Trump and DeVos say it plain, that privatization is the civil rights issue of our time, the hoax is there for anyone who can see or hear. No more pretense.
“When it comes to the education of a child, I am agnostic as to the delivery system, or the building in which it takes place, so long as that child is in an environment that meets their needs and the parents are satisfied. If a child is able to grow and flourish, it shouldn’t matter where they learn.
And one of those quality options should be a great public school. I’ve said this before, and it bears repeating: I support great public schools, and I support great public school teachers—because I support students—all students.”
I think it’s so incredibly generous that DeVos is permitting public schools to continue to exist.
I’m genuinely baffled on what her role is. She appears and gives these speeches on her personal opinions on schools. Why would anyone even cross the street to hear “great schools” and “innovate” over and over and over?
why do public schools bother with DC at all? it’s a complete waste of time. No one in that room wanted “great schools”? DeVos really had to tell them that?
I think it’s interesting only to the extent that it reveals some of the politics of ed reform.
Democrats backed all the GOP ideas on “choice” (privatization) because Democrats believed “choice” would be regulated.
No sooner did the GOP gain political control than they began to gut regulations.
The Democrats got played. They have no real power or influence in ed reform. The “movement” will continue to move further and further Right, ideologically until they get to “backpack vouchers” which was always the end game.
It’s embarrassing for Democratic ed reformers, I imagine. They staked their whole reputations and agenda on “accountability” and now the GOP is discarding the concept.
The GOP will get choice without regulation and the Democrats got nothing. They got screwed.
I wrote in my last two books about how the Democrats quietly, step by step, gave up their historic agenda of equity and opportunity, and began to accept the GOP agenda of testing, accountability, and choice. Now, the Democrats have no agenda, just a weak echo of the GOP agenda.
Democrats don’t have a coherent vision for public education and Republicans do- Republicans want it privatized.
Something beats nothing. hence, privatization will win.
we have passionate advocates for charters and vouchers on the GOP side and then we have the potted plant “agnostics” on the Democratic side who get rolled every single year.
It’s a shame. All those adults and not one passionate advocate FOR public schools.
Part of it is that Democrats are ashamed of labor unions. They want their support at election time but other than that they don’t want to be seen with them. Labor unions are old fashioned and sort of lower class. I think DC Democrats would be thrilled if they never had to deal with a labor union again.
I’m too busy these days to do the research and check my facts, but I believe this puts my blue state, California, in a much better position. We are creating a multifaceted “dashboard” of school ratings, much to the chagrin of charter sympathizing, astroturf group Parent Revolution and other billionaire funded, DFER related groups that wanted a single number or letter grade for each school. I was worried that King might force us to grade schools with a single, misleading number, a la Jeb Bush. I realize not every state is lucky enough to have State Superintendent Tom Torlackson creating a dashboard, but for those of us who do, I am very thankful for the Senate’s decision to kill the King prescriptions.