Thirty-one years ago, I was invited by Secretary of Education Lamar Alexander to join him at the U.S. Department of Education as Assistant Secretary of Education in Charge of Research and Improvement. Before he invited me, he learned a lot about my work and my views. It was a big jump for me because I had never planned to work in government and was surprised to be invited. After I was confirmed by the Senate, I selected the person I wanted as my Deputy Assistant Secretary of Education. It was Francie Alexander, who had been Deputy Superintendent of Curriculum and Assessment in the State of California. I had gotten to know her when I worked on the California history-social science framework in the late 1980s.
Given this brief personal history, I am puzzled that the Biden administration is staffing up the key jobs in the U.S. Department of Education before any of the top officials (Secretary of Education, Deputy Secretary of Education, Undersecretary of Education) have been confirmed. The next layer of officials–the Assistant Secretaries–have not even been named.
Yet the administration continues to roll out lists of people who will be deputies to Assistant Secretaries who are as yet unknown; “chief of staff” to an official who has not been confirmed; “confidential assistant” to a high official. Most of these appointments have one of two things in common: 1) they worked on the Biden-Harris campaign; or 2) they worked in the Obama administration.
It is likely, highly likely, that Secretary-designate Miguel Cardona and his Deputy Secretary-designate Cindy Marten have never met or even heard of any of these people who will be their closest associates. They will not pick their team; when they take office, their team will be in place, chosen by someone else. Who? Arne Duncan? John King?
The important job of Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy and Programs in the Office of the Secretary went to Scott Sargrad, who was until recently vice-president for K-12 education at the Center for American Progress. CAP, as is well known, is pro-testing and pro-charter schools.
Will the Biden administration revive Race to the Top but call it something else?
Asking for a few million friends.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
There is a very simple solution that not many would like to hear, but it would kill the hydra once and for all. I am a firm believer in getting rid of the US Dept of Ed. It is a bloated bureaucracy of “stink tank” employees laundering tax dollars to wealthy corporations that don’t have any interest in the actual education of children. There are a few departments/areas that are necessary and useful and those can be folded into other large government agencies.
Agree, as it stands, Sargrad has merely transitioned from billionaire-funded to taxpayer-funded. There’s no reason to think his allegiance will change. When the middle class and poor turn against Biden because he has turned against them to benefit the tech tyrants, Sargrad will transition back to billionaire employ.
Biden didn’t win by a lot of votes. I wonder how many teachers voted for Biden because he “seemed” to understand the struggles of public education/teaching and b/c of his speech in Pittsburgh? The pro public education bloc (teachers, unions, parents) could have easily given trump a 2nd term? I shudder to think of all the pro-public education folks who voted for trump the 1st time because he vowed to get rid of CC and the standardized testing when HRC wouldn’t (and would continue with the Charter school movement). If Biden doesn’t make good on his promises, we will wind up with trump again or something even worse.
and it is simply overwhelming that he cannot be convinced of this: surely there are many voices now doing a much better job of telling him about reality
This thought occurs to me occasionally. Assuming you mean abolish it as a separate agency– it has been around as a part of various fed agencies for a century & a half. I think there might be value in placing it with the Dept of HHS – putting back together the pre-Carter HEW. But only because we need cross-pollination of ideas among the interdependent fields of health, human services, and education. It wouldn’t solve the issue.
The stage was set by the ESEA, passed under LBJ. Great advances in funding and toward equity in education happened during that liberal era, right up through EHA [/ IDEA] in 1975. Soon after, the conservative era started, and the ESEA’s renewals have brought us mostly the opposite, along with deprofessionalization of teachers.
Sadly, I fear the appointment of Cardona will be window dressing for the house built by Bill Gates. If Washington had any respect for Cardona, I doubt the underlings would not be making policy announcements before his installation. So tired of the same old bait and switch from Democrats.
Agreed. The Biden administration (some nameless person) is hiring people unknown to Cardona to staff “his” Department. This is a sign of disrespect for him.
When an outgoing administration of one party wants to make things difficult for an incoming party of another, political appointees of the former try to convert their positions to become civil services so that the latter can’t get rid of them. It’s called burrowing in. This is another type of burrowing in; using factions of one’s own party to be put into positions to undermine or neuter incoming administration appointments. You’ve got it hand it to deformers, they keep figuring out ways to hold on to power, patronage and de facto policy.
Presidents reward loyal campaign supporters, Hamilton was General Washington’s aide during the revolutionary war, and Washington’s selection asTreasury Secty.
DeVos staff came from the far right, Biden is reaching into Obama staff, after all, he was the VP. “Names” came from the NEA, the AFT, civil rights organizations, maybe big time donors, Ron Klain, Biden’s Chief of Staff and his team are selecting hundreds of staffers across the departments…
As I wrote, senior officials in each department have traditionally been allowed to select their deputies and confidential assistants. The Biden administration is making those choices now. Of course, campaign workers won jobs, as they always have, but not as “Deputy Assistant Secretary” or “Assistant Secretary” or “Confidential Assistant to the Secretary” or “Chief of Staff to the Secretary.”
Does the word ‘confidential’ normally appear in a Department of Education job title? What is the Confidential Assistant, the dark money liaison? Isn’t that more of a national security title? I would expect someone with that title to be a Secret Service agent carrying the football with nuclear codes, not an education assistant.
I admit I served long ago, in the early ’90s, but there was no job title for a “confidential assistant.”
I’m disgusted but not surprised. I also (think I) prefer when they don’t try to hide what they’re doing. Looking for differences between the DeVos Education Department and the ?????? Education Department.
This is so discouraging. It’s going to be the “same old same old” for education. New names….. same old games.
Trump gave us DeVos and held the Bible upside down;
Biden lowers his eyes and crosses himself conspicuously.
Then he gives education re-warmed Obama.
I’m starting to think we’ve been double-crossed.
.
Quit Bitchin
Obama’s warming on the top
Since Betsy left the kitchen
The gruel is bad, but Demo crop
So really, quit her bitchin’
Quit yer bitchin
I am so tired of being fed the lie of the private efficiency of the delivery of formerly public services. More efficient for whom? Somehow these efficiencies seem to transfer a lot of money into private pockets rather than delivering a superior product to the public, a “public” which they define. Why should I pay a private entity that can decide I am not part of their efficient system at any time and to whom I still have to pay (taxes) whether I get any benefit or not? Bottom line? Private enterprise is not designed to provide for the common good.
Private enterprise is designed to feed on the common good with their serial privatizing and public-private partnerships. It seems a lot like taxation without representation to me.
Yup.
“Taxation without representation” was what Jan 6th was all about. Unfortunately, most of the general public isn’t aware of what’s really going on….they just know that their vote and what they believe in doesn’t count. They know that they work harder and get poorer while a few work less and get wealthier. They aren’t aware that big business has taken over government services/goods to divert tax dollars. This is making people crazy and it’s making them believe in absurdities and lies. The free market/competition “experiment” isn’t working for most of the people living and working and spending in this society. It’s time for a BIG change and government can handle it two ways 1. Continue down the same path and get a “Jan 6th” every few months or 2. Come clean, sweep out the mess and start investing people’s tax dollars on “we the people”.
The Biden Betrayal played huge in my stepping away from 20 years+ of advocating for our public schools. The proverbial “last straw” that broke this camel’s back. I am worn out and want to spend the time I have left enjoying my family and hobbies.
Now is not the time to quit.
Trump didn’t care what we thought.
Biden does.
Let’s make sure he won’t ignore us.
We can’t make any gains by giving up.
Biden should call his current policy Race to the Trump.
Right. Far right.
The Jerk Circle
The Party is a circle
Where right is really left
And Trump is really Merkel
And daft is really deft
Daft is really deft. All this talk of Borises and Betsys reminds me of Lewis Carroll. Some DAM poet once wrote:
“…The Billionaire and the Reformer
Walked on a mile or so,
And then they rested on a rock
Conveniently low:
And all the little students stood
And waited in a row.
The time has come,’ the Billionaire said,
To talk of many things:
Of Common Core — and standard tests — of passing scores — and VAMs —
And why the schools are failing [Not!] —
And whether pigs have wings.’…”
LCT,
Regarding the tracking of your students by testing software, send complaint here:
info@studentprivacymatters.org
Thank you.
Done.
I know I’m about as popular as a skunk at a wedding on this topic, but I believe I said all this before he was elected. In fact, I believe I was asking you your plan for how you were going to “push him left” once you “just get him elected!”. All of this was predictable – it’s who Joe has been for 50 years. But here you are again, caught with your pants down expecting something different. So again I’ll ask, what’s your plan now?
BTW, I’m actually very happy that you all are waking up to our new President on education. Now would it be too much to ask that you do the same on other foreign and domestic issues? $2,000 checks (lie), $15 minimum wage (lie), dozens of new drilling permits and no fracking ban (at least he didn’t lie about that), refusing to penalize the Saudis for Khashoggi’s death (just like Trump), bombing Syria, keeping kids in cages – all of those areas are worthy of your attention too, and they’re all something a “decent” man would care about.
You folks elected him, now could you see if you could get him to do any of the things you elected him for? Because if you don’t, what you’re looking at in 2022/2024 is going to make Trump seem like the good old days.
Dienne, would you have preferred that we all vote for Trump as the devil we knew?
I will say here without any hesitation that I will never look back to Trump as “the good old days.”
What part of Trump’s four years did you like?
I liked none.
I don’t want to facilitate the Proud Boys, the Oathkeepers, the KKK, and Trump’s other storm troopers as part of the mainstream.
Whatever Biden does that I don’t like, I will say so.
But my bottom line is that I prefer a neoliberal liar to a fascist liar.
I’d prefer no lying…..AT ALL! Both sides and everything in between.
“You folks” elected him? Do you mean “us folks” like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders and Jamaal Bowman? Interesting that this person unwittingly revealed that she wanted Trump to be re-elected over Biden!
Why aren’t Bernie Sanders and AOC chiding us for voting for Biden instead of doing what this poster does and chiding us for not helping us get another 4 years of Trump because apparently the logic of this person is that if we had another 4 years of Trump it would prevent the bigger horror that is going to happen in “2022/2024” because Bernie Sanders and AOC and the rest of us did NOT join dienne77 to help defeat Biden! (and re-elect Trump!)
This wildly dishonest mischaracterization of what Biden has done in his first month in office is worthy of being in any right wing news source.
The response to this poster when she lectures us about how we were supposed to let Trump have another 4 years in office to prevent some future evil in 2022/2024 is to ask her what she believed got accomplished by her decision to help Trump get elected in 2020? I thought allowing Trump to win in 2020 was going to bring about a progressive nirvana? So what did we get? A right wing Supreme Court and judiciary for the next 2 decades? An empowered far right movement that still believes Trump should be installed by violence if necessary?
If 2022/2024 is bad, the blame will be directly on those who empowered Trump in 2020 and who spent the next 4 years defending and normalizing Trump and insisting Trump did not deserve to be impeached as he did nothing wrong.
Does anyone believe that we needed another 4 years of Trump to prevent some awful thing from happening in 2022/2024 just like this person who devotes herself to normalizing Trump says we should have done?
This person harped over and over again in 2016 that the only way to get to a progressive future was to defeat HRC. Now she claims that the only way to prevent an evil thing that she threatens will happen in 2022 or 2024 was for us to have joined her to defeat Biden as she kept telling us was absolutely necessary.
Any of us who buy this nonsense?
Dienne, no one was fooled by Biden, look back and you’ll see the doubts and disclaimers there in the lukewarm enthusiasm for him. But we had two viable choices, Trump or Biden, and I’d much rather be bird-dogging Biden than watching helplessly as Betsy DeVos closes public schools.
As a Bernie delegate, I worked my tail off, but he got about 30% of the primary vote, running on Medicare for All and The Green New Deal.
If you have a different strategy for winning the White House, I’m all ears, but the progressive left lost ground since 2016 when 137.5 million voted. In 2020, roughly 159 million voted, telling pollsters their #1 issue was defeating Trump.
With these experiences behind us, I share your concern the Republicans will win in the midterms and the next election, but the whole purpose of this article is expressly to alert people how Biden is screwing up in order to hold his feet to the fire.
Lying? Trump is the lying champion of the universe, no comparison to the lies that Biden may have made. Please let’s be real. Trump is no longer in the White House to load up the courts with far right wingers, that is huge and should be the reason to be happy that we have a President Biden. This gloating, smugness and arrogant self-satisfied Schadenfreude-ism (by D-77) is really getting redundant.
And she’s gloating because Trump didn’t win and apparently if Trump did win, she wouldn’t be gloating?
Actually, if Trump had won, she’d be gloating and saying that it’s Biden’s fault for being the wrong candidate who couldn’t defeat Trump!
There is no logic at all to this.
I would have been happy to have President Bernie Sanders, but if Bernie couldn’t defeat Biden in the primary, he wasn’t going to defeat Trump.
It was unbelievably painful, after all the volunteering for Bernie 2020, to join the Biden campaign, worried what he was going to do if he won. It was worth the still lingering pain. Joseph Biden is Barack Obama 2.0. He is Bill Clinton 3.0. He is bombing Syria. He is letting the Saudi murderer-prince off the hook. He is handing over the American people’s children to the tech industry. He is still better than Trump. Who cares, Dienne? Trump was president thirty-seven and a half years ago in pandemic time. It is time now to act with President Biden the way Karen Lewis acted with Rahm Emmanuel. Fight back. Hold the line.
I understand the disappointment of those who worked so hard on the Sanders campaign. But it’s hard to believe that Bernie would be superman and fixing all that you listed within a few weeks of his presidency.
Beachteach
We know Biden told a self-serving lie to the American public about testing.
There is no reason to anticipate that Bernie would have sold out the middle class and poor to tech tyrants.
I, for one, never expected Biden to give us anything but warmed-over Obama. That’s why I called him “Status Quo Joe.” But I’ll take him over Agent Orange any day.
Dienne these cites of Biden’s “lies” are not up to your usual snuff, & sound like warmed-over Trumpy-talk.
During negotiations on covid relief when the bill included no stimulus chex at all, Biden was agitating for $1200 chex. When they put the $600 chex in, Trump tweeted 12/22 that $2k would be more like it. Pelosi picked up on that and tried to put it through separately, but was blocked by Reps. It was too late to change covid bill. Trump hinted he’d veto; Biden on 12/28 threw in for $2000 chex instead of $600 chex. Trump signed bill with $600 chex 12/30. Since taking office, Biden has been pushing for the other $1400 in stimulus chex – as well as replacing the rest of the $2.2 trillion bill the Dem House passed in October.
I fail to see how the $15 min wage promise was a “lie.” He can’t do it by executive order, but stumped for its inclusion in the covid aid bill. Now that that’s been dinged by the parliamentarian, I expect to see him push whatever workaround Dems can come up with.
With all due respect D-77, equating the Biden team appointing members to the Ed Department with the ridiculously corrupt Trump administration is ludicrous and nonsensical. Biden is a serious man who has the experience, understanding of geo-political factors / international relations and a deep concern and love for his country.
Why can Duncan, Gates etc. still have so much influence?? In my opinion it’s because a majority of people on both sides, deep down, agree with the narrative that schools are failing. The solutions for failing schools: injecting competition, raising standards…. holding teachers “accountable”….. using lots of technology…..following the lead of corporate reformers……. makes sense to voters on both sides. I personally know liberals who believe in the narrative that the “teacher’s union” is blocking progress.
I think the reason we don’t have the change that most of us posting on this blog want….. is because not as many people (on the left or right) as we would like to believe – wholeheartedly understand what is happening to public schools and therefore don’t fully support/respect public education and teachers.
No due respect needed, she’s a complete moron, idiot, tool. Choose any or all of the above.
Why do they still have so much influence? Because not one single election in American history has turned on education policy. Not one. Attacking it is low-hanging fruit.
Your last paragraph is spot on. Those of us who care, the vast majority who participate in this blog, we have no political constituency in the halls of power. Sad but true.
“…no political constituency in the halls of power” which makes the conservative churches’ clout in those halls ever more devastating. Worth a read, “High profile Catholic family (Gozar of Arizona) grapples with religious, political divisions…Ali Alexander identified Rep. Paul Gozar as one of the three lawmakers who helped plan the attempted coup.” Gozar’s siblings who are Democrats make it clear that they blame Paul’s views on his upbringing in the authoritarian church. (NCRonline 1-20-2021).
From Az Republic yesterday, “Rep. Gozar speaks at white nationalist event, skips…”
Gosar
Beachteach,
I have written three books and countless articles trying to explain that our schools are not failing, that it’s all,part of a well-funded plan to privatize education for fun and profit.
Read “Death and Life of the Great American School System.”
“Reign of Error.”
“Slaying Goliath”
Everything I know about ed reform, I learned from you and this blog.
If I had the $$ I would send a copy of all of your books to everyone in Congress!
Thank you!
Send “Reign of Error” to Jill Biden.
She is supposed to care.
I wonder if Nick Melvoin ever read the copy of Slaying Goliath I bought for him.
Hmmmm…. LCT you have me thinking. After Cardona is confirmed and things have (hopefully) relatively settled down in terms of cases and schools opening….. It would be a powerful statement to organize a group to send a copy of Slaying Goliath to the President, Vice President and a few key Senators…… along with an op ed in the Washington Post or NYT.
You can bring a book to a policymaker, but you cannot make them read (or comprehend). After reading Derek Black’s Schoolhouse Burning, I wonder how many on this blog have read it (admittedly, I was late to the game). More importantly, how many in Congress and DC who purport to work on education issues have read it.
I think I would send books to Jill Biden. She might actually read them.
I’m sure pols like being given books from educators. I’m certain they like being given first class airfare to dinner at the French Laundry from lobbyists better.
So we give them audio versuions they can listen to on those first class flights. 🙂
And that is the real difference between Bernie and Joe. Justice Democrats do not take campaign contributions from wealthy individuals or corporations. They are not for sale.
Ha ha, speduktr, they need audiobooks — and $300 bottles of wine.
Ha 🙂 It was late. I was tired. I hear you. No one in power cares and nothing can be done. Except Bernie, of course. If he were president all the lobbyists and corporations would follow his plan. And all the conspiracy theorists and rioters would just calm down and peacefully embrace him. 😉
Yup. And pigs would fly.
Don’t give up. In the nature of politics, politicians listen when their base is angry. We are Biden’s base, or part of it. Make noise.
Here’s the thing: one of the epiphanies I had when working on disability and aging rights issue when Hillary was in charge of healthcare reform in 1995 was the concept of taking constituencies for granted. Hillary’s health care reform apparatchiks understood they could take constituencies for granted because, “where the hell would they go? They have no alternatives.”
Where can education constituencies go today if they don’t support the Biden administration? Nowhere. We must support Biden so that we can fight on one front rather than every front. It’s that simple.
Both parties (the only time bothsiderism is legitimate, in my opinion) have constituencies they can take for granted. Are, for example, anti-abortion or gun zealots going anywhere else besides the cult? Of course not!
The question is: if you are a constituency that’s taken for granted regardless, what will you do to get your side really on your side?
the Biden administration is staffing up the key jobs in the U.S. Department of Education before any of the top officials (Secretary of Education, Deputy Secretary of Education, Undersecretary of Education) have been confirmed. The next layer of officials–the Assistant Secretaries–have not even been named”
I believe that’s called “Bottom Up Management (BUM)
“Asking for a few million friends.”
LMAO!!!! That’s awesome.
Heres to skunks at a wedding. Of course Biden is better than Trump. But the problem is that we almost always end up with 2 terrible choices for President and parties run by “monied corporations” (Thomas Jefferson’s term). So the monied ed corporations win every time no matter who is president or what he promises.
Our system works as designed.
The Fondling Fathers were brilliant, but not in the way one learns in most American history books.
Depend on which history books you read …. try Howard Zinn. A People’s History
It was designed so that a monied/propertied class would reap (and rape) the benefits of a slave class.
And it will works as designed.
The recent ruling by the Senate “parliamentarian” , which Biden Harris have indicated they wont overrule (what a surprise) will ensure that things continue that way.
The US Senate is one of the most UNdemocratic legislative bodies in the world (again, by design)
Obama, Duncan, King, 100%. Probably with that guy that started Education Post. He’s seemed kinda quiet lately. Gates is in on it.
Based on what he did this past week(ordering air bombing in Syria, without congressional approval), I am now assuming his administration is lowering the priority for education. His administration is now showing its true colors as many Biden supporters come in defense of him over killing +30(and number will likely rise up) civilians in air-raid. Even CNN Jake Tapper criticized Biden, and he was called out as a Russian asset.
And, what’s going on with Neera Tanden? Why are some Democrats/liberals accusing critics of being sexist/racist for criticizing her past history–i.e, humiliating her employee by revealing the name of sexual harassment victim, physically threatening a journalist, cutting social security/medicaid, defending Israel over military occupation, supporting US foreign policy that harms Palestinians, Iraqis, Syrians to secure oil, etc. Facing numerous allegations and scrutiny, her nomination for OMB(Office of Management and Budget) is now put on hold. Neera Tanden is no Betsy DeVos for sure. But is she a right person to represent the interest for community of color? Doubtful. So glad she’s not the nominee for Education Secretary. Still, it draws concern because the position she’s seeking is the one that supervises the entire budget covering all departments.
These are not an exaggeration. No need to compare with Trump. Approximately 2/3 of Biden administration represents people coming from establishment powerhouses. Do not trust any of these guys, let alone many of those who are getting recruited into the chamber of Education Department as a key staff.
I was rereading this to see if there were any new comments & happened to scroll up & read, again, Diane’s comment that when she was in the DoEd there was “no job title for a “confidential assistant.'”
Decidedly NOT funny, but I did laugh, anyway, because it sounds so ridiculous, reminding me of the film Animal House & “double secret probation.”
Too obvious &, actually, nauseating that this phony titled “confidential assistant” (who looks to be all of 30-years-old if that) has the “authority” to tell the whole country to go f*@k themselves…actually, all American children in public schools.
This must not stand.
I was very saddened but I guess I should not be surprised at how some people seem to have fallen in love with a guy who’s been in Washington for many decades and has failed to make any substantial impact for the good of the public. The one group I do know of personally who has benefited is Jim and Hunter Biden, brother and son respectively, who have previously and will continue despite promises to the contrary to spend most waking hours looking for ways to line their pockets based on their relationships with Joe. I would like to remind folks who might not have been around as long as I have in this town that Joe’s previous two runs for President were a joke, as was much of his weird tenure as Veep. More than anything, the Bidens long to be the Kennedys, but of course that will probably not happen because they’ve been forced to place their hope of the next generation on a guy who is known to be a major a&&hole, who regularly does illegal drugs, who failed Joe’s shameful attempt to give Hunter a military credential by failing drug tests to prove he was unworthy, And of course, Joe will never be JFK, Bobby or especially Ted, who ran circles around Joe in the Senate by accomplishing more in one term that Joe did in 6 terms. When people run for the presidency, it helps to remember that when trying to predict who will win is not a matter of who they are, but who they are running against. Biden won because Trump lost it, many times over. I remember when the only thing Joe was contributing to this town was not a deep policy analysis of his latest major legislative proposal, but gossip about his awful hair plugs. Eventually, the bridal sheen will wear off and we will start to see who this guy really is. It won’t be pretty. People will start to hear repetitions of what Obama policy advisor wrote about Biden, saying he was “something off an unguided missile in the Situation Room.” He referred to Biden’s tendency to spout off with whatever was on his mind, a trait which irked Obama. Remember, it was his boss for 8 years at the White House who said this: “Never underestimate Joe’s ability to F^*k things up.”
In Obama’s endorsement, he expressed that his hopes for Biden, sadly, were in his having good people around him, rather than in his own intelligence and skills. Of course he’s filled in the lower slots first: it’s payback time, baby! It has been a long time since the majority of those jobs were filled from recommendations of the person for whom they worked, directly. Now, it’s mostly the White House who gets to decide who gets that slot (once we move pass this long transition period it will be even more so). That was the case with one of my jobs and with others I knew. I never spoke to the person I was to report to (had I done so I never would have taken the job). Because those people don’t work for their direct boss, they’re there to support the president and his agenda. That is more true now than it was in the Reagan Administration, as it has increased with every president since.
Jamie,
I am not happy with the appointment of people from the Obama education Department or TFA or other deformers. I am very angry about the decision not allow states to seek waivers from testing. But I am thrilled that Biden was elected. The alternative was gruesome. The Republican Party has become the cult of Trump, the most corrupt president in our history.