Politico reports that Republicans view the pandemic and school closures as an opportunity to promote school closures. This should appeal to the 30% of the population who are unvaccinated and oppose mask mandates and other public health measures. These are probably the same parents who want to block teaching about racism and want parents to decide what their children should be taught (think creationism).
‘A WINNING POLITICAL ISSUE’ — The nation watched as Glenn Youngkin won the Virginia governor’s race last November by tapping into parental outrage over school closures and using the rallying cry “Parents Matter.”
— Now, as the highly contagious Omicron variant complicates the spring school semester and the 2022 midterms ramp up, GOP strategists say it is an opportune time to also propel one of their education priorities: school choice.
— “Parents being able to have a greater role in where and how their children are educated is a winning political issue, and we intend to promote it as much as possible in the coming year,” said South Carolina GOP Chair Drew McKissick, adding that bills to advance school choice initiatives, like education savings accounts, are ready to go this legislative session.
— “We look at education as being the civil rights issue of our time,” he said. McKissick also pointed out that school choice will be a key issue for Sen. Tim Scott, who’s in the middle of a re-election campaign. Scott, in an address to rebut Biden’s first address to Congress, said the pandemic-spurred public school closures created the “clearest case I’ve seen for school choice in our lifetime.”
If education “is the civil rights issue of our time” in South Carolina, why does the state refuse to fund its public schools adequately and equitably?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Diane: Gross opportunism is the GOP’s strong suit. CBK
I believe the last word in the first sentence was meant to be the word “choice“. As usual thank you for your vigilant coverage on all things in education, Diane.
Oh, it’s a full court press in the ed reform echo chamber. 100% lockstep, as usual. They blanket endorse any state law that contains the word “charter” or “voucher”. The laws are huge successes even prior to launch, because how could they not be? The only measure is how closely they adhere to the ideological requirements.
The solution to the pandemic in public schools is charter schools and private school vouchers, but that was the solution prior to the pandemic, too.
Funny how they’ve completely sidelined their supporters in the Democratic Party now that they’re no longer politically useful. It’s a Right wing movement now, folks. Thanks for your help! See ya!
“Funny how they’ve completely sidelined their supporters in the Democratic Party now that they’re no longer politically useful.” Im not sure they’ve completely sidelined the Dems. They need the Democrats to break public ed in the blue states. And CAP is probably working hard behind the scenes to keep the effort alive. There really is a cockroach theory in ed reform.
Will the GOP be aided by members of the Center for American Progress Action Fund Board, people like John Podesta or, possibly, Peter Edelman? Maybe, the Children’s Defense Fund ($20+ mil. in assets) will pile on. A column (Marian Wright Edelman) posted at the site, 6-4-2021, praises Stand for Children which was co-founded by Jonah Edelman. Maybe, the Gates Foundation education policy campaign which employed Josh Edelman for 10 years (before he joined the Biden admin.) will weigh in with the GOP in support of charter schools.
Public school teachers cannot expect too many words of encouragement from the DOE leader, Miguel Cardona, who is acting more like a corporate shill than supporter of public education.https://nancyebailey.com/2022/01/12/are-education-secretary-cardona-and-betsy-devos-twins/
Unfortunately true.
CAP has implemented a “contact us” form which can be accessed in a Google search for the Center for American Progress. Also my opinion- CAP doesn’t care if the GOP wins elections.
My opinion- the US DOE is owned by privatizing Melinda Gates.
Great link!
I live in MD (DC suburbs). ALL of the Private, Independent and/or Religious schools were open last year (modified) and are fully open this year. ALL have mask mandates and MANY have vaccine mandates and/or testing protocols in place. PPE money was used appropriately for filtration systems, tests, masks etc. Safety protocols have been followed and there have been minimal problems with Covid shutting down schools or activities. It’s the public school parents here who are protesting about masks and vaccines. School choice isn’t going to solve any problems for anti mask/vaxxers when families must follow the rules of the school to attend.
To open schools as safely as possible in a pandemic takes investment as the Los Angeles schools have shown. Many school districts are unable or unwilling to make that investment. Just opening schools without following protocols or wearing masks is reckless. It places both students and staff at much greater risk of infection.
“The teachers unions’ actions, school systems’ inability to act fast or even deal with teachers unions are certainly a bad mark for Democrats,” said Jeanne Allen, founder of the Center for Education Reform, despite the attention school choice is receiving because of the upcoming election. “I can see and imagine why Republican Party folks would want to be using this, but I don’t like it being used as a political wedge issue. It should be used for people to understand and learn and push for education freedom.”
Teachers unions! I think they get a bonus each time they insert that term in their “educational analysis”.
Charters are all vehemently and ideologically anti-union. Is there a shred of evidence they “acted faster” than public schools, or is this just more parroting of a talking point?
Let me guess. A “study” from the Institute of Charter/Voucher Promotion and Marketing at Ed Reform U?
The end of any vestige of democracy in America might well come about by means of the successful use of education-related disinformation and agitprop by the now Fascist Repugnican Party.
Have any of the Democratic or liberal ed reformers expressed any opposition to this?
No, of course not. To do so would mean they wouldn’t be hired by all those echo chamber think tanks and orgs and university departments and non profits.
They’re fine with Republicans running anti-public school political campaigns inside public schools. After all, none of them use public schools anyway.
Imagine if teachers had a national union that would use their leverage to confront those ed-reform Dems.
Exactly. Imagine that.
If the national unions took ending the federal standardized testing mandate to the streets, it would end. Until they do that, they are complicit in child abuse. This is not hyperbole. It’s fact.
“If the national unions took ending the federal standardized testing mandate to the streets, it would end. Until they do that, they are complicit in child abuse. This is not hyperbole. It’s fact.”
“They are complicit. . . ” In other words they are Go Along to Get Along Good German implementers of top down malpractice policies.
One hopeful thing- the ed reform “movement” has predicted the demise of public schools many, many times. Their sales and marketing team often exaggerate and over sell. I know they’ve all been robotically repeating that the public has rejected public schools for the entire length of the pandemic, so much so that is has become “true” inside the echo chamber, but wishing still doesn’t make it so.
They’d like it if this “debate” was over and they could get on with the privatization agenda with no further discussion, but I think the public may have some thoughts on that.
Let’s hope that by the time the 2022 and 2024 elections come around, the pandemic, school choice and all the other lies and conspiracy theories the fascist GOP [a political party without a platform unless that platform is lying and racism] keeps pushing, is old news except for Traitor Trump’s FOX fake News watching crazed MAGA mob that in realty makes up a minority of all the voters that vote.
To win elections, the fascist Republicans have to fool enough independent voters to vote for them.
I wonder how many independents watch Traitor Trump’s favorite, always lying, conspiracy theory fake news sites.
For the first time, at the last Republican Convention, the Greying Old Party didn’t even bother drafting a platform. The platform was simply Whatever Glorious Leader Says, which is always true of Fascist political parties.
Sigh. Another excuse to try their precious little scheme.
School choice, according to the way Republicans want to do it will only benefit a few. Those few who are already inclined toward school choice. It will be those who are motivated out of politics rather than making the choice because they believe in it.
There’s already a lot of school choice, especially in urban areas. It hasn’t led to better outcomes and most parents are either okay enough or sufficiently disconnected from their kids’ lives to not really investigate “choice.”
Around here, almost nobody has closed. My district and surrounding districts are always open this year. The “masking” protestors are few in number.
And this “civil rights issue of our time” slogan will apparently never die even though it’s among the most disingenuous statements ever said.
The civil rights issue of our time is the right to vote.
YES YES YES!!!!!!!!!
This blog has a bad habit of caricaturing all critics of policies that the blog host and most commenters support. The anger over school closures and the resulting increase in support for school choice cuts across ideological lines, as the linked essay shows. It is not just a right-wing phenomenon, as many other published pieces have shown and that contact with a variety of parents would provide a wealth of anecdotal evidence for.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/01/11/oakland-lefty-my-whole-life-school-closures-triggered-an-identity-crisis-526860
Kate,
I have never ridiculed supporters of keeping schools open. My son has been a fervent advocate of open schools. So is Carol Burris, my dear friend, who is executive director of the Network for Public Education. I am agnostic. I don’t know what is the right answer or if there is a “right answer.”
One one subject, I am certain: everyone should get vaccinated and boosted.
Contact with a VARIETY of parents??? I read this article by an “Oakland lefty”.
Here is what she writes:
“While many Black, Latino and Asian parents felt similarly about wanting their kids back in the classroom, their voices were swept under the rug as union representatives continually claimed only “rich white parents” wanted schools reopened.”
I read the entire article assuming that surely after specifically invoking these “many” other far less privileged parents whose voices she claims are swept under the rug, that surely this ‘Oakland lefty” writer would not sweep their “many” voices under the rug.
But apparently we are supposed to assume that they exist even though talking to them was apparently not worth this Oakland lefty’s time?
Instead she takes the time to talk to the REAL victims (in her mind) who are worthy of her time — Cleveland journalist Angie Schmitt and New York-based historian Natalia Mehlman Petrzela. They are just like her! They agree with her! They are all victims!
Why can’t she bother to talk to all those less privileged parents whose kids attend crowded urban schools who were so angry that their kids were not forced to return to overcrowded classrooms in September 2020 – before there were vaccines — just like this “Oakland lefty” wanted?
FYI, quoting a tweet by Nikole Hannah-Jones is not a substitute for actually speaking with all the poor and working class parents in Oakland who this writer claims agreed with her that schools needed to re-open completely in September 2020, when the pandemic was still raging and there were no vaccines yet.
Talking to Angie Schmitt and not some of these “many” Oakland poor and working class families that this writer invokes to justify her selfish desires?
Sorry. Clearly reopenings AFTER vaccines are working, with the understanding that a school district needs to react to real and changing circumstances.
But I wonder at anyone who cites false information where there were no large urban districts open in the fall of 2020, but privileged white parents believe that the fact that suburban and rural districts opened is absolutely proof that it would have been fine for overcrowded urban schools serving primarily at-risk kids whose often multi-generational families often live in small homes with no good ways to quarantine if one is exposed.
I’m familiar with “Oakland Lefty” and others like her. Parents reeking with privilege, who simply refuse to acknowledge the trauma suffered by marginalized communities (even before the pandemic) a few short miles from their doorstep. They can’t acknowledge what they don’t see, and they would be better off sticking to their own personal narrative rather than using their outsized voices in the comfort and safety of their own homes as a proxy for POC. Disgraceful.
Kate’s linked article was posted by “Ann Althouse” at her blog. Ann got 98 comments. I read until I couldn’t stomach the hateful grievance expressed in ditto head terms any longer. I did learn one of the right wing’s, apparently, popular disparagements – red diaper baby. I guess snowflake suffered wear-out of use.
The Repugnicans have a problem: almost all young people today are “red diaper babies”:
The following is on the home page of an Institute set up at Harvard in 2017.
The person in charge worked, immediately prior, at the Gates Foundation as the Deputy Director for K-12 Ed.
The Institute’s words sound a lot like the training manual of the Koch’s Paul Weyrich. “There are two rivers (faith-inspired and secular human service organizations) running parallel and the separation is not to the benefit of progress.”
Bill and Melinda do not believe in democracy and they do not believe in separation of church and state. The goal is to control the population through religion. It worked in Ireland during the Great Hunger
Last time I checked, 80% of the charters in my neck of the woods were under enrolled, but they still claimed to have long waiting lists. Manufactured demand for the purpose of marketing. All lies.
It is particularly revolting that the Republicans are going to use education as their primary agitprop for the upcoming election.
This is freaking blasphemy on top of their traitorousness.
These are absolutely cynical, completely immoral people willing to risk the lives of children to achieve their own personal goals. Revolting.
They don’t believe a word of their own bs. A total fool like Greene might, but the rest of them–it’s politics to them and nothing more.
Education could not be used as an issue if people were happy with the local public schools. that so many people are unhappy with their local public school should be taken as a call for action instead of a reason to insult people.
Quite the contrary, surveys of parents have consistently shown that most are satisfied or very satisfied with the school their kids attend.
What the Repugnicans are doing is lying to parents (they are teaching white kids to hate themselves, and other such utter nonsense), and the parents believe the lies, which anyone would hate if they were true. But they aren’t.
People don’t leave their public school because they are unhappy with it. They leave because of the promises made by entrepreneurs, most of which are simply marketing and propaganda. Charter schools are not better than public schools, and many of them will close unexpectedly. Religious schools are worse than public schools.
The latest polling shows that at least 1/3 of current parents are unhappy with their schools. that could be due to covid procedures, proposals to eliminate college prep classes, or the basic failure of the school to conduct academic education.
However, 1/3 of parents is enough to swing an election.
Most of the choice movement on the political right is not about charter schools but about wanting vouchers so that people can send their children to private schools.
What most of those school choice proponents do not understand is how limited the supply of private schools are, especially at the high school level. In addition, many of the school choice proponents do not understand who “woke” almost all college prep private schools are.
Gov. Youngkin sends his children to private schools in the District of Columbia. It is a certainty that the curriculum and viewpoint of any college prep private school in DC is on the left politically.
But as Diane often points out, the vouchers won’t come even close to paying the tuitions at decent private schools.
It is a flat-out lie when people like Betsy DeVos say that vouchers will give poor kids “the same choices” as rich kids. Rich kids in DC can go to Sidwell Friends, where the Obama girls went. Or they can go to the classy Episcopal school that Barron Trump attended. But no voucher would cover even half of the tuition. And those schools are not eager to enroll kids with low test scores.
It is a certainty that the curriculum and viewpoint of any college prep private school in DC is on the left politically.
Those darned intellectuals.
You are so right. Kids who get vouchers worth $4,000-$7,000 will be able to enroll in a religious school, not an elite private school. The latter have waiting lists, and their tuition is far larger that what the state voucher provides. And you are right about the political/ideological climate at the elite high schools, which is usually hyper-woke.
I’ve said it many times and I’ll say it again. Anyone who thinks the pandemic as an “opportunity” to advance their own agenda is a scumbag.
What is the best funded public school system and what is the worst funded school system in South Carolina. And does the funding number include Title I funding. Probably the worse funded public school is a rural all white blue collar school with average or better than average test scores.
I bet that a school with all purple students would do even better!
But your argument makes so much sense.
Wow! Just think how well schools would do if we eliminated funding for them altogether!!!
This post and the one you made further below are tired arguments. Mostly because they’re not especially true.
As for American satisfaction with public schools, it has been well-established that when Americans are asked about their neighborhood schools, they tend to like them. But when asked about schools in general, they say worse things.
Just like the fact that people tend to like their Congressional representative but think Congress is awful.
Secondly, your rural schools are better argument is weak. That would require a meta-study. Sure you could cherry-pick but that wouldn’t be representative.
Besides, rural areas have lower education households. In my experience, the less educated the parents are, the lower the respect for getting an education becomes.
Every time I’m in rural America, I’m engaged with people who have some pretty severe misconceptions of the world and are more likely to fall for disinformation. Additionally, they tend to be pretty angry. They also have similar problems to urban areas, like drug addiction.
People know more about their neighborhood public school, which they like, than they do about schools in general, where they echo the negative opinions of the media and the elites.
I guess no one could actually look up the funding of schools in South Carolina to see which ones are the best funded and which ones are the worst funded. I know in Maryland that the western Maryand rural schools are funded at a lower level than Prince Georges County schools but have higher test scores. The same applies In Illinois with rural schools receiving the lowest funding and in Penn.
Also, everyone should look up the research between school funding and test scores. The correlation turns up negative more than positive.
People who live in rural areas are probably more likely to own real estate. Maybe you should correlate that and then look at how systemic racism has thwarted Black ownership of property.
Yes, let’s reduce school funding. By all means. You realize that these arguments have been going on for decades. I guess, according to your logic, if we reduce spending then they’ll get better.
Let me present a great big 2022 problem with your thinking.
There ‘s teacher shortage. And it’s not even near it’s worst moment. Why? Because the job is not attractive. Chiefly because the pay is remarkably low for a college-educated job. Pensions are no longer a thing where I live for new hires. The health care is no better than private sector. So even the non-compensatory features are not what they were 25 years ago. We have few applicants for open positions and few are worth the interview.
Additionally, summer vacation isn’t even appealing because work from home is increasingly common. Teachers have defined hours and a commute.
But in your mind, reducing the cost even more will lead to better results.
There are likely non-school factors that account for your test scores are better at rural schools thinking. For example, fewer ESL. Smaller class sizes.
But don’t you worry. The grand plan is to put kids in front of screens all day. That will be cheap.
The question is not about reducing funding but about whether increasing funding will have any effect. The DC public schools spend twice as much as the surrounding Maryland and Virginia schools. If $15k per student makes no measurable improvement in test scores, then how much money is needed. If Cumberland Maryland where a significant part of the population live in trailers can have higher test scores than PG County, then it is hard to show any data that shows that increasing spending will have any effect.
After basic needs are met, degree of autonomy in the job is more important to people than money is.
Exactly what Daniel Pink wrote about.
yes!!!
Note to medical community about superdestroyer- should he become gravely ill, he wants spending for his care to match that for the healthy. If extra money for services would benefit- he wants the cheapest package possible because quality is all the same.
After that, super destroyer’s name will be just, “destroyed”.
The pandemic is an all ‘round winner for GOP.
Pandemic > school closures > hate on unions > new wings for school choice
Pandemic > mail-in votes > the Big Lie > voter suppression
Pandemic > pandemic aid to workers & smallbiz > Dems take scary turn to socialism
Pandemic > supply-chain disruption > sudden inflation > Biden done it
Etc
nailed it