In Vermont, Republican Governor Phil Scott nominated a candidate for State Commissioner of Education who had spent seven years as a leader of Charter Schools, USA, a for-profit charter chain in Florida. However, the Vermont State Senate rejected the nomination. Governor Scott then named his nominee Acting Secretary of Education. Two members of the legislature sued to block her appointment.
Peter Greene writes about what happened in Vermont.
First, a recap of how the state arrived at this point.
Vermont had been short an education secretary for about a year when Governor Phil Scott got his heart set on Zoie Saunders, despite Saunders having a less-than-spectacular resume.
Zoie Saunders has barely any background in public education. She attended the Dana Hall School, a private girls’ school in Wellesley, Massachusetts. Her first jobs were in the pediatric health care field, then she went to work in strategy for Charter Schools USA, a Florida for-profit charter chain, in particular profiting from taxpayer-funded real estate business. CSUSA was founded by Jonathan Hage, a former Green Beret who previously worked for the Heritage Foundation and Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Florida’s Future. Here’s League Education Chair Patricia Hall talking about how CSUSA rakes in the bucks:
Our shining local examples in Hillsborough County are owned by Charter Schools USA. My first glimpse of Winthrop Charter School in Riverview in November of 2011 was during a scheduled visit with then Rep. Rachel Burgin. When told the two story brick building was a charter school, I was mystified. The site on which it was built was purchased from John Sullivan by Ryan Construction Company, Minneapolis, MN. From research done by the League of Women Voters of Florida all school building purchases ultimately owned and managed by for-profit Charter Schools USA are initiated by Ryan Construction. The Winthrop site was sold to Ryan Co. in March, 2011 for $2,206,700. In September, 2011 the completed 50,000 square foot building was sold to Red Apple Development Company, LLC for $9,300,000 titled as are all schools managed by Charter Schools USA. Red Apple Development is the school development arm of Charter Schools USA. We, tax payers of Hillsborough County, have paid $969,000 and $988,380 for the last two years to Charter Schools USA in lease fees!
After six and a half years with CSUSA, Saunders moved into the job of Chief Education Officer for the city of Fort Lauderdale, a job that involved expanding education opportunities, including nonpublic schools.
Saunders took her first job in public education, chief strategy and innovation officer got Broward County Public Schools, in January 2024; her job there was the lead the district’s work to “close and repurpose schools,” a source of controversy in the community, according to the Sun-Sentinel. But her time as a school-killer for a public system was short, because Vermont was calling.
Once Scott announced his hiring choice (on a Friday), pushback was swift and strong. John Walters at the Vermont Political Observer, a progressive blog that has been all over this, noted that the lack of qualifications for the job was not the bad part:
The bad part is that her experience as a school killer and her years in the charter school industry are in perfect alignment with the governor’s clear education agenda: spread the money around, tighten the screws on public education, watch performance indicators fall, claim that the public schools are failing, spread the money around some more, lather, rinse, repeat. Saunders may not qualify as an educational leader, but her experience is directly relevant to Scott’s policy.
Objections to Saunders in the job were many, including her lack of any apparent vision for job. Add to the list the fact that she’d never run any organization remotely as large or complicated as a state’s education department.
Saunders moved into the office April 15, but the Senate still got to have a say, and what they said was, “Nope.” They voted her down 19-9, a thing which pretty much never happens.
And Scott went ahead and put her in office anyway.
Roughly fifteen minutes (okay–one whole day) after the Senate rejected her, Scott appointed Saundersthe interim Secretary of Education, a thing that does not require any Senate approval and which he presumably doesn’t have to move on from any time soon, particularly given she has announced her 100 day plan. Scott did not appear moved to appoint an interim during the year since Dan French resigned the post.
Scott characterized the vote as a “partisan political hit job,” even though three Democrats voted with the GOP senators to approve. He characterized attacks on Saunders as “unfair,” “hurtful,” and “false.”
Scott kept spinning in the aftermath, claiming that it was false to say that she only had three months experience in public education, even though she clearly only has three months of experience in the public education sector. As John Walters reported,Scott also tried to pin the defeat on “outside groups.” Walters pointed out that Scott has previously said he favors “CEO experience more than public school experience,” though Saunders doesn’t have that, either.
In June, two state senators (Tanya Vyhovsky and Dick McCormack) sued the governor and Saunders for “purposefully circumventing” the Senate’ authority to confirm or deny appointments. As reported by Sarah Mearhoff at VTDigger, another news site that has stayed on stop of the story:
“This is now no longer even about the secretary of education,” Vyhovsky told VTDigger in an interview. “It’s about separation of powers and the right of the Senate to do the job that it is constitutionally and statutorily given.”
So now…
Yesterday, the two sides got to speak their piece in Vermont Superior Court in front of Judge Robert Mello. Mello was appointed by Republican Governor Jim Douglas in 2010.
Mello promised a quick decision on Thursday, and sure enough– he issued his ruling today (Friday).
Judge Mello dismissed the lawsuit:
To the extent that the Senators argue that the Senate’s decision to not confirm Ms. Saunders prevents the Governor from reappointing her, whether on an interim or permanent basis, the court disagrees…When the legislature has wanted to so limit the Governor’s appointment power, it has simply said so.
The reference is to legislative action that specifically forbid the governor reappointing someone to the Green Mountain Care Board after the Senate rejected them. Apparently since the legislature didn’t specifically list another time that the governor is not allowed to overrule them, well, too bad.
What comes next? We’ll have to wait and see, but in the meantime Saunders can keep treating the job as hers, “interim” notwithstanding, because there’s no sign that the interim is going to conclude any time soon.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
This is clearly a political issue to be dealt with by the Governor and the State House. The appointment law does not require the candidates to be qualified or even competent. The basic requirements seem to be they must still be breathing and liked by the Governor.
This is the time the bureaucracy needs to put its foot down. If all of the department bureaucrats ignore this candidates directions, then eventually she will go away.
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Steve,
Is there an issue when the Governor gives the position to a candidate who was rejected by the State Senate? The job requires Senate approval. She doesn’t have it.
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That’s why it is a political dispute. It is obviously an overplay by the Gov, basically an FU to the state senate.
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The argument I would expect to be made is that she wasn’t rejected for the same job. She was rejected for the original job. The governor then appointed her on an interim basis. That is in fact a different position, a non-permanent position.
Now, obviously, that seems like quibbling, but it is a difference. There are numerous ways the law can be fixed, but not retroactively. But that is what legislative writing is about – accounting for seemingly stupid situations where a legislature was being less than clear.
But courts are not going to rewrite legislation because the legislature failed to cover a possible situation.
Go to any decent law library. They tend to be huge and have lots of books. This is why. If the legislature fails to ask “What if…?”, it is not the role of the courts to answer that question. The governor seems to have appointed someone to a job that didn’t exist – interim secretary of education.
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That’s strange. As interim , she gets to exercise the rights and responsibilities of the job for which the Senate rejected her. I don’t see the difference between being the Secretary of education or the interim Secretary of education.
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Generally, any interim position grants the powers to the interim officeholder. This is why statutes and rules have to define their terms. This is where mischief-making comes in: lack of clarity. How long can an “interim” appointment last? For that matter, are “interim” appointments even allowed for by law? Are the qualifications for an “interim” appointment the same as for a “permanent” appointment?
Statutory compilations consist of many volumes, because statutes have to cover nearly every conceivable situation. If they don’t, someone may go to court.
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Diane and thread: The odd thing is that, filling in every “WHAT IF” situation with legislation is a fool’s errand. When every what-if situation is legislated already, there is no freedom of thought left, not to mention creativity.
This is why hiring incompetent or nefarious people, besides being just plain stupid, is so damaging to a democracy–the need for “what if” legislation gets bigger and bigger, and pretty soon we are all legislated to death. It’s a late-modern version of a Dickens novel.
The basic idea is intelligent and well-informed competence backed up by personal development we all want and can admire.
Only then can the free space between government and the people in a democracy be well preserved and where the inevitable “what-ifs” are more like the pragmatics of traffic lights than the destructive force of hurricanes. CBK
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CBK,
You just described the harm in NCLB and Race to the Top. Trying to control the nation’s schools from DC is a fool’s errand. No one does their best when they are stifled by mandates and legislation.
Hire good teachers, give them guidelines, let them teach.
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Diane: Exactly that. I think also “the problem” need not be deliberate but also can be an inadvertent result (but nevertheless similarly dangerous) of the ever-increasing size of a country, culture, or whatever defines the established order and range of communications. The ever-broadening intellectual space, so to speak, has made it difficult for everyone–which also points to the importance of theory- and experience-informed education of teachers AND ADMINISTRATORS on every level. <here, as you notice and others notice, the insertion of money-making schemes and other elements of own present breakdown, are easily recognizable, though it’s worse when deliberate. (Selling watches with a backdrop of American Flags?)
Add to that, and I might say as is a hidden element in human development, is that some people actually are better developed and know more than others. On the other hand, and though it’s the central reality of what many mean by “elitism,” a specialist’s knowledge does not excuse a personal arrogance (any more than does Trump’s whiteness).
As a matter of fact, and though ignored by many (e.g., our special brand of technofascists), such knowledge informed by (shall we say) mature personal development, is already seeded with the mandate of a more basic humility–especially in the face of what we do not know. CBK
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Humility! How about a national campaign for humility?
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Diane: I’m for that, or something that embodies it, which is already “out there” all over the place, if not so recognizable by those who don’t already “get it.” And considering how much water one needs to get the seed to –grow into a mature plant. (I think Kamala embodies it and that it informs her temperate nature.) CBK
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These questionable right wing Ivy League graduates are opportunists are always seeking better access to plunder the common good and spread their toxic brew. https://networkforpubliceducation.org/blog-content/john-walters-a-few-questions-for-zoie-saunders/
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The Destroy Public Education Crime Syndicate and/or religious sect fights dirty, almost following the same battle plans Traitor Trump does.
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YUP!
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This practice of moving semi-competent administration from one place to another to hide their intended purpose is getting old.
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The Privatization Movement for Education is like “Death by a thousand cuts.” State by state, Charter schools and Vouchers and their advocates are being proposed by MAGA Governors. I believe that historically, after reading “Schoolhouse Burning” that the Project 2025 push to cripple public education is coordinated by the MAGA Movement “think tanks.” It’s time to support reading Derrick Black’s book in my view. It changed my perspective from when I’d completed “Education Vouchers: The issue of family choice in public eduction” Masters Thesis (1986).
Book: Schoolhouse Burning: Public Education and the Assault on American Democracy
Derek W. Black, a law professor at the University of South Carolina School of Law, is an expert on school vouchers and educational policy:
Vouchers as a threat to public education
Black believes that vouchers can threaten public education by allowing some families to leave the public school system, leaving only poor and minority students behind. He says that this would end public education as it has been known for the past two centuries.
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Thanks, Monty. Derek Black’s book is excellent. So much has changed since 1996 when you wrote your thesis. NOw we know that in every state, the majority of kids taking vouchers were already in private school. And that vouchers do not improve the academic outcomes of public school kids who use them. In fact, these kids lose ground, compared to their peers in public school.
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