Why Conservatives Should Keep a Close Eye on Betsy Devos’ Time at the Department of Education
In a rare moment where I wonder whether I might be hallucinating, I seem to find myself in agreement with Juan Williams, the liberal Fox News, ex-NPR commentator. In a recent op-ed in The Hill, Williams takes a hard look at Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of education, Betsy DeVos, and concludes that she might do great things for education … and she might do the exact opposite.
Education policy has long been one of my interests, and with respect to policy there are few evils greater than the Department of Education. Apart from being blatantly unconstitutional (the Constitution makes no mention of education and therefore reserves it to the states, not the federal government) the attempt to federalize education has led to such abominations as high-stakes testing, Common Core Standards, and data collection on students. It’s one of the first departments I would like to see a conservative president eliminate in its entirety. And while Trump has shown no signs of going this far, at first glance DeVos looks like she might be a step in the right direction.
As an education activist in Michigan, she was a strong supporter of school choice and her efforts greatly increased the state’s number of charter schools. Unlike many liberals, Juan Williams recognizes the benefits of choice in education and even admits to sending his own children to a charter school in Washington, DC because charter schools are just better than the public alternatives.
But DeVos is an untested quantity in anything like the role which she is being given, and there is no way to know how her past support for school choice will manifest itself at the federal level. It might take the form of a federalized voucher system, which many conservatives would consider a good thing. I would urge caution, however, before enthusiastically embracing such a system. Yes, federal vouchers would allow you to take your child to a private or religious school you otherwise might not be able to afford, but it also hands the federal government the purse strings of those institutions. If a school teaches something the government doesn’t like, there is always the threat of reclassifying the school in order to deny it voucher money.
Schools will do almost anything to avoid this loss of funding, which means that the Department of Education could essentially control the curriculum or standards of private schools just as it does for public schools now. In this way, what initially seemed like more choice becomes less choice as all schools, public and private, conform to the same standards.
One of Williams’ chief criticisms of DeVos is based on claims that the charter schools in Michigan don’t work, meaning that students don’t perform well on standardized tests or have high graduation rates compared to public schools in the state. There may be some truth in this, but we should always be careful of getting bogged down in data when it comes to education. Despite what the Left would have us believe, it’s not really possible to objectively measure education. It’s necessary for parents and children to decide what kind of school works for them, and that decision can’t be captured in a simple numerical score.
In short, I generally agree with Williams, especially when he says:
To me, no area of public policy is more in need of positive disruption than a public education system that is condemning too many children, especially black and Latino children, to live in poverty because they are not equipped with a good education.
To his credit, Williams recognizes that the status quo is unacceptable, although I suspect we differ on the question of how much public schools, as opposed to other forms of education, should be prioritized.
DeVos looks like she might be willing to shake things up, which is something we badly need, but her success as Education Secretary is far from certain. Her past support of Common Core is concerning, meaning that she does foresee a federal role in testing standards that is fundamentally anti-choice. She has since rescinded that position, but time will tell whether this is a genuine conversion, or a matter of political convenience. (For more from the author of “Why Conservatives Should Keep a Close Eye on Betsy Devos’ Time at the Department of Education” please click HERE)
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