Network Schools – Wayne Gerseny to https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/04/03/magazine/thomas-piketty-interview u w B l.html?h I’ll smid=url-share the Is for

Education Week reporter Andrew Ujifusa wrote an article describing the four tumultuous years of Betsy DeVos’ leadership and, like many of his education beat colleagues, concluded that her policy impact on public education was limited. He concluded that after all was said and done, she focused on two overarching themes:  

One was the rollback of Obama administration initiatives to increase school diversity, expand transgender students’ rights, and address racial disparities in school discipline. The Biden administration is expected to reinstate these and perhaps others from the Obama era, further cementing the see-saw pattern of the executive branch’s actions in education as presidents come and go.

The other is the failure—so far—of her favored initiatives to become law, even as they generated so much controversy. They include her push to use federal power if not dollars to dramatically expand educational choice; her unsuccessful calls for Congress to cut her agency’s budget, which lawmakers responded to by increasing it; and, more broadly, the Trump administration’s dead-on-arrival proposal to consolidate the Education Department with the Department of Labor. (Whether a new coronavirus relief bill includes the expansion of school choice she’s lobbied for remains to be seen.)

Mr. Ujifusa offers lots of evidence to support his assertions. But I think he misses Betsy DeVos greatest legacy: she shifted the spotlight away from the issues of funding equity and opportunity equity. In doing so she (and her GOP supporters at the State level) has undermined the voters support for public schools by convincing them that education is a commodity and not a public good. Ultimately, Ms. DeVos and her libertarian supporters believe that parents should be able to shop for schools the same way they shop for groceries or apparel, reasoning that such a “market driven” basis for schools would enable parents who reside in an attendance zone where schools are poorly funded would be able to enroll in any school they want to. Their argument is reduced to the soundbite that “any parent should be able to offer their child a choice of schools no matter what zip code they live in”.

This argument is flawed on two grounds: the market does not offer residents in poor communities ANY kind of “choice” for goods that is comparable to residents in affluent communities; and the physical plants that currently provide the most desirable schooling are limited in their capacity.

Two questions illustrate my point: Can a parent in the Bronx walk to or drive to a grocery store or shopping area that compares to what is available in Scarsdale? Can a school in Scarsdale provide space for parents in the Bronx who want to send their child there?

Until the answer to THOSE questions is a resounding “YES” the whole concept of market-based school choice is clearly bogus… and that answer will never be a resounding “YES” until public schools have funding equity AND offer an equitable educational opportunity.

But, as Betsy DeVos and her supporters/enablers know, it is far easier to sell voters on the idea that offering parents a “choice” of where to send their children can solve the problems of equity without raising more money to build and staff schools to the level of those available to the most affluent parents… and over the past four years Ms. DeVos has, in the phrase of Derrick Black, poured gasoline on the fire of “choice”… a fire that NCLB set and a fire that smoldered for years under Obama.

Biden needs someone to put out that fire and shift the debate BACK to funding equity and equity of opportunity. Anything short of that will allow the fire to spread… especially given the dominance of the GOP at the State level.