Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, is wasting no time when it comes to destroying our children's education on a federal level. During her confirmation hearing, she stressed that she would work in the best interests of students, teachers and education leaders, and that she supported public schools, wanting only the best for them. But for those who know DeVos' history, this was not in tune with her previous statements and actions.
She has spent the last twenty plus years destroying the education system in her home state of Michigan. Through investing millions of her personal fortune into buying influence with Michigan politicians, she was able to get numerous bills passed that established charter schools and voucher programs. The DeVos family also helped create organizations that supported these bills, organizations that Betsy was a board member of. These organizations would then pressure and fund candidates who were under the impression this was a movement within education. Only it wasn't. It was actually all coming from a small group of like minded people: The Heritage Foundation, the DeVos family and the Koch brothers to name a few.
Today, the system Betsy DeVos created in Michigan is falling apart. Schools are closing, and there is no fair play when it comes to the quality of education being offered. This is mainly due to DeVos funding opposition to state mandated accountability practices. Schools in Michigan report to no one, and literally anyone can open a school. Students are failing and unable to maintain scores similar to other states. Taxpayer money is being drained from public schools and given to charter schools, thus crippling the public system. Public schools were not failing until she got her grubby little hands on them.
Step One: Cut accountability
Secretary DeVos began her assault on the Department of Education by gutting the very program she promised to uphold, the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). The ESSA is more or less the same set of standards and reporting practices that President George W. Bush's No Child Left Behind Act and the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act before it. Each president has changed the name of the program while adding or subtracting a few programs here and there. It is a large set of regulations that require schools across the nation to meet state academic standards, conduct academic assessments, have statewide accountability systems and provide for school support.
While DeVos kept all the programs in ESSA, on March 13, 2017, she created what is referred to as the Consolidated ESSA Plan. It dropped all accountability measures. States will still have to submit their program plans to the Department of Education as this helps the federal government determine how much assistance/funding to give each state. As DeVos stated:
"Students have never been well-served by rules, regulations, and red tape that are not absolutely necessary and that hinder their teachers, local school districts, and state leaders."
This statement makes is seem as if she only cut those rules and regulations that were not benefiting students and schools. However, this is not the case. To be clear, she cut all rules and regulations. States can now choose the programs they participate in as long as they do not violate disability and discrimination laws. How those states evaluate their schools and programs is up to them. Further, they do not need any approval as to how they spend any funds even if they are taxpayer funds.
Step Two: Break up teacher's unions
States will no longer be required to report on teacher's issues such as pay discrepancy. Schools will not have to provide students with access to school counselors, experienced teachers or certified teachers. In short, this allows schools to hire teachers with little to no experience or certification. A recent bill stating that teachers need not have a teaching degree but merely experience in a field in Wisconsin was killed due to voter outrage. Aside from making Joe Blow a teacher, this will reduce actual teachers' pay and benefits.
DeVos' goal is to take taxpayer money from the federal government and dole it out to states who in turn hire private management companies that maintain charter schools. By refusing to hold states accountable at the federal level, they no longer have to follow Constitutional requirements of separation of church and state. This will allow for religion to be brought into the classroom; of course they mean Christianity. Additionally, she will be creating a private market that is funded by taxpayer dollars.
Step Three: Bring in the vast right-wing network she created in Michigan
On Tuesday, March 14, 2017, Secretary DeVos met with the Center for Education Reform (CER). According to her schedule, this was "behind closed doors," so we have no idea what was said. That's convenient since the CER is part of the DeVos education network she created in Michigan. This network consists of many private, non-profit organizations that are funded by right-wing think tanks.
At the top of this network is The Heritage Foundation. Betsy DeVos' father-in-law, Richard DeVos, helped create the foundation by initially funding it in the 1970's. The Heritage Foundation is the go to organization for everything right-wing. They are the reason America is under Trump tyranny right now. They are behind the voter roll purges, voter ID laws and all the other Republican shenanigans. The Heritage Foundation maintains professional advisers on every subject from the environment to defense. They tell Republicans what to think and what to do, which explains how they are always in lockstep on every issue.
The Heritage Foundation's education department established mini-Heritage Foundations in every state called the State Policy Network (SPN). The SPN in turn funds the multitude of charitable, pro-charter school, pro-voucher organizations that have been established by the DeVos, the Koch brothers and a handful of other mega-wealthy parasites that feed at the government trough. The CERS is one of these groups. They in turn donate to each other's organizations and to both the SPN and The Heritage Foundation. They are all supporting each other in gaining access to state legislatures and local school boards to make each system into a private education enterprise run off of taxpayer dollars.
In order to streamline this concept, The Heritage Foundation, SPN and all these charitable organizations joined the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). ALEC is responsible for bringing together corporate interests and legislation. It maintains departments in all subject matters like The Heritage Foundation, but ALEC focuses on writing legislation only. They claim to be non-partisan but only have one Democrat on their roles. Your state representatives meet with corporate representatives and vote on what should be included in bills. ALEC then writes the legislation and makes it available to all legislative bodies. Representatives merely have to copy and paste their names to the bills and pretend they wrote them.
ALEC maintains education bills concerning legalizing charter schools, resolutions supporting homeschooling, school tax credit programs, online school charter acts and many more. As reported by an investigation by The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), they have been pushing for privatization in schools since 1985 when they wrote Milwaukee's Parental Choice Program. Today Georgia, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Florida and Indiana have all passed charter school legislation using ALEC bills. It has been estimated that half of all legislation in the states was written not by your representatives that you voted for, but by ALEC.
In addition to funding The Heritage Foundation, SPN and ALEC, the Koch brothers also funnel money into education through various non-profit groups. Millions have been pushed toward privatizing schools via their Claude R. Lambe Foundation, Donors Trust, Donors Capital Fund, Americans for Prosperity and the Knowledge and Progress Fund. Likewise, the DeVos family funneled their money through the American Enterprise Institute, FreedomWorks, The Federalist Society, The Mackinac Center for Public Policy, The Great Lakes Education Program and many other groups.
Step Four: Convince Americans to privatize education
ALEC is a pro at using terms to fool the public. CMD's investigation found that ALEC purposefully labeled their arguments for privatizing schools as "school choice" and "opportunities for low-income families." Many of these organizations show minority children on their websites in an effort to make it seem as though school choice, charters and vouchers are to benefit the minority and poor communities. They also offer scholarship programs that appeal to parents like the Special Needs Scholarship, Foster Child Scholarship and Opportunity Scholarship Programs. The term 'vouchers" will be replaced by "The Education Savings Account Act." You can expect to hear Secretary DeVos make that change in terminology soon.
As usual with these privatizing anti-government types, these programs are in reality a way to benefit rich, white families. According to the CMD report, the wealthy in Wisconsin can now take tax money and pay for private tuition even though most (upwards of 75%) were in those private, religious schools already. In Georgia, ALEC sold a voucher program to parents by claiming it was intended to assist minority families, yet most scholarships were given to white, wealthy families.
ALEC's latest scam is to write bills allowing for corporations to deduct 100% of their donations to educational organizations. Past laws only allowed 50%. This bill is referred to as "The Great Schools Tax Credit Act" and was introduced in seventeen state legislatures during 2015. It's expected to be introduced federally as well.
Game, set, match
DeVos began immediately by soliciting contracts for studies on how to fund private, religious schools with taxpayer funds. This week she completely scrapped all of the state education requirements for accountability, all data reporting on teachers and how schools use their taxpayer funds. Meetings with her labyrinth of charter school organizations have also begun as evidenced by her off-the-record meeting with the CER.
This is nothing more than a DeVos style scheme to get tax money into private hands and Christianity into schools. Instead of tax dollars going to public schools, they will go to private management companies that will then give 10-15% to your kid's school. The professional teacher will all but disappear. In return, The Heritage Foundation, the DeVos family and the Kochs will have generations of uneducated, religious zealots to vote for their right-wing causes. This is corporate welfare at its worst.
Only the loud voices of educators and parents can stop this. Start organizing and making your protests heard in hopes that it's not too late.
