Tuesday afternoon’s confirmation of Betsy DeVos as Donald Trump’s education secretary certainly produced its share of political drama, from the 24-hour "talkathon" by Senate Democrats to Vice President Mike Pence casting the deciding vote, the first time a vice president has been called on to break a tie over a cabinet nominee in the nation’s history. But at its heart, it really wasn’t about politics or process, it was about a supremely unqualified nominee.
Much has been made of Ms. DeVos’ support for vouchers, private schools, public charter schools and private alternatives to traditional public schools. But that’s hardly unique, particularly within the conservative wing of the Republican Party. Nor is it shocking that she is a billionaire and high-profile donor to GOP candidates and causes — she’s hardly alone among Mr. Trump’s cabinet picks in those respects either.
It’s also fair to point out that teacher unions, a key Democratic constituency under nearly any circumstances, have been working hard against Ms. DeVos. And that involves no small amount of self-interest on their part, given that any diversion of funds from public schools to private schools (or even non-union alternative schools) would be a blow to the public sector labor movement. That doesn’t make them wrong, incidentally, any more than advocating for books and blackboards is tainted by how teachers benefit from those classroom resources, too.
No, what truly set Ms. DeVos apart was how little she knows about public schools and the myriad challenges they face in the 21st century. And that’s not just because she didn’t attend public schools, did not send her own children to public schools and never worked in public schools (although those are obviously contributing factors), it’s because — as she demonstrated in her testimony to a Senate committee — she simply hasn’t bothered to become educated on the issues.
The nominee’s supporters like to describe her as a change agent and someone willing to buck the deeply entrenched education bureaucracy. That may well be true, but what kind of crusader doesn’t know what’s she’s crusading against? Over and over again, she made it clear that she’s not familiar with issues involving special education, standardized testing, student debt and on and on. These are not small matters.
Ms. DeVos is a single-issue lobbyist. Asking her to oversee this nation’s education establishment is like hiring a carpenter to build a home when all he possesses and knows how to use is a hammer. To such a workman, every problem appears to be a nail. And Ms. DeVos is no different — she has advocated for charter schools and against restrictions on them in her home state of Michigan. And even in that arena, it’s not clear how expert she is given that, in written testimony (that one presumes is double-checked by her staff), she greatly overstated the graduation rates of virtual charter schools.
There’s no question that the confirmation represents a personal victory for the Trump administration, but the more important question is what it will mean for America’s public schools. The manner in which her opponents rallied so many people against her — including two GOP senators who both revealed that large numbers of their home state constituents were up in arms over the nominee — suggests that she will not only be the nation’s least-qualified education secretary, she will likely be the least effective.
Ms. DeVos wasn’t President Trump’s worst cabinet appointment (Scott Pruitt at the EPA and Sen. Jeff Sessions for attorney general may be more qualified in their fields, but their beliefs are easily more odious than those of Ms. DeVos), but she takes office as a strikingly unpopular and controversial secretary — the James G. Watt of this era. And just like Ronald Reagan’s controversial Interior secretary, Ms. DeVos is bound to serve primarily as a lightning rod for an administration that is already upset with the jolts of criticism that have been directed its way. This isn’t someone to reform public education, encourage states to support charter schools or even to teach the public about the challenges facing educators generally. Rather, it’s the confirmation of yet another recurring character on "Saturday Night Live," a one-note, lightweight school-choice advocate who can’t tell the difference between student proficiency and growth.
Our editors found this article on this site using Google and regenerated it for our readers.
