California teachers unions are furious about the approval of Betsy DeVos as secretary of education. DeVos, a staunch advocate of school choice, school vouchers and charter schools, was narrowly approved Tuesday by a 50-50 vote of the Senate, with Vice President Mike Pence breaking the tie. More revealing than the final vote, though, is just how frenzied the rhetoric of the teachers unions has been.
While DeVos hasn’t always given the most polished of answers throughout her confirmation, her commitment to innovation and choice in education has been made clear. “Why, in 2017, are we still questioning parents’ ability to exercise educational choice for their children?” DeVos asked during her Senate confirmation hearing on Jan. 17. “I am a firm believer that parents should be empowered to choose the learning environment that’s best for each of their individual children.”
To the average person, such statements might sound perfectly sensible, but for those for whom ideology and political control trumps all other considerations, there was something sinister lurking behind such talk of “educational choice” and parents doing what’s “best for each of their individual children.”
The day after her hearing, Eric Heins, president of the California Teachers Association, shared his strongly worded statement of the week. “It seems clear to us: she is an anti-public education activist more interested in funneling public monies into private schools and for-profit charter schools,” he said. “She doesn’t value the diversity we celebrate and hold dear here in California.”
Incredibly, to the teachers unions, wanting parents to have their pick of traditional public schools, public charter schools and private schools constitutes an opposition to public schools and diversity. United Teachers Los Angeles took its opposition to hysterical levels, holding protests before Inauguration Day in which teachers, parents and even students held signs linking DeVos and President Trump to racism, sexism and privatization.
It’s the sort of rhetoric that only a far-left ideologue could appreciate — and merely muddies the waters of what is a critical debate, in California and in most local school districts across the country, over the value of school choice.
Upon DeVos’ approval, things didn’t get much better. The California Federation of Teachers put out a statement lamenting DeVos’ confirmation. “It is unfortunate that someone so openly anti-public education is running public education,” the union argued. Likewise, the CTA attempted to find some solace in the 50-50 vote, asserting “the bipartisan public outcry denies President Trump and DeVos any mandate to take over our public schools.”
Such rhetoric reveals a profound, but probably deliberate, misrepresentation of what DeVos can achieve as education secretary. The head of the federal Education Department can hardly be said to be “running public education,” or really in a position to literally “take over our public schools.”
It is true, of course, that the Department of Education, launched in 1979 under the Carter administration, has nevertheless seen its mission, and budget, perpetually expand, but it is simply incorrect to assert that DeVos is actually “running public education.” The powers of the secretary of education are actually quite constrained.
While a fundamental debate to have here is whether the federal government needs to play any role whatsoever in public education, considering that “education” is nowhere to be found in the Constitution, what the unions are actually so upset over is that DeVos’ position provides her a national bully pulpit to advocate for school choice.
California’s teachers unions have long waged a campaign to denigrate charter schools, in particular — largely because such schools are growing in popularity — and in DeVos they have a prominent foe. While honest critiques of DeVos and her ideas should be freely expressed, California’s teachers unions have made clear that they prefer hyperbole and hysteria to reasoned debate.
Sal Rodriguez is a staff columnist. He may be reached at: salrodriguez@scng.com.
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