Betsy DeVos Disaster

[firstfloor]

I’ve been watching the confirmation hearing. How does someone this bad and clearly so unsuitable get so far? Donations to the Republican Party aimed at gutting public education?
Education generates wealth - that's why a high-tec economy needs as many well educated people from all backgrounds as it can get - it is investment - education is not commerce.
#SayNoToBetsyDeVos

[Meh Gerbil]

I’ve been watching the confirmation hearing. How does someone this bad and clearly so unsuitable get so far? Donations to the Republican Party aimed at gutting public education?
Education generates wealth - that's why a high-tec economy needs as many well educated people from all backgrounds as it can get - it is investment - education is not commerce.
#SayNoToBetsyDeVos

We need to de-centralize education so that the state can no longer use it as a propaganda tool.
BTW, I like the Bertrand Russell quote in your signature.

[Cow Poke]

I’ve been watching the confirmation hearing. How does someone this bad and clearly so unsuitable get so far? Donations to the Republican Party aimed at gutting public education?

You think public education in America is good "as is"?

Education generates wealth -

Education would be GREAT! What we have is a massive teachers' union looking out for themselves.

that's why a high-tec economy needs as many well educated people from all backgrounds as it can get - it is investment - education is not commerce.
#SayNoToBetsyDeVos

So, again, you think the American public education system is good "as is"?

[MsJack]

She's clearly unqualified (and I say that as someone who usually votes Republican and has very few issues with Trump's other nominees).

I hope another Republican defects so Mike Pence can't tiebreaker her through.

[Jedidiah]

I’ve been watching the confirmation hearing. How does someone this bad and clearly so unsuitable get so far? Donations to the Republican Party aimed at gutting public education?
Education generates wealth - that's why a high-tec economy needs as many well educated people from all backgrounds as it can get - it is investment - education is not commerce.
#SayNoToBetsyDeVos

Public education today has ceased to serve the purposes for which it was intended, and which you describe. It needs gutting, that is to say decentralization. Fewer high level administrators and more classroom teachers.

[Starlight]

You think public education in America is good "as is"?

It seems okayish according to international comparison charts. It's not significantly worse than the OECD average, so I don't see a reason to panic about it.

[Cow Poke]

It seems okayish according to international comparison charts. It's not significantly worse than the OECD average, so I don't see a reason to panic about it.

I don't see any panic. Just a desire to get the focus on children and learning instead of teachers and career educrats.

[Cow Poke]

I don't see any panic. Just a desire to get the focus on children and learning instead of teachers and career educrats.

Looks like the powerful "Big Ed" union may win....


[bolding mine]

Democrats stood in solidarity when President Obama made his Cabinet picks in 2008. Eight years later the Republicans aren’t showing the same level of discipline for President Trump.

This week two liberal Republicans unexpectedly abandoned Betsy DeVos, Mr. Trump’s nominee for secretary of education. Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Maine’s Susan M. Collins revealed they will not support Ms. DeVos because they believe that she lacks the qualifications for the job.

Ms. DeVos is an exceptional nominee, an outsider who understands the political machinery within the federal bureaucracy and the need to break the unions’ stranglehold on a public education system badly in need of reform. Ms. DeVos believes in finding the right educational choice for each child, whether that be public, private, home-schooling or religious. The one-size-fits-all educational model is antiquated and needs a thorough overhaul.

But now the real story has been revealed. Ms. Murkowski and Ms. Collins have a cozy relationship with the National Education Association (NEA), which strongly opposes Ms. DeVos. The NEA, the largest labor union for public school teachers, is a fierce opponent of school choice. They view Ms. DeVos as a threat to the status quo — a top-down, government-run educational system.

Liberals are "pro choice", except when it comes to education.

[KingsGambit]

Education is one issue where I agree with the Conservatives that it ought to be handled on a state level, which is to say that the role of Secretary of Education should be significantly limited. Having said that, actual experience working in the school system would be an ideal prerequisite. DeVos simply is not qualified.

[Meh Gerbil]

"In the 1960s and 1970s, the United States had the best-educated young people in the world, or pretty close to it. But a disturbing new report from the Council on Foreign Relations says that the generations who’ve followed the boomers haven’t been able to maintain that global edge – and that, as a result, America’s ability to compete economically is suffering as well."
- Source: http://blog.aarp.org/2013/06/19/u-s-...d-strong-lead/

What happened?
Well, I don't know for sure but the U.S. Department of Education was formed in 1979.

That's right, the decline in our education has been at the direction of a federal program ostensibly in place to ensure the opposite.
That is 36 years of failure - how long does a department have to fail before we axe it?

[Cow Poke]

Education is one issue where I agree with the Conservatives that it ought to be handled on a state level, which is to say that the role of Secretary of Education should be significantly limited. Having said that, actual experience working in the school system would be an ideal prerequisite. DeVos simply is not qualified.

The problem with "experience" in this field is that it pretty much means "the same old crowd" that has been in charge of education - meaning a flunky of the teachers' unions. I think we need a shakeup.

[Cow Poke]

"In the 1960s and 1970s, the United States had the best-educated young people in the world, or pretty close to it. But a disturbing new report from the Council on Foreign Relations says that the generations who’ve followed the boomers haven’t been able to maintain that global edge – and that, as a result, America’s ability to compete economically is suffering as well."
- Source: http://blog.aarp.org/2013/06/19/u-s-...d-strong-lead/

What happened?
Well, I don't know for sure but the U.S. Department of Education was formed in 1979.

That's right, the decline in our education has been at the direction of a federal program ostensibly in place to ensure the opposite.
That is 36 years of failure - how long does a department have to fail before we axe it?

that

[KingsGambit]

The problem with "experience" in this field is that it pretty much means "the same old crowd" that has been in charge of education - meaning a flunky of the teachers' unions. I think we need a shakeup.

I don't see why they couldn't find somebody separate from unions. There are plenty of teachers out there who want nothing to do with the NEA.

[RumTumTugger]

I don't see why they couldn't find somebody separate from unions. There are plenty of teachers out there who want nothing to do with the NEA.

the unions have a lock down on the public school systems

[JimL]

"In the 1960s and 1970s, the United States had the best-educated young people in the world, or pretty close to it. But a disturbing new report from the Council on Foreign Relations says that the generations who’ve followed the boomers haven’t been able to maintain that global edge – and that, as a result, America’s ability to compete economically is suffering as well."
- Source: http://blog.aarp.org/2013/06/19/u-s-...d-strong-lead/

What happened?
Well, I don't know for sure but the U.S. Department of Education was formed in 1979.

That's right, the decline in our education has been at the direction of a federal program ostensibly in place to ensure the opposite.
That is 36 years of failure - how long does a department have to fail before we axe it?

The U.S. had a head start in public education, its only natural that the rest of the world would catch up. It isn't a decline in our education as much as it is the rest of the world catching up. Thats not to say thats its perfect, or that it hasn't had its problems, and doesn't need fix'n, but you don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Conservatives/Republicans just have a problem with government in general, and they don't like the idea of paying taxes when it doesn't benefit them personally. Unions aren't the problem, not valuing education enough to get more great teachers into the system is a problem.