USA Still World's Worst For Parental Leave

It's for the kids. Our children. 

I'm pretty sure you can't call yourself a politician or a policy education thought wonk leader if you don't invoke the children. And if you're a conservative, you must also invoke parents and parenthood as a sacred calling, to be revered and protected.

How do we know that this mostly a bunch of bovine byproduct?

Because the USA still has the world's worst parental leave policy.

Shut up, kid. You are not our problem.

I was reminded of this when a few folks noted the 30th anniversary of the Family and Medical Leave Act. The Washington Post headline captures the moment well-- "Once revolutionary, still inadequate." Petula Dvorak gets right to it from the jump:

In most American states, it is illegal to separate a puppy from its mother before it’s 8 weeks old.

Also in most American states, the average working mom is separated from her baby 10 weeks after delivery.

Our nation is hostile to families. Look at your inbox, social media feed or the GoFundMe site to see just how cruel:

And then follows a parade of terrible pleas for GoFundMe and sick day bank help from new parents struggling with the demands of new parenthood.

It is everywhere, all the time, often in ways that typify how we think of the Miracle Of New Life as an unwelcome interruption to the Real Business of Life. At my old district, we instituted a sick day exchange, allowing teachers to give their sick days to other teachers. Administration was upset that so much of the exchanging involved female teachers staying home with their new infants. It had apparently never occurred to them that in a staff dominated by young women that A) maternity leave would be one of the major asks and B) that the crappy minimal unpaid leave offered by the district wasn't enough. 

But it's everywhere. Parental rights are super-duper important, but get the hell back to work ASAP and get that kid in some kind of Day Care (which isn't going to be subsidized because that's your problem, not anyone else's). 

If you want the facts, the US is worse than every other major nation, by a lot. The only major nation in the world with no paid parental leave. The only nations as bad as ours are a couple of tiny islands (and actually, I'm working from a 2014 report, so those others may have improved in the interim, leaving us alone at the bottom of the barrel).

It's nuts. It's doubly nuts that the while some employers step up, the teaching profession is toward the bottom of the barrel in the nation that is at the bottom of the barrel. Want to make sure your newborn gets a good start in life? That's great, but we're short subs and you've used up all your sick days now (because that's what sick days are for because we still treat pregnancy and birth like they are some damn disease) and we're short of subs, so get your ass in here. You know-- for the children. Just not your children. And heaven help you if your infant comes into the world with some health issues. Heaven will have to help you, because our government will not.

Bring the issue up, and you will inevitably hear the same thing--it would put undue stress and strain on business owners. Which tells us everything we need to know about the relative importance of business owners, mothers, and children. We can spend a literally inconceivable amount of money on "defense," but not on parental leave. Politicians even line up to support universal pre-school, because plenty of people smell a chance to make money supplying that need. But something like, say, a federal fund that pays for a decent-size parental leave for every new parent? Crickets, cause that's just crazy talk.

Yes, this gets me cranky. It's such a blindingly obvious piece of hypocrisy, a nation's leaders screaming "We like children as props and excuses to do things, but we'd rather not spend money to actually take care of them." Yes, paid parental leave is hard--so hard that EVERY OTHER COUNTRY IN THE WORLD HAS FIGURED OUT HOW TO DO IT!

Okay, I'm calm now. In a nation where we worked hard to say that "Hey, higher education is your own problem" and some of us are trying hard right now to convert K-12 to a "Hey, that's your own problem" system, it's no surprise that our reaction to small children is the same--"Hey, that's your problem." But the continuing attempts to pretend otherwise just make me tired.

It's no wonder we passed the anniversary of FMLA rather quietly. It's nothing to brag about, and our parental leave policy remains the shame of our nation.

And if you're a politician, I don't want to hear about how much you value children and family unless you can also tell me about how you have worked to get a paid parental leave policy in this country. 

Vermont Moves To Restrict School Vouchers

Vermont, much like Maine, has long had school vouchers. It's a system that makes sense in a state where many rural communities do not have schools of their own. Instead, those students get tuition paid to the school of their choice. That program has, in the past, never included private religious schools.

That was working fine until Carson v. Makin, the case in which the Supreme Court declared that if Maine is going to have a school voucher program, that program has to include private religious schools as well. 

The ruling has obvious implications for Vermont, but Vermont has an extra wrinkle-- a constitutional clause that says residents can't be made to support religious practices with which they disagree. 

Now a bill has been proposed to fix the problem, and it represents one of the first attempts in any state to actually slap restrictions on an existing voucher program.

S.66 is an attempt to more closely define how the vouchers may be used. "Sending districts," those that have no public schools of their own, would designate up to three schools for their students to attend. Those schools could be other public schools or select private schools that meet certain state criteria (these can be in or out of state). There's an exception for Vermont's four historic academies-- a set of long-standing private schools. Also, schools that have special programs for serving students with special needs would also be allowed as choices over and above the district's designated schools.

This is bad news for many of the private schools that have done well under the former system.

"S.66 would completely dismantle a system that has successfully delivered high quality educational opportunities for rural Vermont students for over a century,” the Vermont Independent Schools Association said in a statement emailed by Mill Moore, the organization’s executive director.

But Sue Ceglowski, executive director of the state school boards association and a member of the Education Equity Alliance, says “Our position is that taxpayer funds should be administered in a way that is equitable, accountable and transparent."

The old system in Vermont may well be missed, but the tough truth here is that no matter what, it is going away, either to be replaced with a system that requires taxpayers to foot the bill for private religious education, or a system like the one proposed in this bill. This was always one of the possible outcomes of the Carson ruling--that states would more tightly control any voucher programs in order to maintain accountability for voucher schools and protection for taxpayers. It will be interesting to see if Vermont's model catches on there, or anywhere else.

What Trump 2024 Tells Us About The Politics Of Education

I just finished transcribing Trump's education screed for 2024. You can read that, and my reactions to it here, but in this post, I want to talk about what Trump demonstrates about the political discourse around education, about what the folks who want to disrupt, defund and dismantle public education have that the defenders of public education do not.

I do not imagine that Donald Trump has more than the barest understanding of what he's saying in his education policy videos, if that. His writer has strung together a bunch of the prevailing language and talking points in the right wing education space. At least5 I assume it was a writer, or a team of writers, but actually, it could just as easily have been ChatGPT, which simply takes the language that is already out in the world and remixes it.

And that's all his speech is-- a remix. 

And he's not alone. We hear the same education policy word salad from politician after politician. I have talked to more than a few pro-public ed activists who express frustration because when they talked to a politician, those politicians had little actual understanding of the actual issues. Pro-public education activists are bringing pointy little facts to a talking point artillery fight.

The thing is, folks taking a right wing position don't have to either know or care what they're talking about.

A well-oiled machine regularly generates, polishes, and disperses talking points on any number of subjects. Think tanks and advocacy groups come up with some angles to pitch, and then it's run through the media outlets, talking head after talking head, like rocks through a stone polisher. 

So if someone jockeying for office or power or just some press decides that Issue X is hot right now, he doesn't have to do research or dig into the issues or try to get a handle on anything. The language is already right there, ready and waiting. Field tested. All he has to do is pick it up and use it. 

I'm convinced that one big reasons Democrats are by and large such terrible defenders of public education is that they have lost the language. The drum starte3d beating thirty years ago with the made-to-order hatchet job of A Nation at Risk. Way back in the No Child Left Behind days, they gave up the language or pride and accomplishment when it came to public education, and just kept on giving up more and more of it. I'll never forget Dennis van Roekel's betrayal as NEA president, responding to criticism of Common Core by saying, "Well, then what would you do instead," as if the implicit Core assumption that schools were failing couldn't possibly be challenged. 

And of course by the time of Obama-Duncan, Democrats had completely given up the language of support for public education and adopted the conservative language of attacking the institution. The detente between free marketeers and social justice folks and neo-libs required everyone to adopt the language of disrupt, defund and dismantle. When Trump ascended, it sort of hit Dems that maybe they needed some sort of language to oppose his policies, but they simply didn't have any. They still don't, and in many cases, they have no real will to. 

How many political leaders are actually studying up on the issues they address or run for office touting? I have no idea, but my sense is that it's not most, probably not many, and barely even several. Nor do I think any of them have a bunch of time to be taught the issues, particularly when the issues are complicated.

That Democratic fecklessness isn't limited to education, of course, but the loss of language around the support of public schools is particularly noticeable. And I'm not sure it gets fixed easily. In the meantime, anyone who wants to run for office on the far right can get a quick sheet of tested talking points emailed to him and be ready for a hard-hitting video full of nonsense soup. 

Trump 2024's Education Plan

Yes, you've seen bits and pieces quoted, And I have misgivings about giving this any more air, but folks laughed Trump off in 2016, and we know where that got us. 

We have to pay attention because 2024 is shaping up to be a year in which GOP candidates compete to see who can beat up public education the worst (and Democrats stand there just kind of tongue-tied). 

So on January 26, Trump released a video manifesto of education, and I'm going to run through the whole thing, because every single point is a radical threat. You can watch it yourself if you want to check my work, but I don't recommend it.

Trump just leaps right in and starts doggy-paddling through a deep vat of nonsense soup

Schools have been taken over by the radical left maniacs. Here is my plan to save American education, restore power to American parents.

First, we will cut federal funding for any school or program pushing critical race theory, gender ideology, or other inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content onto our children. We're not going to allow it to happen.

Next I will direct the Department of Justice and Education to open civil rights investigations into any school district that has engaged in race-based discrimination. That includes discrimination against Asian Americans. 

The Marxism being preached in our schools is also totally hostile to Judeo-Christian teachings and in many ways it's resembling an established new religion--can't let that happen--for this reason my administration will aggressively pursue potential violations of the establishment clause and the free exercise clause of the Constitution--that's simple.

It's a little staggering how this all boils down to using the power of the federal government to stamp out things that folks on the right don't like. And he's pulling from lots of grievances floating around the right wing-o-sphere right now, from the schools in Virginia being hammered over a made-up scandal (schools failed to quickly notify students who fell in the fourth tier "commended" category for National Scholarship because, allegedly, those also rans are Asian) but it got traction on Twitter. The whole idea of saying schools teach some kind of secular religion and thereby violate the establishment clause is silly--doubly silly since the Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that free exercise trumps establishment every time, and therefor even if schools were found to be teaching such a religion (violating the non-existent Judeo-Christian tradition), by current reasoning, it would violate teachers free exercise rights to make them stop.

But he has just barely begun to get scary.

Additionally, on day one we will begin to find and remove the radical zealots and Marxists who have infiltrated the Federal Department of Education. And that also includes others--and you know who you are--because we're not going to allow anybody to hurt our children.

Hunt down those guilty of thought crime.

Joe Biden has given these lunatics unchecked power. I will have them fired and escorted from the building and I will tell Congress that any Appropriations bill I sign must reaffirm the President's ability to remove defiant employees from the job. It's all about our children.

Does anybody in the Department of Education have unchecked power? And if so, what exactly have they been doing with it? Well, the unchecked power is supposed to belong to Trump. And I hope we've all learned enough to avoid saying, "Well, Congress wouldn't let him..." because they rolled over for him in 2016, and that was before Congress was packed with insurrectionists.

I will veto the sinister effort to weaponize civics education. We will keep men out of women's sports. And we will create a new credentialling body that will be the gold standard anywhere in the world to certify teachers embrace patriotic values, support our way of life, and understand that their job is not to indoctrinate children, but very simply to educate them.

Pretty sure the effort to weaponize civics is a DeSantis thing. And don't indoctrinate kids--just teach them that our way of life is the One True way and properly patriotic citizens don't think otherwise. But no indoctrination, which is guess is only indoctrination when it goes against Beloved Leader's desires. 

Finally, I will implement massive funding preferences and favorable treatment for all states and school districts that make the following historic reforms in education:

One, abolish teacher tenure for grades K through 12 so we can remove bad teachers and adopt merit pay to reward good teachers we want great teachers in our schools.

Two, drastically cut the bloated number of school administrators, including the costly, divisive, and unnecessary diversity, equity and inclusion bureaucracy. 

Three, adopt a parental bill of rights that includes complete curriculum transparency and a form of universal school choice.

And four, implement the direct election of school principals by the parents. It's all about the parents for their children. More than anyone else, parents know what their children need. If any principal is not getting the job done, the parents should be able to vote to fire them and select someone who will. This will be the ultimate form of local control. Our country has frankly never had anything like it or let's say for at least the last fifty years.

The first three are such pandering baloney. Number four is extra-silly. It is not the ultimate form of local control, because all the local taxpayers who are not parents get no say. Of course, if we gave parents and taxpayers the chance to elect a representative council to handle such matters, like a board, related to the school. Lord, this is such a dumb idea.

As the saying goes, personnel is policy and at the end of the day, if we have pink haired Communists teaching our kids, we have a major problem.

When I'm President, we will put parents back in charge and give them the final say. We will get back to teaching reading writing and match called arithmetic and we will give our kids the high quality pro-American education they deserve.

But no indoctrination.

We spend more per pupil than any nation in the world by double. We're going to keep spending the money, but we're now going to get our money's worth. We're at the end of every list on education, and yet we spend the most. We're going to change it around. We may spend the most but we're gonna be tops in education no matter where you go, anywhere in the world. Thank you very much. 

There is a sequel to this--26 more seconds about those teacher credentials.

As part of our new credentialling body for teachers, we will promote positive education about the nuclear family, the roles of mothers and fathers and celebrating rather than erasing the things that make men and women different and unique. I will ask Congress to pass a bill establishing that the only genders recognized by the United States Government are male and female, and they are assigned at birth.

I'm surprised he didn't say "assigned at conception." 

I can remember when conservatives thought government should keep out of peoples' lives; now they don't even support keeping government out of peoples' pants. 

This is some totalitarian "we must all love the fatherland and trust Beloved Leader" shit here, and if you don't think it's scary already, take a stroll through the Youtube comments to see all the people who can't wait to have the country dragged back to the white christianist 1950s of grandpappy's imagination. Parts of this are just boilerplate copied from the actvists already at work, but the parts about rewarding our friends and punishing our enemies, about rooting out and eradicating people who Believe Bad Things are legitimately scary.

Doubly so because none of this has been thought through and so the attempt to turn it into real policy could be so much worse. Triply so because Ron DeSantis may feel the need to up his own totalitarian game to push past Trump. It's still a long way to the primaries, and I'm afraid these are going to be really rough times for public education. 

Congressman Proposes Turning Title Funds Into Vouchers

We already looked at one federal school voucher proposal. That one was based on Betsy DeVos's freedom scholarships, which were based on tax credit scholarships (instead of paying taxes, you can send a kid to private school). 

But that wasn't the only federal voucher plan to show its face in late January. Senator Mike Lee brought back another perennial favorite-- the Children Having Opportunities in Classrooms Everywhere Act (CHOICE). 

Lee (and his co-sponsoring buddy Senator Tuberville) is one more choicer starting from a solid premise and then carefully avoiding what follows. "Where you live should not determine your child's education," he argues, and he is 100% correct. I agree with this premise. Yet, I do not agree that it somehow leads us to "therefor, some small select group of students should be given an opportunity to take advantage of a system that has been repeatedly proven to deliver lousy education results." 

Let's not "save" just a few students, and let's not "save" them by having them waive their rights to a free and appropriate education. 

Alas, this is never where choicers are going with this point.

Lee's voucher bill is different in its plan for financing this tiny, leaky lifeboat that will only allow certain students aboard. Lee's idea is to simply redirect all the Title money.

The bill is pretty short and sweet. Here's the critical part.

FUNDS TO FOLLOW THE STUDENT.

(1) IN GENERAL.—Notwithstanding any other provision of law and to the extent permitted under State law, a State educational agency shall allocate grant funds provided under title I, subparts 2 and 3 of part B of title II, and titles III, IV, V, and VI, for the purposes of ensuring that funding under such titles follows children, to the public school the children attend or for the expenses described in section 529(c)(7) of the Internal Revenue Code of 3 1986.

The money would go to private schools and home schoolers, and as always, the bill explicitly states that "Nothing in this section shall permit, allow, encourage, or authorize Federal or State control over non-public education providers." So no telling those Nazi homeschoolers that they can't use their flat earth textbooks. 

Probably not a bill destined to accomplish much of anything other than continuing to hammer on the overton window and further normalize the notion that aid for the most vulnerable can be turned into a scythe for cutting them loose and ending government services for them. 

ICYMI: Arctic Blast Edition (2/5)

Best wishes to friends and family living in the land of Holy Scheikies That's Cold this weekend. We have the normal kind of cold here, but Mount Washington has got -109 wind chill (and negative fifty-something air temp without the wind) and that's just not okay. Stay warm. Stay safe.

While you're cuddled up today, here's the reading list from last week. As always, I encourage you to share the ones that strike you as important. It would be great if we had billionaires to amplify our signal, but only one group has that advantage.

Inside a US Neo-Nazi Homeschool Network With Thousands of Members

The not-to-be-missed story of the week is the discovery of a large network of homeschoolers aimed at producing beautiful young nazis. Really. As you read this, don't forget that in some states, legislators are trying to set up a system that would result in these folks being subsidized by tax dollars.

Voucher Proponents Across the Country are Winning. What Are the Stakes?

Steve Nuzum lays out some of the stakes (including funding nazis) as voucher movements sweep through several states.

The Far Right Has Used Culture War Politics to Open the Gate to a Vast Expansion of School Vouchers

Jan Resseger looks at how the culture wars have been used to energize the voucher push.

I’m a teacher in Florida. Here’s what the DeSantis book bans look like in my classroom

From Andrea Phillips, a heartwrenching piece about what the Florida crack down on books looks like on the ground, and it's not pretty.

UPDATE: Florida Commissioner of Education attacks Popular Information

Judd Legum of Popular Information continues to be all over Florida's book banning. This post includes complaints from Florida's leaders about being quoted accurately. Also: meet the Wokebusters.

Hide your books to avoid felony charges, Fla. schools tell teachers

Hannah Natanson at the Washington Post digs into some details about how the book ban is going, including an explanation of how felony charges ended up on the table. 

Teachers Are Not Meant to Be Martyrs

My Ed Week subscription lapsed when I wasn't looking, so I missed this piece when it ran a few weeks ago. Amanda Slaten Frasier writes this unapologetic defense of teachers' rightful role in education. Come for this closing line: "In short, teachers don’t need a seat at the table. Teachers need everyone, themselves included, to realize that they own the table."

Records show powerful, wealthy funders outside Idaho back school choice campaign

The voucher push across the nation is coming, state by state, from the same set of fake grass roots millionaire funded operators. DeVos, Koch, and Walton are on the march. Here's what that looks like in Idaho.

Behind the 'grassroots' movement for Oklahoma school vouchers championed by Ryan Walters

In Oklahoma, the same batch of carpetbagging astroturfers are at work. Well-researched piece for The Oklahoman, by Ben Felder.

School choice nightmare: Vouchers are endangering the rights of families

Jeff Bryant tells the story of a Maine family that thought school choice would be a huge benefit; instead, it turned out to be a nightmare.

It Takes A Village: Expelling Right-Wing Extremism From Bucks County School Districts

From Cyril Mychalejko at the Bucks County Beacon, a look at the ongoing struggle there between right wing leaders and, well, an awful lot of other people.

Inside the audacious new scheme to erase LGBTQ people from Michigan schools

Judd Legum again. This time with a new group that has a plan for emptying out public schools. Make sure you get to the part where their website's "concerned parents" turn out to be stock photos.

Running a Charter School for Profit Should Be Illegal

Carol Burris at the Progressive with a broad rundown of the latest Network for Public Education report on charter school profiteering.

Once-subversive plot to dismantle traditional public schools in Florida now central policy

 

Frank Cerabino at the Palm Beach Post with a not-very-encouraging look at how privatizers are winning in Florida.

PA principals and superintendents are much less diverse than the students they serve, according to a Penn State study

Pennsylvania has long had some issues with diversity in education. Ed Fuller from Penn State adds some new data to the discussion.

Texas’ private and rural schools again brace for a showdown on school choice

The Texas tribune explains the showdown coming between privatizers and rural school districts.

'Stand up for kids like me,' trans student tells Iowa senators, but LGBTQ school bills advance

In Iowa, trans kids are speaking out. Iowa legislators don't much care. From the Des Moines Register.

Paul Vallas as Chicago’s Next Mayor?? Talk About a Terrible Mistake.

Paul Vallas has made a career out of failing upward, and now he wants to be the mayor of Chicago. The indispensable Mercedes Schneider offers a career retrospective to help us remember why Vallas shouldn't be put in charge of a one car parade.

Introducing the Slickest Con Artist of All Time

From Ted Gioia, another entry for your ChatGPT file

MAGA parents demand school choice and I can’t wait to say goodbye 

In the Wichita Eagle, Dion Lefler offers a decidedly different take on the loud parental rights movement

Scientists Discover Dangerous Link Between Book Learnin’, Back Talk

The Onion, from a few years back. Seems appropriate at the moment.

Over at Forbes.com this week, I looked at the NPE report on dark money behind parent rights groups, and bad news for teachers regarding new Netflix sharing policies.

I also wrote about how most of the new crop of voucher bills specifically protect private schools and vendors who wish to push a particular faith, teach anti-science baloney, and discriminate against students and faculty. I think it's one of the more important things I've written, so please take a look.

And as always, you're invited to sign up for my substack, a efficient and free way to have my writing delivered to your inbox. 

Bellwether's Big Book O'Data Worth A Look

Bellwether  (formerly Bellwether Education Partners) is an education consulting firm, generally located petty solidly along the American Enterprise Institute-Thomas Fordham Institute axis of education reform. Their huge list of "partners" include those two thinky tanks, the CANs, Teach for America, the Broad Foundation, then 74, the Walton Foundation, American Federation for Children, and a host of other choicey reformster outfits. They have some Bain alumni, including co-founder Mary K. Wells, though co-founder Andrew Rotherham, external relations guy and voice of Eduwonk, is the person you more likely run across on line.

While there is no mistaking their particular bent, this outfit is less about lathered-up advocacy and more about actual facts than some of the brethren (looking at you, current version of Manhattan Institute). Rotherham is on my short list of People I'll Probably Disagree With But I Will Still Make It A Point To Read Them. 

All of which is to lead up to my point, which is that Bellwether has put out a publication that is really worth reading.

Common Ground: How Public K-12 Schools Are Navigating Pandemic Disruptions and Political Trends, by Rotherham, Kelly Robson Foster, and Michael D. Corral is a one-hundred-and-page collection of information from a wide variety of sources. The stated goal is "to help the field separate signal from noise and provide context around various issues and trends affecting the sector." And the report delivers lots of information from diverse sources, a little bit of contextualizing, and no real attempt to dictate what should come next.

Our goal is to provide a clear fact base for discussion about complicated issues. It is not to suggest “right” answers on contested questions. We present a great deal of public opinion data not because we believe the majority position is axiomatically the correct one but rather because understanding the landscape is essential. Reasonable people can and will disagree about the best remedies or policies for much of what we describe here. Instead, we seek to establish a common fact base on the premise that understanding the landscape is the first step toward successfully navigating it.

I'm going to skim the sections so you get a sense of what is in here, but this is not one of those times where I can read it so you don't have to. This is a work that is best dug through yourself (especially if, like me, you're a fan of charts and graphs).

The report starts with an executive summary which is a pretty good wrap up of what's to come. Then we're into it.

School Enrollment

A good timeline of pandemic events, then some breakdowns of enrollment changes. The bulk of lost enrollment was in pre-K and K, but I'm surprised to see that from Fall 2019 to Fall 2020 grades 8, 10, 11, and 12 actually gained. The longer schools were closed, the more students they lost, which goes along with larger losses in Blue areas than in Red. Charter enrollment grew as public declined, but (another surprise) Catholic schools have still not made it back to pre-pandemic levels.

And reminder that when looking at polling info, always have your filters on. The report cites an Education Next survey that shows growing support for various school choice options, and I remain unconvinced.

Student Achievement

Some breakdowns here of how open building vs. remote learning played out, and lots of sifting through various testing data, which, as regular readers of this space know, I am unimpressed by. But if you care about that sort of thing, they've got a bunch, and it is handy to see things like the NWEA results separate from NWEA sales pitches.

Student Discipline

This section is gold. The writers take an even-handed look at an issue on which almost nobody is taking an even-handed look. There's a chart looking at reported discipline problems 2009-19 vs. 2019-20 that shows teachers aren't just imagining things. The section places student discipline as a major reason for teacher attrition. It reminds us that student misbehavior echoes a rise in grown-up misbehavior. It looks at how exclusionary discipline techniques and restorative justice techniques are playing out, underlining that this is complex stuff. Many voices are heard here.

Guns and School Safety

This section also does a good job of sticking to the basics while navigating a hot button issue. It tells the story of how people feel about it, the facts of what is actually happening (guns are now the leading cause of death for ages 1-19, but how many mass school shootings there are depends on your definitions), and why nothing gets done. 

Race and Racism

The authors offer a simple summation of events of the past few years. George Floyd's murder leads to more DEI initiatives leads to more tension over those issues leads to the CRT "political catchall" leads to Trump's DEI ban leads to our current mess. 

This section probably includes the most "analysis," and everyone is going to be pissed off about some part of it. On the one hand, as DEI programs spread, "A toxic blend of political opportunism, ideology, and sloppy implementation of DEI work fueled a conservative backlash." On the other hand, they also say, "CRT became a catchall phrase in part through intentional efforts of some conservative activists." And just in case you wonder what they mean, Rufo's infamous tweet is right there on the page.

Polling data shows that CRT panic was unaccompanied by CRT knowledge. One particular telling poll shows that people support CRT as long as you don't call it CRT. And the writers are clear about the problems caused by anti-CRT laws that are vague and difficult to enforce (though on this they do miss the role of giving the public the right to sue any school they think is being naughty). 

They also offer some data to suggest that the disagreement is not as wide or deep as most people think it is, and that other issues are of greater concern.

LGBT Rights

The US has become more accepting of LGBR rights, but there are big disagreements about how that should play out in schools. The report does a good job of breaking down the underlying issues, and if you've been looking for a clear simple source on which states have landed on which policies, there are good resources here. And they end the section with a sobering chart that shows some brutal realities of life for LGBT youth. 

Appendix

Would you like even more charts and graphs and stuff? Here you go.

Bottom line

I'm still unlikely to agree with Bellwether or their many friends about a multitude of public education policy issues. But I like this report. I like its focus on data and information without bashing me over the head with their policy objectives. I like having these various sources gathered in one place.

Mosty of all, I read this report thinking that this is what it looks like when someone on the choicer side decides not to use culture war issues as a marketing tool for choice policies, but actually looks at the real, serious issues that are being turned into culture war talking points. Children should not be shot. Discipline is hard to manage in a society that values violence and confrontation. Race remains a core issue for our culture. LGBTQ students go through a lot of awful crap. 

In short, the issues that directly affect students and the adults who work with them are real issues that affect real live human beings and it is deeply tiring to watch these human beings' actual problems ignored by political opportunists looking for a win for their squad. 

But I digress. This report is free and online and worth your time. Everything is sourced (no mystery data here) and while you not agree with everything in these pages, there's still plenty that's useful and informative.