Rural Education Myths

I was in the ruralish education biz for almost my entire teaching career, and one small thing that wears on you is that policy discussions almost always ignore rural needs and realities.

The current Trusk administration buzz saw looks to continue that tradition. Take the privatization of the United States Postal Service-- there are plenty of private delivery services right now, and they mostly won't deliver to our most rural areas (they hand those packages off to the USPS). 

School "choice" policies are built on assumption of a relatively large, dense market. Meanwhile, Catholic private schools in my county have closed because they couldn't get enough students to enroll, and there are no private options springing up in their place. Like rural delivery, it's a market private operators don't want to enter because it's too hard to make money serving it. \

If, for instance, Title I funds turn into block grants and those turn into vouchers, rural areas will take a double hit-- a loss of needed Title I funds for the public school and no options for any sort of private vouchery options (this is where folks pop up to chirp "Oh, but you could start a micro-school" because everyone enjoyed that so much during the pandemic and also it works great in places with sub-optimal wi-fi connections). 

So many people don't get small towns and rural areas (e.g. every movie and tv show depiction of a small town), and that includes people who create policy. 

There's a nice piece in The Conversation by Sheneka Williams, Darren DuBose, and Kimberly Clarida, three Michigan State University rural education researchers, in which they distill much of their research into three important but unrecognized truths about rural education.

Rural communities are becoming more diverse.

The three researchers are talking mostly about race, and that is on point-- rural areas are not all white any more. There are increasingly people of color in these communities.

From 2010 to 2020, over 2 million white people left rural communities, while more than 2 million people of color took their place. The number of rural people who identified as multiracial doubled to nearly 4 million over the same period, and all rural communities except those in Arizona saw an increase in their Latino population.

That tracks. So does a point made by rural Missouri blogger Jess Piper, who points out that most rural people are not farmers. Politicians often calculate that if they address some sort of farm policy, then you've done your bit for the rural vote. 

But the typical rural family is not some redneck farmer. Rural areas include a broad range of human beings engaged in a broad range of human endeavors. Though I will say there's one things that rural areas mostly don't have-- super-rich people. I've always maintained that's one of the many, many reasons that trickle down economics fails; there's nobody here in my region to trickle down on the rest of us. And my region provides a sort of laboratory of that, because 150-ish years ago we became the center of the oil industry. We were loaded with rich folks, and to this day we live amongst the many benefits that their wealth brought to town (though some of those gifts have become troublesome white elephants). Then that ended, and we're all quite aware of the money that isn't here and what we aren't able to get done. Sooner or later, if you want stuff, somebody with money has to invest it, spend it on your community. It's not strictly a rural problem-- read Andre Perry's Know Your Price to see how it happens for certain urban communities. 

But I digress. Point is, folks working from a stereotypical picture of who lives in rural communities and what the need (or don't) is working from the wrong script, so they'll get the wrong answers.

Rural educators know how to succeed.

Rural schools lack resources, but rural teachers are expert at working around that lack (which is not to say they couldn't be even better with the resources). The three writers also show this as essentially an extension of the previous point--because folks in high places don't really understand the nature of rural communities, the cultural capital of rural areas is ignored.

One glaring example is that rural communities are rarely represented in teaching materials and curricula, which frequently ignore their local knowledge, traditions and values. This creates a gap in students’ ability to see themselves in jobs and positions outside of their personal contexts. And it hampers teachers’ ability to leverage student strengths when teachers are unprepared to connect with their backgrounds.

There are teachers in rural schools who are prepared to connect--they are the teachers who grew up in those same communities. But they are very much in a Do It Yourself situation. 

The researchers also make the point that policy makers favor things like closure and consolidation of schools. Pennsylvania is a perfect example. In the 1960's, the state had a huge number of small borough and township school districts, and the state pushed consolidation (yes, our current 500 districts is considerably fewer than previously). That left many smaller communities with one school; that school often served as a community hub, and a major source of property value and tax base in that community. When the last fifteen years of further consolidation and closure came along, those single schools were closed, delivering a hammer blow both culturally and financially. There are plenty of factors that created the pressures behind these moves, but at no point did policy makers stand up for rural schools and communities and try to hold back this wave that has hollowed out many rural communities.

Rural educators know how to tap into local resources, knowing that little support is coming from the state or federal government. But policy makers rarely make an attempt to tap those resources.

Rural students are high achievers

The trio notes that students in rural schools score higher on math and reading tests than urban students, and rural students have a higher graduation rate. 

What rural students lack is the extras that non-rural students enjoy. From summer programs to enrichment programs to personal SAT coaches, nonrural students have opportunities that rural students do not. Rural students end up with lower going-to-college numbers. 

There's no earthly reason to imagine that rural students are any less capable than their nonrural counterparts. None. 

It is a myth that rural schools are filled with farm kids who aren't all that bright being taught by teachers who are less-than. It is not a myth that rural schools are under-represented and simply -- I can't say ignored, because to ignore something you have to see it and deliberately look past it. Rural education is more commonly invisible to folks in the policy world. 

I expect that problem is likely to be even worse under the current regime. Guttung funding as a prelude to privatization will be a double slam for rural districts. Those districts will see a loss of funding and will have limited ability to replace those funds by raising local taxes. At the same time, they are not attractive markets for any high quality education-flavored businesses; those communities are more likely to end up with a "school" aisle in their local Dollar General. Rural students deserve better. 

DeSantis: More Shootings, Please

This week in his State of the State speech, Ron DeSantis announced that it was time to get over the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School shooting--that would be the one in Parkland in which a 19-year-old killed 17 and injured 17 others in the deadliest mass shooting at a high school in US history. 

After that shooting, the state put in place a piddly excuse for an attempt to make such horrors less likely, but even that is too much for DeSantis, who specifically wants to get rid of language raising the age to purchase a shotgun or rifle from 18 to 21 and also the red flag law that lets family members or law enforcement petition the court to remove someone's firearms id they are risk to themselves of others. You know-- like maybe a 19 year old with a long history of racism and fascination with mass shootings. 

“We need to be a strong Second Amendment state. I know many of you agree, so let’s get some positive reform done for the people in this state of Florida,” DeSantis was quoted by the Florida Phoenix. 

Also, he'd like to have open carry in the state.

Because nothing is more important than an American's God-given right to shoot other people. Because we should go to any length to "protect" a fetus, but once it's a live child, its life is less important than someone's right to fire off a couple of rounds at anyone that bugs them. Because this is one more way politicians can show that for all their talk, they don't particular care about young humans. 

On the right column of the blogspot version of this blog, I have had one image parked for years. It's not complicated

I would say that it's the least we could do, but of course the least we can do is nothing, and Ron DeSantis would like us to get back to doing that. 

The only bright spot here is that the legislature doesn't seem to have his back on this. Good. DeSantis should be ashamed that he can't even produce a bad argument for his favored policies other than complaining that Florida has "lagged on this issue." What a bummer-- imagine all the people who are going to some other state because it's easier to shoot people there. 

Scary AI Teacher Coaching Tool

This seems like several kinds of bad ideas, and some schools are absolutely going to go for it.

What if teachers could have a sort of feedback and self-evaluation tool working with them every day, powered, of course, by AI? Well, dream no more.

Teachers get little feedback on classroom performance, nor is it possible to collect a ton of data while simultaneously doing the job. Kathleen Moore at the Times Union reports cheerfully:

Enter AI. The AI tool uses cameras and audio recordings to report on whether the teacher looked at or walked through each section of the classroom, how often they used group work, and many other techniques. Even the words the teacher and students use are tracked.

The AI works with the Mathematical Quality of Instruction, which comes to us from the Center for Education Policy Research. It is, they tell us, "a Common Core-aligned observational rubric that provides a framework for analyzing mathematics instruction in several domains." Ruh-roh.

It considers five domains-- common core-aligned student practices, working with students and mathematics, richness of mathematics, errors and imprecision, and classroom work is connected to mathematics. And I'm not going to dig any deeper because 1) I've got my doubts about how much of that an AI can actually measure and 2) common core. 

The fresh-faced assistant professor promoting this AI eval is Jonathan Foster, who started out teaching math (well, he really started out in South Carolina's Teacher Cadet program, a pretty nifty program aimed at getting high school students started on the path to teaching) at the Montessori Academy of Spartanburg. He was hired by SUNY at Albany in 2023. 

GT reports that Peter Youngs and Scott Acton of University of Virginia (education and computer engineering, respectively) are leading the project.

The money? Why, from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation-- a cool $1.4 million. 

They are field testing the tool on some early career teachers, who "have been receptive" but also complain that the AI "isn't good at noticing everything." No kidding. AI cannot understand or interpret in any conventional sense of the words. It can only scan for particular words or positions in the room. Which means that this system will inevitably train teachers to incorporate an assortment of odd behaviors and vocabulary for no reason other than it will game the AI.

While all of that provides reason enough to give this coaching tool a big fat side eye, here's a sentence that just hints at bigger issues:

But the AI can give them daily feedback, without it going on performance reports.

Yet.

I'm trying to imagine a universe in which administrators and policymakers say something along the lines of, "Well, the computer is just sitting there chock full of performance data on the teachers, but we should definitely not use that at all."

No, this tool is just a half-step away from being your computerized teacher evaluator, counting every day of your work as part of your professional measure. Some administrators would love it because it would save them time. Policymakers would love it because it generates numbers, so you know it's reliable hard data and all scientific and stuff. And if that's not scary enough, let's imagine what happens when someone hacks into the system. 

"Oh, but it's just math teachers," I hear you say. I invite you to travel to that imaginary universe where there is definitely nobody saying, "Yeah, with just a few tweaks we could totally use this to evaluate reading or history or home ec or phys ed teachers."

Foster gamely tries to head off the idea that this AI could be used to substitute for teachers. "I see the act of teaching as a human endeavor," he tells Moore, and I agree, but how human is a human who is taking career advice from an AI coach? 

It could be worse. I expect that right now, someone is out there programming an AI to work with the Charlotte Danielson framework. In the meantime, it's one more sign that teachers should prepare to meet their new robot overlords. 

McMahon's Three Convictions

Linda McMahon is now the latest in a long line of deeply unqualified Secretaries of Education, and she has hit the ground running with her memo about the department's Final Destination Solution Mission. 

She's pro-disruption! Nobody is more qualified than parents to make educational decisions (so non-parents should not be allowed to serve on a school board?). She started out to be a teacher almost (which, tragically, puts her far ahead of many of her predecessors). Education shouldn't be plagued with corruption and unjust discrimination (but the department has already thrown out many complaints of what I guess was just discrimination). She is a font of privateer right wing talking points.

McMahon focuses on three convictions, which, if nothing else, may give a clue which of the administration's conflicting education goals (end federal meddling in education, and increase federal meddling in education) she is going to pursue. None of them are good news.

Parents are the primary decision makers in their children’s education.

Send education back to the states! Then the states can send it back to parents and voila-- government has sloughed off any involvement in or responsibility for public education.

We should not take seriously any parental rights declaration that does not include recognition and protection of students' rights. Both their rights to safety and their rights to make choices about their own lives. 

It's also worth noting that this "empowerment" of parents is never accompanied by sources of information to help inform parental choices, nor regulation to assure parents that what they encounter on the free market is actually sound. Kind of like "We will abolish the FDA so that consumers are free to select from among a panoply of products that may or may include some which are poisonous, but we're sure the market will sort that out."

Taxpayer-funded education should refocus on meaningful learning in math, reading, science, and history—not divisive DEI programs and gender ideology.

The list of Things To Focus On is, of course, missing many items (art, music, writing, the ever-expanding list of "practical" items like filling out taxes and changing tires, etc etc etc). The "divisive DEI programs and gender ideology" portion is meaningless enough to be adapted to whatever grievance MAGA has decided to be outraged by. 

Are schools meant to ignore diversity and pretend that all students are the same? If equity is bad, how does one propose that inequity be administered? If schools are opposed to inclusion, who is meant to be excluded, and how should that exclusion be managed? Serving the special needs of some students comes under DEI--should that be terminated? 

The department has attempted to clarify its anti-diversity directive

"Schools may not operate policies or programs under any name that treat students differently based on race, engage in racial stereotyping, or create hostile environments for students of particular races," the letter reads. "For example, schools with programs focused on interests in particular cultures, heritages, and areas of the world would not in and of themselves violate Title VI, assuming they are open to all students regardless of race." The letter also clarified that identity-based observances like Black History Month are acceptable, as long as the events are open to all students.

Which comes awfully close to "you can't exclude white kids from anything." "Hostile environment" is a vague term that will depend entirely on how the folks in charge of enforcement care to interpret it. The language could certainly support a complaint about racism in a school, but the fact that the department has dropped a reported 10,000 complaints about disability access and sexual and racial harassment gives us a pretty good sense of which way the wind is blowing here.

"Gender ideology" is an even more mysterious term. As near as I can tell, "gender ideology" refers to anything that suggests that it's unremarkable that LGBTQ persons exist. 

Postsecondary education should be a path to a well-paying career aligned with workforce needs.

This administration is certainly not the first to want to apply return-on-investment analysis to higher education. The "aligned with workforce needs" is a popular standard for the business world; why train workers yourself if you can get post-high school institutions to create the pool of meat widgets you want (while getting the meat widgets themselves to pay for it). 

Nobody has yet figured out how to actually do this, and I don't imagine the current brain trust has any better ideas.

So what do we have here

Instead of dismantling the department and thereby ending its access to any levers of power, McMahon appears to be going with increasing the levels of micro-management by the feds in order to score some culture panic victories. 

"Final mission" tries to signal that they are absolutely going to dismantle the department just as soon as they clean up this culture panic stuff. However, the culture panic crowd is never done. I cannot imagine a universe in which McMahon says, "We have now wiped out all the terrible indoctrination and DEI/CRT/MOUSE in the education system, so we can shut down the department."

No, a culture panic movement is deeply in love with the problem, because the problem gives them license to do whatever they wish. To declare the problem solved is to give up the power they derive from continuously hammering the panic button. Like Betsy DeVos before her, McMahon may have been determined to dismantle the levers of power until she gets her hands on them and...well...maybe as long as it's for the right cause... Panic always craves power; I will put a small bet on the prediction that the department will not be tossed into the fires of Mount Doom any time soon. 

FL: No Art For Children

Florida's law about materials "harmful to minors" apparently needed a tweak, and Sen. Stan McClain has provided just the thing.

SB 1692 fixes that part of Florida law by addressing the part that defines "harmful to minors." It currently includes in that definition the clause that says that a work is not "harmful to minors" if it has "serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors." 

McClain proposes to add a little language to that part of the definition, saying that it does not apply to any of the naughty stuff 

in an educational setting or to a determination made by an employee of any kindergarten, elementary school, middle school, junior high school, or secondary school, whether public or private, with regard to such material if the material is possessed by a person with the intent to send, sell, distribute, exhibit, represent, or display it to a minor and is not part of an approved instructional or library material.

In other words, if there's any depiction of "any kind of nudity, sexual conduct, or sexual excitement," then artistic merit doesn't count. If a school employee says that in their professional judgment the work has merit for the students, that doesn't count. There is a carve-out for materials specifically authorized as part of state-required health education. 

The proposal is a little confusing-- it's okay if the work is part of "approved instructional or library material," and who is doing that approving if not a school employee? But as always, the point is not to be clear, but to be scary.

To help with the scariness, the bill requires the school to pull the materials within five days of an objection being filed and the material must remain "unavailable" while being considered. The bill says specifically that the school board may not consider "potential literary, artistic, political, or scientific value as a basis for retaining the material." 

If the board doesn't behave itself, the state may withhold state funds, grants, lottery funds, or any other funds they can figure out how to withhold. Plus the district has thirty days to come up with a "corrective action plan." After which the state can decide if it wants to come up with any other punishment for the district.

We humans do threat assessment by asking 1) how likely is it that the bad thing will happen and 2) how bad will the consequences be? So top-notch threat legislation like this hits both. How likely is a district to get in trouble? Hard to say-- the law is vague and anybody can turn them in. How bad will the consequences be? Probably pretty bad, but how bad is unclear.

What is clear is that Florida students would be protected from that nasty artistic, literary, political and scientific merit. Way to close that loophole!

If passed, the bill is supposed to take effect July 1, 2025. Place your bets now on how long it will take for some sassy district to ban the Bible.

More Culture Panic From Heritage Foundation

A who's who of culture warriors has helped the Heritage Foundation conjure up yet another set of demands for American public education. Think of this--The Pheonix Declaration--as the most current list of demands from the right wing privatization crowd.

The tone was set by news releases:

Dr. Kevin Roberts, President of the Heritage Foundation, emphasized the need for a proactive approach in education. "For too long, education freedom advocates have been on defense," he stated. "It’s time to go on offense."

Yeah, "education freedom advocates" surely haven't been vocally and aggressively attacking public education for the past umpteen years. Organizations funded by powerful billionaires have been after public education for decades, while simultaneously claiming to be David up against Goliath. Sure. One of the key pieces of the right wing pitch is to complain about being oppressed and outmatched.  

That's especially a claim of the christianist nationalism crowd, and those are Heritage's people. The Phoenix Declaration is itself a fine example of how to take a few values that ought to be unobjectionable and, by surrounding them with a particular context, make them icky.

Every child should have access to a high-quality, content-rich education that fosters the pursuit of the good, the true, and the beautiful, so that they may achieve their full, God-given potential. America’s schools must work alongside parents to prepare children for the responsibilities of adulthood, including their familial and civic responsibilities, by cultivating excellence in mind and heart.

See? A few sentences from the introduction seem mostly on point. Except that phrases like "the good, the true, and the beautiful" and "work alongside parents" are recognizable dog whistly phrases; if you aren't in with the Heritage crowd, you might not get what they have in mind (we'll get to that). "Responsibilities" comes up twice, and hints at a grim "buckle down and get to work" view of life. Likewise, the pursuit of "excellence in mind and heart" is a little off for a life goal (I don't see a lot of scripture in which Jesus exhorts folks to be excellent). None of it is objectionable, and yet... In particular, all of these point toward being directed by outward measures.

Schools should equip students with the knowledge, character, and skills necessary to succeed in life as individuals and to fulfill their obligations as members of their families, local communities, and country. In order to empower families, advance educational excellence, transmit our culture, and uphold the foundational principles of our constitutional republic, we believe the following principles should guide American families, schools, and policymakers

"Obligations." And "transmit our culture." Education isn't to serve the interests of the human students, but to make them useful meat widgets. 

Well, maybe it gets better. Let's look at the actual principles.

Parental Choice and Responsibility

Parents are the "primary educators" of their children and should be free to choose "the learning environments that align with their values" and best meet the child's needs. This language of parental rights sounds so much nicer than "Educating the child is the parents' problem, and the rest of us shouldn't have to worry about it or pay for it." On top of being selfish, it's also short-sighted. 

And it's not just that this principle is a justification for selfishness and privatization. Any policy that elevates the rights of parents and ignores the rights of the child is a dangerous policy, because not all parents are awesome. The majority of parents are just fine, but I can tell you stories, and so can every other teacher, of parents who were a danger to the safety and well-being of their children. Children are not chattel, and making loud noises about a parent's "right and high duty" doesn't turn young human beings into property. 

Nor do I think that anyone at all is served by learning environments that teach the flat earth or extol the greatness of nazis. 

Parental "rights" without guardrails is both an excuse to privatize education and to abdicate collective responsibility for making sure that each young human has a shot at an education that doesn't suck.

Transparency and Accountability

The concern here is for parents. "Schools, as secondary educators, should work with parents, not attempt to serve as replacements for them," which is a good thought as long as those parents don't pose a threat to the safety or well-being of the children. The principle especially mentions "misguided policies that hide information from parents" about student mental, emotional or physical well-being, which is a dodge, because what we're really talking about here is what to do when students want to hide information from their parents, and the idea that children have no rights and parents have all of them. Schools have no rights over students; they do, however, have a responsibility to protect students, and in a country where the vast number of homeless children are homeless because their parents threw them out for being LGBTQ, that's not always an easy call.

Are there schools where staff have gone a step too far? Sure, just as there are parents who go a step too far. This will never be an easy issue to litigate, and anyone who thinks they have a simple answer (Either parents or the school are always right) is just wrong.

Truth and Goodness

I'm going to quote this whole part, because this is the shaky foundation on which the whole wobbly house rests.

Education must be grounded in truth. Students should learn that there is objective truth and that it is knowable. Science courses must be grounded in reality, not ideological fads. Students should learn that good and evil exist, and that human beings have the capacity and duty to choose good.

God save us all from people who believe there is one Truth, and they personally know what it is.  Teaching The Truth rather than teaching truth fundamentally changes the whole act of education into something else, something that does not serve anyone, not even the people trying to peddle their particular Truth.

Too often the idea that Truth can be known is delivered by someone who believes they know it. Here Heritage just hints at all the attendant problems. "Science courses must be grounded in reality, not ideological fads" is a fine argument for favoring evolution over creationism in the classroom, but I'm betting that's not what they had in mind. And the notion that humans ought to choose good over evil is not wrong, but it's useless, because everyone thinks they're choosing good-- as they see it.

What Heritage wants to argue for is education that is grounded in their idea of reality and which adheres to their view of good. Let's just skip any debate about whether they are right or not--they are sure they're right and people who disagree with them are wrong and that should be the end of it.

Cultural Transmission

Heritage argues that transmitting accumulated human wisdom and the particular culture and heritage of a country as the "central purpose" of education, but again they assume that "what is our culture" has a single known answer. They are arguing for one particular version-- "America’s founding principles and roots in the broader Western and Judeo-Christian traditions"-- of culture, as if that culture has not changed on a yearly basis, as if that culture is not informed by constant debates about what it is, as if there aren't a whole world of roots outside "Western and Judeo-Christian traditions."

Yes, education is absolutely part of transmitting and preserving culture. But the Heritage track record suggests that what they really mean is stripping the current culture of all those influences that aren't supposed to be there and restoring it to some sort of factory setting from an imaginary golden age. And that is the opposite of cultural preservation and transmission; it's locking down a preferred culture and trying to stifle its natural growth and change. 

Character Formation

Education should, in fact, prepare children "for the challenges and responsibilities of adulthood," though it would be nice if it also prepared them for the joys and beauty of human life. Thing is, there's a whole body of work intended to formally include character education-- it's social and emotional learning, the SEL that Heritage really hates. Education, they say here, should cultivate "virtues and discipline." As if the list of virtues is an immutable knowable objective thing, and not subject to arguments over virtues such as empathy.

Academic Excellence"Schools should help students achieve their full potential, going as far and as fast as their talents will take them." Well, yeah. Yeah, also, to content-rich curriculum. "No fads or experimental teaching methods." Sure. Academic excellence should be the focus. Can we get rid of the Big Standardized Test now?

Citizenship

I cannot object to a call for "an educated and patriotic citizenry," even though I know none of us will agree on what those terms actually mean, though it's clear that Heritage means that patriotic citizens agree with Heritage politics-- "ordered liberty, justice, the rule of law, limited government, natural rights, and the equal dignity of all human beings." But I'm pretty sure that Heritage's beef here is not with guys like me but with...well. they call for schools to "cultivate gratitude for and attachment to our country and all who serve its central institutions" and call for honest history that still shows that "America is a great source of good in the world." Might want to check with President Musk and Dear Leader on those.



The Phoenix Declaration is artfully done (it should be--the drafting committee contains 15 folks, some of whom are pretty smart). Some of it is silly (a call to put the pledge back in classrooms) and much of it uses broad enough terms that everyone can agree with what it says even as they totally disagree about what it means. It blows its anti-woke dog whistle hard enough to awaken the oldest, deafest labrador, and it skips over some of its biggest self-contradictions-- parents should have their choice of a school that matches their values, but all schools should be based on the values listed here. It also has a curiously dour and joyless view of education (and life), an old man waving his fist at clouds while complaining about all the lazy wokey Kids These Days.

But mostly it assumes that all reasonable Americans see it this way, and while it name checks "civil disagreement" at one point, it doesn't particularly embrace pluralism or diversity as American virtues and values.

The folks who signed off on this run the ideological gamut from A to B. Kevin Stitt, Manny Diaz, Frank Edelblut, Corey DeAngelis, Jim Blew, and folks from Hillsdale College. Institutions include the 1776 Project Foundation, Parents Defending Education, the Center for Christian Virtue, and the United States Christian Network.

Do I think this is some sort of attempt to put a fig leaf over the christianist nationalist version of education? Not really. I'm not entirely sure who the audience for the declaration is supposed to be.

I don't think it's this slice of the right wing trying to pretend to be reasonable. I think this is them believing that they are reasonable and right, that their view of education is reasonable and proper, and if they just lay their core beliefs out without the usual purple prose and rhetoric (say, Heritage Foundation via Project 2025) they will, at the very least, provide their allies with a document that lets them point and say, "See? We're not so unreasonable." There's no fig leaf here, just some of the folks who usually are waving torches and writing anti-government manifestos like Project 2025, sitting down with some of their calmer brethren and trying to stay cool.

It's remarkably cool for a declaration that we live in a time of "moral and political crises," that promises to be a beacon back toward some vision of the central purposes of education. But as I've tried to point out in some instances, many of these words are open to a broad variety of interpretation, and the core belief "There is One Truth and I personally Know what it is" really gets in the way, particularly when that truth includes items such as "all reasonable people would agree with me" and its corollary "unreasonable people should shut up." So much of the declaration could mean anything, though its creators clearly have certain meanings in mind.

Maybe it's the created-by-committee problem. Maybe it would be better if Heritage just came out and said what they really mean; I mean, I generally think they're wrong, but at least it's usually easy to see what they mean. Even the choice of phoenix is vague-- what set the old bird on fire, and what are the ashes that this one is supposed to be rising from? Are we supposed to be following the light it gives to some other place, or following the light to the phoenix itself, which is...? It's an incomplete image. The phoenix is mythical and non-existent, which fits the affection for a golden time that never existed. But I can think of better birds for this declaration.

ICYMI: Where's Your Suit Edition (3/2)

The White House reached a new critical mass of bullshit this week with the public mugging of The Ukraine in favor of new bestie Russia. A lot has been written about it, and I won't be including any of that here because that's not what you come here for. But I do like to put down markers now and then so that later, I can tab back to special moments. After all, some day, someone is going to have to explain to future generations why the country couldn't keep its act together long enough for them.

Nobody can deal with all of it. But those of us who have been advocating for public education can keep doing that, because lord knows it's on the chopping block, just like every other piece of government that involves taking care of other people. So here we go. And I don't care if you're wearing a suit or not.

Children with disabilities swept up in DEI fight, advocates say

Lexi Cochran reports from Sioux City's KCAU about some of the collateral damage with the various diversity bans.

Why Are We Getting Rid of the Department of Education Again?

Jennifer Berkshire gets to the heart of the drive against DEI-- the real target is equality.

Cruel to Your School

Jennifer had a productive week. Here's a big picture piece about Trump's attack on public education that was published in The Baffler (and referenced in the above post).

Five Things Your Child’s Teacher Accomplished Last Week

President Musk managed to inspire Nancy Flanagan this week. What are five things teachers accomplished in your school?

U.S. Department of Education sued over letter on race-conscious practices in schools

A story I expect we'll be following for a while, as the courts try to figure out what the vague handwaving at race stuff is supposed to mean--and if it's even legal.

Michigan Department of Education responds to request to end 'racial preferences' or have federal funding cut

Meanwhile, Michigan's Department of Education actually pushed back on the directive.

To Make Ed Tech More Secure, Software Companies Need to Step Up

There's much to be concerned about in this The74 story, but "the average district now uses 2,592 edtech products" is certainly something.

School Choice Vouchers Led To Lower Academic Achievement, Researchers Say

Want some more research showing that vouchers lower test scores? Here you go.

Alabama’s Ten Commandment’s bill: A power grab disguised as faith

Bill Britt, editor of Alabama P{olitical Reporter, calls out the state's attempt to inject religion into classrooms.

Is it "Book Banning" to Ban Books?

Supporters of South Carolina's book banning laws are trying to support them. Syeve Nuzum points out how they are failing.

Most banned books feature people of color and LGBTQ+ people, report finds

Gloria Oladipo reports for the Guardian on the latest PEN America study that shows only certain sorts of books need to be banned--and it's not necessarily the sexy ones.

Florida: Where Essays are Both Written AND Graded By AI

No surprise here. Sue Kingery Woltanski reports that Florida's writing assessment, already a waste of time, is now approaching the singularity involving no humans at all.

What a 30-Day Break From AI Taught Me About My Teaching

Both depressing and encouraging, as this teacher figures out that maybe having ChatGPT do his thinking for him is not great.

Nobody's Business

Audrey Watters is essential reading every week on technology in ed (twice a week if you pay for your subscription) and it's always worthwhile. Here she opens with the quote "If you're so rich, why aren't you smart?"

Linda McMahon’s ‘Elegant Gaslighting’ of Democratic Senators

For The Progressive, Jeff Bryant has a great analysis of Linda McMahon's hearing.

Trump's expanded ICE raids are causing big problems for some schools

USA Today covers the mess created by sending armed police after children. Who could have predicted?

Teach Truth

Thomas Ultican gives us a look at a new book by Jesse Hagopian about the struggle for anti-racist education.

School Vouchers and the Threat to Religious Freedom

Anne Lutz Fernandez looks at a subject near and dear to my heart. Yes, it's bad for schools to have religion injected into them-- but it is also bad for religion to be commandeered by the state.

This week at the Bucks County Beacon, I wrote about a state auditor report that shows just how badly we in PA need cyber charter reform, and at Forbes, a survey that shows 40% of two year olds have their own digital devices. Yikes!

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