During the 2015 fight over the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), over 200 parent and conservative organizations and leaders denounced the bill due to its extension of tight control over state and local education by the federal government — features it retained from its No Child Left Behind predecessor. One of the strongest concerns was the […]
Prominent Indiana businessman Alan Hubbard just recently announced his withdrawal from consideration as Deputy Secretary of Education, the number two position under current Secretary Betsy DeVos. In his statement, he cited the significant financial sacrifice his family would need to make as far as selling assets for him meet ethics requirements in order to take […]
Charter school and voucher expansion has been a hot topic across the nation at both the state and federal levels. Interest and grave concern about this expansion, especially at the federal level, has intensified from all points on the political spectrum in light of several recent developments: Florida’s bill serving as a trial run, the […]
This piece was co-authored by Emmett McGroarty, a senior fellow at the American Principles Project. In her recent appearance before a House subcommittee, Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos again made the case for school choice (allowing some semblance of public funding for private education, whether through vouchers, tax credits, or other mechanisms). But the questioning […]
The bureaucrats and technocrats who see education as mere workforce preparation and who are devoted to monitoring, tracking and slotting free-born American citizens from womb to tomb in order to create their vision of a planned economy are continuing their dystopian efforts with a new bill. S 1121, the College Transparency Act, is sponsored by […]
It is no secret that Jeb Bush and his close friend and ally, Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, are huge fans of charter schools. Bush’s Foundation for Florida’s Future (FFF) and his national Foundation for Excellence in Education (FEE) are pushing charter-friendly laws in a number of states, with Florida being a major example. There is […]
Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos just can’t seem to avoid making misleading statements on Common Core. After suggesting — falsely — on a couple occasions that Common Core is no longer an issue, she repeated this claim yesterday, along with a statement which appeared to imply states which have moved away from Common Core may […]
Last month, I reported on invasive social emotional learning (SEL) surveys which are being added to Common Core-aligned tests in many states. While that news alone is alarming, it is unfortunately only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the rapid expansion of SEL across the country. In a recently published brief, the […]
This piece was co-authored by Jane Robbins, an attorney and senior fellow at the American Principles Project. On Wednesday President Trump issued an executive order directing Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos to determine which regulations and guidance documents issued by the U.S. Department of Education (USED) have unlawfully overreached on education policy to the detriment […]
Monday, in an appearance on Fox News, Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos once again asserted that “[t]here isn’t really any Common Core anymore” and that the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), passed last year by Congress and signed by an enthusiastic President Obama, “essentially does away with the whole argument about Common Core.” You can […]
The evidence showing the decided lack of effectiveness of government preschool continues to mount. Numerous policy analysts have already begun to discuss this problem, including the Heartland Institute’s Joy Pullmann, the American Principles Project’s Jane Robbins, the Cato Institute’s David Armor, Lindsey Burke and Salim Furth of the Heritage Foundation, and my own compilation as highlighted at The Federalist. Even the more moderate, corporately-aligned American […]
The new Republican governor of Alabama, Kay Ivey, just set the date for the special election to fill Jeff Sessions’ old Senate seat: August 15. Let the games begin. It’s pure Southern gothic. First, there is the man currently holding that seat, appointed by disgraced former Gov. Robert Bentley as one of his final acts before […]
Large national organizations like the National Association of State Boards of Education and the American School Counselors Association have already admitted that one of the main purposes of the Common Core standards and the aligned testing is to mold and profile students’ attitudes, beliefs and behavior — through what’s called social emotional learning (SEL) or […]
At his CEO Business Town Hall today at the White House, President Trump reiterated his campaign promise to end Common Core and return to local control of education: Common Core, I mean, we have to bring education more local. We can’t be managing education from Washington. When I go out to Iowa, when I go out […]
There is no doubt that former Florida Governor Jeb Bush supports Common Core and the privatization of public schools with imposition of the Common Core on private schools. There is also no doubt that his support for these disastrous education policies scuttled his presidential campaign. So why is he continuing to push such terrible policy […]
It seems that all of the grassroots efforts to reach the Trump administration with Common Core-related concerns are finally starting to bear fruit. These concerns include Betsy DeVos’ pro-Common Core record, the disturbingly large number of Jeb Bush foundation employees and alumni staffing the U.S. Department of Education (USED), and the prominent decrease in the […]
Last week, The Huffington Post noted that, absent a strong intervention by President Donald Trump himself, his team is taking a pretty lackadaisical attitude to Common Core so far: During the campaign and in the weeks following his election, Trump’s pledge to end the Common Core, a set of education goals that has stirred controversy on […]
In last week’s column, I mentioned four things that President Donald Trump could do to keep his education promises. One had to do with the budget: 3.) Cut the Federal Education Budget Considering that there are so many invasive, ineffective, expensive, over-reaching, privacy-robbing federal education programs that include related social emotional standards tied to Common Core, President Trump […]
Generally, the first 50 days of the Trump Administration have been an absolute joy to watch. The media and the Left have been apoplectic as President Trump largely honors his campaign promises and does exactly what he said he would do. Truthfully, Trump has been everything we hoped he would be and more. Still, that’s […]
Despite consistently promising to end Common Core in nearly every stump speech as a candidate, which was likely one key aspect of his stunning election victory, those words “Common Core” seem to have disappeared from now-President Donald Trump’s political lexicon. The academically inferior, developmentally inappropriate, and psychologically manipulative standards were not mentioned in either his […]