Fifty shades of education reform

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

There should be no doubt where the Trump administration stands on education reform. The president would not have risked nominating a non-politician to run point on education policy if he doesn’t plan or want to change policies from the inside.

How and why change is needed is clear in every state and in the home of the seat of the federal government. D.C. public charter schools now represent 46 percent of the city’s public school children — and that didn’t happen because elected and appointed officials willingly chose to change course.

In the mid-1990s, both houses of Congress pulled along a pliable President Bill Clinton, while elected and appointed D.C. officials tried to dig in their heels in resistance. Indeed, Franklin Smith, who was the D.C. schools chief, knew with certainty that he was going to be kicked to the curb because teachers unions and elected officials discovered he supported public charters.

That all happened 20 years, and next week school choice supporters are scheduled to hold the first D.C. Charter Conference — a sort of how-to, what-works and where-are-the-potholes confab by the Friends of Choice in Urban Schools, or FOCUS (God bless ’em), which has been there every step of the way for parents and students.

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos needn’t attend the conference: As a reform warrior, she has listened to parents and politicians, supporters and anti-choicers, reformers and died-in-the-wool status quo backers explain the pros and cons of education reform.

Unfortunately, she was mischaracterized as a public school opponent. Fortunately, Vice President Mike Pence was on hand to settle the score during the Senate’s vote on her confirmation.

Now, comes show and tell.

If you want to know the chief mission of the U.S. Department of Education, you can hop onto its website to learn that its publicly espoused mission isn’t how the federal government carries out its duties.

These days, Uncle Sam is nothing more than a nanny, trying to raise your children from birth to 18, giving children three hots and a cot (like jails), mandating uniforms (like prisons), telling them when to eat, sleep and play outdoors — well, you already know.

It’s gotten to the point that moms and dads need not even worry about whether, say, Playboy is teaching their sons about condom use. His public school teaches that — as does hers.

Still, don’t expect Mrs. DeVos to immediately dive into the weeds on those issues following the fierce battle to keep hers and Mr. Trump’s fingers off the reins of the coffers at the Education Department, whose policies can help or hurt rural and tribal areas, and urban and suburban districts alike.

Mrs. DeVos should remember the voices of parents and supporters for choice that she’s heard over two decades, especially parents whose hearts were broken when they learned that President Barack Obama did not support the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, which allows parents to send their children to private schools via a public voucher.

Ending the program, as Mr. Obama tried to do, would have condemned poor children and robbed their parents of real school choice. Imagine, you can use food stamps to buy junk food and SpaghettiOs every day, but you only have one education option for your children.

The Senate fight suggests that America is on the verge of turning another corner in the education reform movement, which has as many shades of gray as a couture designer’s fashion wheel.

At this juncture, Mrs. DeVos should continue her forward progress, although not by mimicking the Obama, Bush and Clinton administrations by ramming federal policies down the throats of local and state authorities. Nor should she bait or mislead those authorities into thinking that one-size-fits-all federal policies are the only way to reform education, transform the status quo and prepare our youngsters for the real world means racing to the top of some fictcious mountain for federal dollars.

School districts and the people who control public school systems are as disparate as genuine craft-brewed beers. The brewers might share many things in common, but the appeal of the marketplace is different strokes for different folks.

Making our children move in lock step with one another isn’t the way forward, unless they’re members of a marching band.

• Deborah Simmons can be contacted at dsimmons@washingtontimes.com.