4 minPolitics
Schultz says backing failing schools and teachers unions is a losing strategy
The CEO of the American Federation for Children argues that Republicans and Democrats alike should not defend failing public schools or align with teachers unions, pointing to union political spending and the fallout from pandemic-era learning loss.
The chief executive of the American Federation for Children, a conservative school choice group, says that defending failing schools and backing teachers unions is not a winnable political strategy. Schultz made the argument as debate continues over vouchers, education savings accounts and the future of public education in the United States. In Schultz's view, the central agenda of teachers unions is keeping students in union-run schools, and the organizations' opposition to vouchers and education savings accounts follows from that goal.
Those programs would let families direct public money toward private options, including private tuition. Unions argue the opposite: that voucher funds should instead go to salaries, staffing and facilities in the public system. The disagreement goes to the heart of how public dollars should follow students, and it has become one of the most contested questions in state education policy.
The political alignment of the unions is a major point in the debate. The National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers are major Democratic campaign donors, according to financial analyses, and the two organizations have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on politics and lobbying over the past decade. The record is not uniformly partisan, however. Some unions have backed select rural Republicans who sought public school aid, a detail that complicates a simple picture of the unions as a purely Democratic force.
Schultz's remarks come as relations between unions and parents have been strained by learning loss during the pandemic. Parents who watched their children fall behind during remote and disrupted instruction have grown more open to alternatives, and Republicans have pushed voucher and education savings account proposals as a way to give families private options. The strain has been especially visible in large urban systems, where enrollment has fallen steeply since COVID-19. The Houston Independent School District is among the districts that have seen steep declines.
The fight has also taken on new weight in Texas. Democrat Gina Hinojosa won the governor's race over Republican Greg Abbott on November 3. Hinojosa has signaled opposition to the state's voucher program, known as the Texas Education Freedom Accounts, or TEFA, which began with an initial allocation of $1 billion. The program lets families direct state funds to private tuition and other education costs. Because Hinojosa has not spelled out a detailed plan, the program's future remains uncertain under the incoming administration.
The American Federation of Teachers and Hinojosa did not respond to requests for comment. The National Education Association's president, Princess Moss, issued a statement after the midterm elections, but the material available for this report does not include its contents. Whether the school choice debate will reshape the political map in the coming elections remains an open question, as both parties weigh how to respond to parents' concerns about the schools their children attend.
Source: foxnews.com
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