Indiana Senator Donnelly opposes nomination for Department of Education Secretary

Education is the key to the future.

“We’re concerned about the nominee”, vice president of the Erie Education Association Bill Kuhar said. “It’s in her nature, and Lamar Alexander should know better”.

U.S. Senator Joe Donnelly (D-Indiana) will oppose President Donald Trump’s nominee for U.S. Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos.

He sees DeVos as an outsider who could shake up education policy, Schoesler said this week. She lacked any plan whatsoever to police waste, fraud, and abuse in publicly funded higher education, stuttering instead that she, “if confirmed, will certainly be very vigilant”.

Educators also have an issue with what they say say is a basic lack of understanding of basic education laws. If she is approved by the committee, her appointment next goes to the full Senate for a vote. I’m confident that we will do that. The stage was set for DeVos by the Democrats who have colluded with the Republicans in a decades-long assault on public education.

It’s fair to say the stakes for public schools are especially high.

The biggest stumbling block to Democratic efforts to block DeVos’ confirmation may be the sheer weight of public opinion. DeVos is chairman of the Federation for Children. She has never taught in a public school nor served on a school board. DeVos worked the third shift in her family business during the summers in her college years. She says DeVos has been a big financial backer for the voucher and charter system in the state of MI, which Hopson calls a disaster.

She helped create a Wild West of for-profit charter schools, while fighting against any accountability for how the public’s money was spent.

“Anyone who is espousing the views that Betsy DeVos espouses really doesn’t have any credibility when it comes to public education”, says Allen. Betsy Devos’ education track record shows she has no love for public schools. In the hands of new leadership, the report bolsters the argument that expanded aid to the private sector may be the best way to force these schools to measure up while giving inner city kids with real promise a chance to fulfill their dreams.

Perhaps most surprising of all was DeVos’ failure to discuss her opinion of Title 1, the vitally important mechanism by which the federal government provides financial support to benefit the nation’s poorest students.

Though Bushey agrees with DeVos’s voucher programs, he feels as if she is underqualified for the position because of her inexperience. It is hard to dodge the frank conclusion, as one New York Times op-ed put it, that Detroit “is the biggest school reform disaster in the country”. She stated that she believes what is “fair” treatment should be “left to the states”, even if they are treated poorly in some states. In 2008, the Ohio Elections Commission found that a PAC started by DeVos-devoted to promoting school choice and called All Children Matter-broke state law by funneling $870,000 from a national PAC to its Ohio affiliate.

DeVos’ letter to Isakson addressed three areas: the federal role in implementing IDEA, individualized education programs, and expanding educational options for parents.

Personally I support those who hold all schools accountable for yearly student progress. Thompson got around constitutional hurdles by devising a scheme that sent taxpayer money to the parents themselves who, in turn, used them to attend private religious schools of their choice. She was also asked to submit answers to written questions. MI is below the national average in graduation rates for low-income students, for students with disabilities and for all students in general. The election of Donald Trump as our 45th president was a decisive message that Americans have grown tired of Washington’s business as usual and want new leaders who will change the direction of our government.