Author: BelieveAgain
Education savings accounts are dead in South Carolina—for now—after the state Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the state’s newest private school choice program violates the state’s constitution.The Education Trust Fund Scholarship Program, which Republican Gov. Henry McMaster signed into law in the spring of 2023, offers parents up to $6,000 in state funds for a wide range of private education expenses, including private school tuition, fees, transportation, and supplies. The legislature allocated funding for up to 5,000 students who previously attended a public school, and whose families earn up to 200 percent of the federal poverty level, to receive ESA…
Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump did not discuss education or school safety in the first debate between the two presidential candidates Tuesday, which happened less than a week after a mass shooting at a Georgia high school.Moderators did not ask the candidates about a Sept. 4 attack at Apalachee High School in Winder, Ga., in which a 14-year-old student has been charged with killing two students and two teachers with an AR-15-style rifle, an act that has stirred up perennial debates over school safety and gun laws.The Georgia shooting has also raised questions about how law…
A federal appeals court on Monday ruled in favor of two prepubescent transgender female athletes seeking to play girls’ sports in school, agreeing with a lower court that there are no significant athletic differences between boys and girls before puberty.The three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, in San Francisco, upheld an injunction that partially blocks an Arizona law barring transgender women and girls from college and school sports.The injunction applies only to the two challengers as the case is litigated. One is identified in court papers as Jane Doe, an 11-year-old transgender girl who…
One of the most popular breakout sessions at the recent Moms for Liberty national conference at a downtown hotel here focused on one of many education topics that has the focus of the conservative grassroots group—Title IX.The session focused on the U.S. Department of Education’s recently promulgated final regulation for the 1972 federal statute, which bars sex discrimination in federally funded schools and colleges. The regulation, among other things, interprets the statute to protect students on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.That doesn’t sit well with Moms for Liberty, whose conference also included sessions such as “Crafting parental…
When you’ve been around as long as I have, one gets all manner of intriguing questions. While I usually respond to such queries in private, some seem likely to be of broader interest. So, in “Ask Rick,” I occasionally take up reader queries. If you’d like to send one along, just send it to me, care of Greg Fournier, at greg.fournier@aei.org.Dear Rick,I’ve seen your new book, Getting Education Right. The subtitle says it offers a “conservative” vision for early childhood, K–12, and college. That left me wondering why you’d tell potential readers they’d only be interested in what you have…
At the Moms for Liberty national summit here last week, former President Donald Trump fielded questions from Tiffany Justice, co-founder of the conservative parents’ rights organization, on a range of issues.Largely missing from the discussion: education.Moms for Liberty was founded in 2021 as a response to parental frustrations with schools’ COVID policies. In the years since, the group has expanded its agenda to supporting and electing conservative candidates to local school boards. See also Open image caption Close image caption Former President Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, speaks with Tiffany Justice, a Moms for Liberty co-founder, during the group’s…
Former President Donald Trump did not make education or K-12 schools a priority in an on-stage conversation at the national summit of the Moms for Liberty, a conservative parents’ rights organization. Trump answered questions from Tiffany Justice, a co-founder of Moms for Liberty, during the organization’s annual Joyful Warriors Summit here on Aug. 30. The conversation—which lasted more than an hour—included little discussion of education policy and focused more on Trump’s personal history as a star of reality television and immigration, an issue central to his campaign but not one that Moms for Liberty has focused on. However, Trump affirmed…
Pop quiz!A celebrity-turned-politician runs for president on a bold pledge to abolish the U.S. Department of Education. Does that sentence describe: A) Ronald Reagan in 1980; or B) Donald Trump in 2024?The answer is: C) all of the above. While Trump’s brash rhetoric about the federal agency has raised fresh alarm bells among voters who oppose him, Republicans’ perennial calls to eliminate the Education Department actually date back to its creation 45 years ago. No president has come close to fulfilling that promise. The best chance for getting it done may have come in 1981, when Reagan Education Secretary Terrel…
When Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz quickly rose to prominence in national Democratic politics this summer and then was chosen by Vice President Kamala Harris as her running mate on the presidential ticket, high school coaches around the country paid attention.“That was pretty cool for most coaches in America,” said Gary Rankin, the head football coach at Boyd Buchanan School, a private high school in Chattanooga, Tenn. “Regardless of one’s politics, this is exciting for a lot of us.”Joe Aresimowicz, the head football coach at Berlin High School in Berlin, Conn., said he quickly learned what he could about Walz, including…
Arne Duncan served as U.S. secretary of education under President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2016, following a seven-year tenure as the superintendent of the Chicago public schools. During his time at the U.S. Department of Education, we often didn’t see eye to eye when it came to Race to the Top, NCLB waivers, the Common Core, college lending, and more. But these were debates over policy and principle. I understood that Duncan was doing what he thought best and I like to think he took my critiques in that same spirit. With that kind of respectful disagreement in short…