| | | | |  | | By Juan Perez Jr. | |  Protesters gather outside the Glendale Unified School District headquarters in Glendale, Calif., on June 20. | David Swanson/AFP via Getty Images | COURSE CORRECTION — Some Republicans say their party should update its political approach to education after conservative-backed culture warriors lost school board elections across the country this month. — Conservative defeats in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Kansas, Iowa and Virginia showed the risks of shoehorning divisive social issues into hyperlocal races. Republicans eyeballing more of the same in 2024 should consider this month’s results, one operative told Weekly Education. — “What you saw in elections, especially after Covid, was a response to Democrats overplaying their hands on a host of issues that parents just weren't comfortable with,” said Alex Stroman, a South Carolina Republican operative and former executive director of the state’s GOP. — “Republicans also have to watch out that they’re not overplaying their hands and are instead just focused on outcomes, opportunities, and the issues that actually matter to parents whether they be in urban centers, rural areas or somewhere in between,” said Stroman, who is currently unaligned with a 2024 presidential contender. — November’s elections swung away from conservatives partly because their opponents mobilized to resist a message that caught them off guard in 2021, Stroman acknowledged. But he also said Republican efforts to center school races on social debates overlook issues that matter more to a broad array of voters. — “When Republicans talk about issues, when it comes just to education policy, it can't really be about hot-button, culture-warrior type issues,” he said. “Because those issues only affect your base and they rally the others, on the left and the right.” — Stroman believes most voters are uncomfortable with what he describes as left-leaning ideology in school districts and classrooms, to be clear. He argues Republicans are still “generally right” when it comes to social issues in education. Yet the response, he said, “does not have to be overwhelming.” — “Most people look at most issues with compassion and with reason,” Stroman said. “The bad thing is that over the past couple of years both the left and the right have just gone a bit overboard when it comes to focusing on those issues — and taking away attention from what it should be on: increasing opportunities for students across the country.” — A Republican message focused on expanding educational opportunity will play better than “screaming matches in boards of education about masking or vaccines,” he said. — “Whether it's in inner city Chicago or rural South Carolina, students are being failed by these conversations that we're having on issues like transgender bathrooms, and they're being failed by the uncompetitive nature of education in this country,” Stroman said. IT’S MONDAY, NOV. 27. WELCOME TO WEEKLY EDUCATION. President Joe Biden has just under a year to convince skeptical U.S. voters they’re better off financially thanks to him. Widening holes in the country’s social safety net could make his task even harder. Reach out with tips to today’s host at jperez@politico.com and also my colleagues Michael Stratford (mstratford@politico.com), Bianca Quilantan (bquilantan@politico.com) and Mackenzie Wilkes (mwilkes@politico.com). And don’t forget to follow us @Morning_Edu and @POLITICOPro.
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| | |  Striking teachers march across the Burnside Bridge in Portland, Ore., on Nov. 21. | KGW-TV via AP | ROLL CALL — More than 40,000 Portland Public Schools students and their families learned they can return to classes today after teacher union and school district negotiators landed an agreement to resolve a labor strike that was set to enter its fourth week. — Instead, officials said school will start two hours late in Portland today. More than 3,500 members of the Portland Association of Teachers will need to ratify the agreement. So will the city school board at a meeting scheduled for Tuesday. — “We are relieved to have our students returning to school and know that being out of school for the last three weeks – missing classmates, teachers, and learning – has been hard for everyone,” school Superintendent Guadalupe Guerrero said in a statement on Sunday. Negotiators agreed to make up 11 days of missed classes through June 14. — According to the school district, the tentative agreement offers educators a nearly 14 percent “cumulative cost of living increase” over the next three years. Approximately half of the city’s educators would also earn an additional 10.6 percent in pay increases. The tentative deal also included some new class-size thresholds and processes for resolving class size concerns that include educators, school leaders, and parents. — “This contract is a watershed moment for Portland students, families, and educators,” union President Angela Bonilla said in a statement on Sunday. “Educators walked picket lines alongside families, students, and allies - and because of that, our schools are getting the added investment they need.” — The contract will cost roughly $175 million over the next three years, the school district said, while promising “significant cuts” during its budget planning process for the upcoming school year. — The Oregonian newspaper’s editorial board on Friday declared the lost class time was “unconscionable”. — A blizzard of disputes kept schools closed and divided the city since Nov. 1. The latest quarrel, according to Portland school officials, centered on teacher pay for a workday added to next year’s calendar.
| | WHAT RURAL SCHOOLS WANT — Millions of the country’s rural-dwelling students are at risk as their communities confront multiple crises centered on lost learning, unemployment, and mental health. — But these children and their schools “often seem invisible” because policymakers lack a full understanding of their challenges, the National Rural Education Association declared in its latest “Why Rural Matters” report. — Weekly Education sat down with Allen Pratt, the NREA’s executive director, to discuss the report and rural schools’ most urgent concerns. Here’s a portion of our conversation, edited for length and clarity: One of the most controversial aspects of federal budget negotiations are major proposed cuts to education spending, particularly the Title I program for students from low-income families. What would that entail for rural schools? Any type of funding cut to an area or region of the country that already has education funding issues is going to be a disastrous combination. Cutting funding now would be detrimental to all school districts across the country no matter their ZIP code, but our rural districts are counting on that money. A lot of times that Title I funding has been allocated for the fiscal year calendar that local school systems are using, and they're waiting on the rest of the money after the federal budget is approved. That is money that we are ready to spend, or may have spent, and cutting that would be disastrous to programs that we count on every day. Lawmakers sometimes believe they can trim federal education funding because schools have access to unspent pandemic relief dollars as state governments channel more money towards education. Do you think that’s an accurate perception? Most of the money that came out of Covid, which we have until 2024 to use the last amounts of, is already allocated. It may look like it’s sitting there, but it’s in use or will be in use. The big push for us is to educate our folks on how to deal with their state politicians, but also folks at the federal level to say, hey, we need this money but we also don't need to be cut back. This money is being used for things we could not afford otherwise. What else do rural schools need from Washington? An understanding of the landscape of rural, meaning the number of rural students that we’re dealing with. Also an understanding that how we define ‘rural’ might not be as accurate as it needs to be. That’s at the federal level, and I think that’s important. There’s also a way to use funding that may exist, or may be coming, in ways that allow rural districts to be more innovative and flexible. The federal government can allow our schools to do that. And when we look at educational outcomes, dealing with how much we test our students.
| | UF UNDER THE MICROSCOPE — Professors at the University of Florida had high hopes for Joseph Ladapo. But they quickly lost faith in him, POLITICO’s Arek Sarkissian reports from Tallahassee. — In 2021, the university was fast-tracking Ladapo into a tenured professorship as part of his appointment as Florida’s surgeon general. Ladapo, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ pick for the state’s top medical official, dazzled them with his Harvard degree and work as a research professor at New York University and UCLA. — Ladapo’s work at UF has generally escaped scrutiny. Yet interviews with more than two dozen current and former faculty members, state lawmakers and former agency heads, as well as reviews of internal university emails and reports, show that staff was worried that Ladapo had bypassed a crucial review process when he was rushed into his coveted tenured position and, moreover, was unsuited for the position.
| | | | JOIN WOMEN RULE ON 12/12: For centuries, women were left out of the rooms that shaped policy, built companies and led countries. Now, society needs the creativity and entrepreneurship of women more than ever. How can we make sure that women are given the space and opportunity to shape the world’s future for the better? Join POLITICO's Women Rule on Dec. 12 for Leading with Purpose: How Women Are Reinventing the World to explore this and more. REGISTER HERE. | | | | | | | | | — Tentative deal on Portland teacher contract means students will return to school Monday: The Oregonian — GOP states are embracing vouchers. Wealthy parents are benefiting: POLITICO — Education Department fines Union Institute & University $4.3M, moves to cut off Title IV aid: Higher Ed Dive — Democrats who swept Moms for Liberty off school board fight superintendent’s $700,000 exit deal: The Associated Press — New Mexico's top education official tells districts he's 'deeply alarmed' by low-performing schools: Albuquerque Journal | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |
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