President Donald Trump’s Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, has been an absolute disaster for public education and especially historically marginalized students.
She cancelled an Obama Administration policy regarding school discipline guidance designed to lower the rates whereby Black children are suspended from school and referred to law enforcement, even using racist pseudoscience to justify her action. She fought against union representation, specifically by attempting to nullify the role of union participation in collective bargaining. DeVos has also failed to protect disabled students by not enforcing an Obama-era rule requiring states to address racial disparities in special education programs.
DeVos, like Trump himself, was never committed to supporting or improving public schools, which she once called “a dead end.”
DeVos, like Trump himself, was never committed to supporting or improving public schools, which she once called “a dead end.” Rather than support the 90 percent of U.S. students who attend public schools nationwide, she crusaded in favor of removing students and funding from public schools. In May, she even stepped in to redirect COVID-19 relief funding from public to private schools.
Thankfully, DeVos’s reign of incompetence and malfeasance will soon come to an end, and our attention can turn to an incoming Biden Administration that has the opportunity to turn the page.
Currently, during this period of transition, President-elect Biden is considering potential picks for Secretary of Education. A number of names have been floated, including past and present leaders of teachers associations and the heads of city and state school systems.
One key priority must be for Biden to ensure that his administration is committed to racial equity and racial justice within public education. That means going beyond adjusting policies to balance out institutional racism found in schools and instead aim towards removing institutional racism in schools altogether.
Accomplishing this end requires that public schools aren’t defunded in the name of reform—particularly those schools serving students of color that are already receiving millions less than predominantly white schools. It also requires that Black residents never lose control over the governance of their local schools.
The goal of the Biden Administration must be to remove the racism that’s widespread in America’s schools.
The goal of the Biden Administration must be to remove the racism that’s widespread in America’s schools. It must work to increase the numbers of Black and Afro-Latinx teachers in classrooms nationwide and keep them there.
Research shows the importance of Black and Afro-Latinx teachers in the classroom. Black students who have had at least one Black teacher are more likely to graduate from high school and attend college and less likely to drop out of school. Black students are also less likely to receive exclusionary discipline at the hands of a Black teacher.
However, these teachers are more likely than their white counterparts to quit the profession. The Biden Administration must institute funding programs and initiatives for recruiting, hiring, and retaining Black and Afro-Latinx teachers. This can include funding to alleviate the student loan debt of recently hired Black and Afro-Latinx teachers, a factor that keeps those aspiring teachers out of the classroom.
Here are some other items that ought to be on the Biden Administration’s education task list:
Reinstate the Obama Administration’s guidelines on discipline procedures to further reduce the disproportionate number of Black students who are suspended and arrested in schools. Missing days of school due to suspension means that students aren’t learning, and Black children miss more days than children of any other race. Even worse, these policies contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline.
Reconsider the use of high-stakes standardized testing, particularly in light of the challenges of educating during a global pandemic. These tests, which are designed to measure student proficiency, are far from race-neutral. They are racist in origin and misrepresent knowledge attainment growth of Black students.
Make culturally relevant education a priority, particularly given that the majority of students in public schools nationwide are non-white. Culturally relevant education both addresses teacher practice and teacher pedagogy. Training teachers in this way will equip them to use the right methods and resources to teach while having an informed perspective on the role culture plays in how students learn.
Make sure that the majority of teachers and school administrators, who are white, are trained and supported with resources in the area of culturally relevant education, relying on the work of scholars such as Geneva Gay, Gloria Ladson-Billings, Zaretta Hammond, and Gholnecsar Muhammad.
I believe that if the Biden Administration committed to these items, the educational experiences of Black children would change for the better, resulting in improved academic achievement. This is what antiracism looks like in schools from a governance standpoint at the federal level.
Talks and seminars are good. Book clubs are okay. But what’s needed are measurable actions that actually improve the conditions by which Black children are taught, disciplined, and prepared for the world.
Talks and seminars are good. Book clubs are okay. But what’s needed are measurable actions that actually improve the conditions by which Black children are taught, disciplined, and prepared for the world.
It was Black voters in urban centers where Black residents make up the majority—including, Milwaukee, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Atlanta—that helped secure the election for Biden. Implementing recommendations such as these, in those cities and elsewhere, will go a long way toward repaying that debt of gratitude.
But I also think Biden, unlike Trump, will implement these ideas because they are the right thing to do.