Former Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) “said he will withdraw from a planned Harvard fellowship after a social media backlash and email and petition campaign opposing the appointment,” the Detroit Free Press reports.
News of the appointment “sparked outrage over the weekend from critics who cited Snyder’s role in the Flint drinking water crisis.”
“Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) will propose on Monday eliminating all $1.6 trillion of student debt held in the United States, a significant escalation of the policy fight in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary two days before the candidates’ first debate in Miami,” the Washington Post reports.
“Sanders is proposing the federal government pay to wipe clean the student debt held by 45 million Americans — including all private and graduate school debt — as part of a package that also would make public universities, community colleges and trade schools tuition-free.”
Vox: Sanders’s free college proposal just got a whole lot bigger.
A new Civic Science survey finds 56% of Americans don’t want Arabic numerals taught in schools.
“In a major education policy speech set to be delivered Saturday, Sen. Bernie Sanders will call for a ban on all for-profit charter schools, a position that puts him directly at odds with the Trump administration and becoming the first of the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates to insist on such a move,” CNN reports.
“Kentucky’s 2019 teacher of the year skipped a formal ceremony at the White House on Monday — a snub Jessica Dueñas said was in protest of the Trump administration’s embrace of school-choice policies,” the Louisville Courier-Journal reports.
Said Dueñas: “I feel like the current administration is clearly attacking public education. Why come to D.C. and smile and get an award and not stand up for my students?”
NBC News: “In the wake of the $25 million college admissions cheating scandal in which 50 people were criminally charged, California lawmakers are attempting to crack down on the so-called side door that allowed wealthy parents to engineer their children’s acceptance to elite universities.”
“The six-bill legislative package, put forth in the State Assembly on March 28, takes aim at certain college admissions practices like the one exploited in the scheme, in which coaches can select a number of students who might not get in otherwise as athletic recruits, essentially guaranteeing their acceptance.”
“Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) unveiled a new plan on Monday that would offer free public college for future students while cancelling up to $50,000 in student debt for over 40 million Americans,” NBC News reports.
“Warren said her proposal was designed to confront a recent surge in student loans, now totaling $1.5 trillion nationally. She blamed insufficient funding in higher education in favor of lower taxes for the mounting student debt.”
New York Times: “Ms. Warren’s sweeping plan has several planks. She would pay for it with revenue generated by her proposed increase in taxes for America’s most wealthy families and corporations, which the campaign estimates to be $2.75 trillion over 10 years. In addition to eliminating undergraduate tuition at public colleges and universities, she would expand federal grants to help students with nontuition expenses and create a $50 billion fund to support historically black colleges and universities.”
“In the first major policy rollout of her presidential campaign, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) unveiled a plan on Tuesday to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to boost teacher salaries,” NBC News reports.
“Billed as ‘the largest investment in teachers in American history,’ the plan would devote $315 billion in federal funding over the next 10 years toward programs that would subsidize pay for public K-12 educators and reward state and local governments for raising them even higher. It would be paid for by as-yet unspecified changes to the estate tax, which currently applies only to inheritances over $11.4 million for individuals and $22.8 million for married couples.”
First Read: “The jaw-dropping college admissions scandal that ensnared two Hollywood actresses and embarrassed some of the country’s top universities not only underscores the divide between the haves and have-nots.”
“It also plays into the hands of the Democratic presidential hopefuls who have made erasing this divide a central message in their campaigns.”
“But the story also might play with Trump voters who think college is rigged, although maybe for a different reason — affirmative action.”
“The nation is rightfully outraged after yesterday’s news, which exposed 1) how the wealthy have tried to take advantage of the system, and 2) how another American institution (higher education) has let us down.”
The Atlantic: “Bernie Sanders has called for tuition-free college. Julián Castro has signaled support for it as well. Elizabeth Warren has pushed, for years, for ‘debt-free’ college. Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, and Kirsten Gillibrand have signed on to legislation that could make college debt-free. Even Amy Klobuchar, who notably shirked ‘free college for all’ during a CNN town hall in February, signed on to a metered free-college proposal last year.”
“All together, the field seems to have converged on a consensus: A free-college proposal—or an answer about why they don’t have one—is something of a prerequisite for Democratic candidates hoping to challenge Donald Trump in the 2020 election.”
“A majority of Americans in every state except Vermont would fail a test based on the questions in the U.S. citizenship test, according to Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation survey.
“It suggests most Americans can’t live up to the standards we set for people applying to be U.S. citizens — and we set those standards because we expect Americans to be informed and engaged. Only four out of 10 Americans would have passed the test, and just 27% of those under age 45.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told CBS News that middle school children in Kentucky would be better off if funds that would otherwise have gone to building new schools were used for a border wall.
Said Graham: “It’s better for the middle school kids in Kentucky to have a secure border. We’ll get them the school they need, but right now we’ve got a national emergency.”
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’ security detail is projected to cost up to $7.74 million from now through the end of September 2019, a spokesman for the U.S. Marshals Service told Politico.
Pennsylvania state Rep. Will Tallman (R) has introduced a bill that would ban public school teachers from discussing politics or government in their classrooms, the Allentown Morning Call reports.
“Tallman said his bill would forbid public school teachers from endorsing, supporting or opposing candidates or incumbents for local, state and federal offices while in the classroom. On the job, teachers could not discuss enacted or pending legislation, regulations, executive orders or court cases involving any level or branch of government.”
Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) claimed that what he described as “atheist litigation groups” in California were trying to get hidden video of Christian student activities at a local high school, the Shreveport Times reports.
“Johnson’s claims are the latest chapter in a saga involving a federal lawsuit alleging that teachers and other staff have consistently promoted Christianity in Bossier Parish Schools in violation of the U.S. Constitution. The lawsuit also alleges that some teachers or staff have sought to shame or coerce non-Christian students.”
“Education Secretary Betsy DeVos says free speech on college campuses is being threatened and told students in Philadelphia that listening to people with differing views is an important part of education,” the AP reports.
Said DeVos: “More than a few institutions have been unwilling to provide a forum for their students to discuss serious policy matters that affect our country. I can and have found other forums, but what about students who cannot?”
She added: “We have abandoned truth.”
As part of an effort to “streamline” the social studies curriculum in public schools, the Texas Board of Education “voted Friday to adjust what students in every grade are required to learn in the classroom. Among the changes, board members approved the removal of several historical figures, including Hillary Clinton and Helen Keller, from the curriculum,” the Dallas Morning News reports.
“The board also voted to keep in the curriculum a reference to the ‘heroism’ of the defenders of the Alamo, which had been recommended for elimination, as well as Moses’ influence on the writing of the nation’s founding documents, multiple references to ‘Judeo-Christian’ values and a requirement that students explain how the ‘Arab rejection of the State of Israel has led to ongoing conflict’ in the Middle East.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
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