On Nov. 5, Reject Extremist Attacks on Public Education | Opinion

An issue of crucial importance to tens of millions of parents, students, and teachers has inexplicably gotten short shrift this election season. Nary a word was uttered about public education on either the presidential or vice-presidential debate stages. It is rarely mentioned by pollsters and pundits as a top-tier issue. But education is on the ballot next week—and the stakes are existential. Will we vote to strengthen the public schools that 90 percent of America’s children and families rely on, or to weaken and ultimately destroy our last remaining truly public institution?

Public schools need support to prepare young people for life, college, career, and citizenship. But some extremist politicians have embroiled our classrooms in toxic culture wars to soften the ground for their systematic defunding, privatizing, and voucherizing. It’s time we took the threat seriously.

I’m in schools every chance I get. I see the joy that comes from kids immersing themselves in a good book, engaging in hands-on projects, and working in teams to showcase their knowledge. I’ve seen how we can transform public schools to embed them in their communities and align them with economic and career opportunities. With so many young people still struggling through the coronavirus pandemic’s effects on their learning, development, and mental health, we need to redouble our efforts to make school more engaging and relevant, address students’ well-being, and fuel their critical thinking and problem-solving skills. I know that with the right support, we can make every public school a place where parents want to send their children, educators want to work, and students thrive.

Donald Trump and JD Vance have long disparaged America’s educators and public schools, and the GOP platform will gut public education as we know it. It calls for a vast expansion of school voucher programs, despite evidence they siphon money from public schools, blow billion-dollar holes in state budgets, and cause significant declines in student achievement. Vouchers mostly go to parents whose children are already in private schools—providing a taxpayer-funded handout to the well-to-do. Since Arizona began its statewide voucher program in 2022, the promised price tag for taxpayers quintupled. In Wisconsin, 41 percent of voucher schools failed. In Louisiana and Ohio, the hit to student achievement for students in voucher schools has been almost twice the loss caused by the pandemic.

These schools can choose which students to accept; are free to discriminate against students on the basis of disability, learning styles, or identity; and lack the basic student and family services that public schools are required to provide. The choice for many rural families without a nearby private alternative would boil down to homeschooling or Zoom schools run by for-profit companies.

Project 2025 goes further. It urges the government to police local curricula, ban books, and censor teachers. It would abolish the federal Department of Education, zeroing out support for poor children and those with the greatest needs. Pulling up the ladder of opportunity would harm millions of kids and hand a victory to our international competitors. If America wants to out-educate, out-innovate, and out-compete our rivals, we need to unleash, not snuff out, kids’ potential.

Public schools are more than physical structures. They are the manifestation of the idea that education is so important for individuals and for society that a free education must be available to all; that all young people should have opportunities to prepare for life, college, careers, and citizenship; that, in a pluralistic society, people with different beliefs and backgrounds must learn to bridge differences; and that, as the Founders believed, an educated citizenry is essential to protect our democracy from demagogues.

The Biden-Harris administration made the largest investment in public schools in America’s history, devoting $130 billion to reopen and strengthen schools—and it is essential that support continues in the next Congress. Harris and Walz—a longtime high school teacher—support free, universal preschool; full funding of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act; increased accountability for charter schools; strategies to reduce gun violence; and training for good, middle-class jobs that do not require a four-year college degree. Gov. Walz made school lunch free in Minnesota because he knows banishing hunger is so much more laudable than banning books.

My union, the AFT, has fought back against vouchers and fought for real solutions to expand community schools and experiential learning, and to secure investments in public education. Instead of defunding and undermining public schools, we’re pushing for new pathways to college and careers, including high-demand jobs in health care, aeronautics, and advanced manufacturing. Our partnership with Micron Technology will help thousands of high school students hone the skills necessary for success in the booming semiconductor industry. A grant from the Commerce Department will equip students in New York, Michigan, and Minnesota with real-life, marketable skills and knowledge to lead directly to fulfilling careers.

This Election Day, we must choose leaders who believe the pathway to success for every child begins in well-funded and supported public schools. The alternative is an attack on democracy and broad-based opportunity that will not be easily reversed. The future of public education in America would have been a good use of at least a few minutes of airtime during the debates—but there’s still time to get it on the agenda.

Randi Weingarten is president of AFT, representing 1.7 million members who work in education, health care, and public services, and is a member of the Democratic National Committee.

The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.