Education Week - April 17, 2019 - 15

DeVos Mends Fences With Chiefs, Faces Critics in Congress
Lawmakers, chiefs
hear ed. secretary

shot back that the memo clearly
contradicted DeVos' official position about her authority on this
issue.
"You have the ability to make a
decision. Your silence is a decision,"
Hayes told DeVos.

By Andrew Ujifusa
Washington

Shift in Tone
When DeVos last appeared before the state chiefs in 2018, her
remarks triggered something of a
backlash among the officials she
addressed. In that speech, she criticized states for not taking advantage of the freedom allowed to them
in their ESSA plans. DeVos said
at the time that she was taking a
"tough love" approach with states,
but some chiefs bristled, saying that
they were indeed taking innovative
approaches to helping students.
One year on, however, DeVos
struck a gentler tone during a discussion at the CCSSO's annual
legislative gathering. She again encouraged states to use ESSA's flexibility, and also counseled that they
be more proactive in changing their
teacher workforce if the need arose
to ensure more talented educators
enter the profession. At the same

'Gotcha Hearing'

Eric Kruszewski for Education Week

After weathering a political
storm over the Trump administration's proposed budget at the end of
March, U.S. Secretary of Education
Betsy DeVos continued her run of
public appearances into April, and
got widely varied reactions from
state education leaders and from
lawmakers on Capitol Hill on issues ranging from arming teachers
to testing.
In a discussion at a Council of
Chief School Officers meeting,
DeVos told states she'd look favorably on changes they might want
to propose to their Every Student
Succeeds Act plans-but only up to
a point.
Two days later, before a House
education committee hearing,
DeVos defended President Donald
Trump's pitch to create $5 billion
in annual tax credits to support
school choice and other forms of
educational choice. But in a confrontational move, committee
Democrats took the opportunity to
reveal a 2018 Education Department memo that they said contradicts her claims that it's up to
states to decide whether they can
use certain federal grants to purchase guns and train teachers in
the use of firearms.
And the day after that contentious House hearing, the secretary
again pressed for the scholarships
at an event here hosted by the Ronald Reagan Institute.
In each of those appearances,
DeVos stressed she is trying to help
students and teachers who she said
are ill-served by traditional education practices and systems. DeVos
also appeared to have survived
another round of shakeups within
Trump's cabinet-as of the end of
last week, DeVos had outlasted 10
other original members of Trump's
cabinet who, like her, required Senate confirmation.

time, she said the teaching profession has taken a "bad beating" in
recent years.
Her shift in attitude wasn't a
complete reversal, however. On the
subject of states' desire to call an
audible on their ESSA plans, DeVos
said her tolerance for alterations to
them were limited. (DeVos has approved plans from all 50 states and
the District of Columbia.)
"Anything that is going to ultimately result in greater student
achievement is going to be seen
very favorably by the Department
of Education," DeVos told the chiefs.
"On the other end of the spectrum,
if it's a request to obfuscate or put
off something that you should be
doing today for students, that will
not be as well-received."
Pennsylvania Secretary of Education Pedro Rivera noted the shift
in DeVos' comments compared to
what he had heard out of last year's
meeting, stating, "It was a good dialogue. It was a very good dialogue."

Tense Hearing
Two days later, DeVos herself
was not particularly well-received
by House Democrats, who took
control of the chamber at the start
of the new Congress in January.
Newly empowered Democrats took
DeVos to task over the Trump
administration's proposals to cut
$7.1 billion from the department's
budget by slashing programs for
literacy, teacher professional development, and more.
Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., the committee chairman, listed the importance of providing students equitable opportunities and lamented,
"Unfortunately under the president's fiscal 2020 budget, it would
be nearly impossible to meet that
challenge." (Congress is likely to
reject many of the key elements
of the budget Trump and DeVos
proposed.) And Rep. Marcia Fudge,
D-Ohio, labeled the $5 billion taxcredits proposal a "ridiculous" idea
that would ultimately benefit the
wealthy, just like the 2017 federal

tax cuts Trump signed into law.
But Rep. Jahana Hayes, D-Conn.,
a first-term Democrat and the 2016
National Teacher of the Year, created perhaps the biggest stir.
At issue was a controversy from
last year over whether DeVos
would allow certain money under
ESSA to be used to arm teachers;
the money in question is grant
aid under Title IV, which was created to support student well-being,
school safety, and academic enrichment. DeVos eventually said she
would not take a position either
way, and that the decision rested
with states as to whether the
money could be used that way.
But Hayes produced a 2018 internal Education Department memo
stating in part that, "It is ... reasonable for the Secretary to disallow this
particular use of the funds absent
specific Congressional authorization."
When DeVos maintained states'
prerogatives on this issue, Hayes

U.S. Secretary of Education
Betsy DeVos speaks at the
Council of Chief State School
Officers conference in
Washington, in a week in
which she also was grilled by
Democrats on Capitol Hill.

With the encouragement of several committee Republicans, DeVos
was eager instead to focus on the
Freedom Scholarships proposal
and how they would expand opportunities for dual-enrollment
courses and career and technical
education, among other things.
When highlighting how the
scholarships could open the door to
more apprenticeships, for example,
DeVos said, "There is no one-sizefits-all approach. But we need to,
from this level, make sure that the
impediments that are there are
broken down to the greatest extent
possible."
More broadly, the top Republican
on the committee, Rep. Virginia
Foxx, R-N.C., complained that
Democrats had not called DeVos
before the committee in good faith.
Instead of discussing the best ways
of helping students with DeVos,
she said Democrats had acted arrogantly towards the secretary.
"This is a gotcha hearing," Foxx
stated.
The next day, at an event hosted by
the Ronald Reagan Institute, DeVos
talked up the scholarships again
alongside Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas,
who has introduced a bill to create
the scholarships, which would be administered by the Department of the
Treasury.
"Education Freedom Scholarships ... will ultimately mean a
better education for more kids,"
DeVos told the audience. "Think
very broadly about what it would
mean for kids in every state to
find the right fit for them and
their future."

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