Harming education
Re “Pence breaks tie to confirm DeVos to Education post,” Feb. 8
It is clear to me after the Senate voted 51-50 (with Vice President Mike Pence breaking the tie) to confirm Betsy DeVos as secretary of Education that the Republicans care little about honesty or qualifications; this woman has no idea of what education means in this country.
She is not an educator. She evidently did not know what the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act was, did not know the facts about educational testing and appears to have plagiarized part of her questionnaire.
My government has been disastrously hijacked.
Jan Goldsmith Sherman Oaks
As a retired public school teacher who served urban communities, I’m acutely aware that schools are often a reflection of historic ills in our society.
Charter schools, as they are now, are merely a permutation of “white flight” to the suburbs and offer no systemic solutions. Instead, they represent what is commonly referred to as a “brain drain” from our public schools since they tend to serve students of the most involved parents. Public schools must take all comers.
Until the day comes when charter schools state that they want the most behaviorally and academically challenged students because they’ve devised a proven approach that will turn around such at-risk students, advocates who have diverted tax dollars to charter schools like DeVos should be prevented from assuming leadership roles in public education.
Jeff Siskin
Canyon Country
In the language of the country of my birth, the Netherlands, the name DeVos (originally de Vos) means “the fox.” So now we have a literal application of “the fox guarding the hen house.”
Who knew that a name could be so descriptive of its owner?
Anneke Mendiola
Santa Ana