Technically, the Race to the Top fund has dried up and nation-wide competition has ended. Ideologically, however, Race to the Top’s roots run deep. Competition and a marketized vision for education inform President Trump’s campaign promises and Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos’ legislative goals. Trump and DeVos focus more explicitly on expanding the private sector through their concern and support for vouchers, while Duncan and Obama took a less obvious approach by supporting corporatization and privatization through with Race to the Top (RTTT). Race to the Top, while no longer functioning, has served as a platform for the Trump administration’s goals to dismantle public education and incentivize states and their school districts to adopt voucher programs.
Before getting into where Race to the Top is now under Trump and DeVos, it is important understand the context and ideologies that gave rise to Race to the Top under the Obama administration. In 2009, Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). This act was predicted to stimulate the economy, create thousands of jobs and divert attention to political sectors that needed the most attention post-Recession. Part of ARRA’s responsibility was to provide $4.35 billion for Race to the Top which was designed to “…encourage and reward States that are creating the conditions for education innovation and reform…” (“Race to the Top Executive Summary”, 1). Improved student testing outcomes, increased high school graduation rates, and ensuring student preparation for college/careers were all used as measurements of that innovation. These outcomes would be dictated by the principles of competition in the global economy, systematic data production to measure success and recruiting and rewarding effective teachers (“Race to the Top Executive Summary”, 2). All of this, was in hopes of improving the lowest-achieving schools in the country by pushing them to reshape their curricula and measures of success.
With the help of Arne Duncan, Obama was able to re-define schools “…within a market-based and penal model of pedagogy…” without being as punitive as No Child Left Behind; thus, being able to maintain his image as an equalizer (Giroux, 138). Race to the Top was not able to achieve much. Very few states were able to receive funding as the application process was confusing, demanding and too early in the school year to be fully completed in time (Bakeman, Web.). Race to the Top pressured forty-eight states to restructure evaluative methods and curricula without ever providing a majority of those states the funding needed to carry out the restructuring leaving the districts with holes in their infrastructure and their budget.
Betsy DeVos
Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, is at the helm of the school choice movement which has taken center stage for this administration, building on Race to the Top’s ideologies. DeVos’ home base is in Grand Rapids, Michigan where, before becoming Secretary, she worked as a philanthropist and major political donor directing her money at supporting school choice programs (“The Day Michigan Killed Public Schools”). DeVos played a large part in Michigan’s charter school law that passed in the early 1990s. The “Wolverine State Charter School Law” effectively lifted Michigan’s charter school cap and executed huge property tax cuts on which public schools rely. Essentially Michigan, with one law, defunded public schools. Fast forward, her major White House initiatives revolve around similar issues that she addressed with her philanthropy, those of school choice and de-regulation. Her choice agenda’s end goal is to fill the market with hundreds of options for parents/students/families through charters and vouchers (“What Has Betsy DeVos Actually Done…”). Betsy DeVos has been critiqued for her lack of experience in public education. Neither her nor her children ever attended public school. DeVos has never worked or taught in a school, public or private. Trump’s decision to pick someone so outside of the realm education gives his administration the room and reason to completely remodel or dismantle the educational system, fueled by DeVos’ business experience.
Trump’s Race to the Top for Vouchers
During his campaign, President Trump boasted that he would create a budget of $1.4 million ($20 million annually) for states that were willing to apply voucher models and integrate them into their education system. Sound familiar? This mirrors Race to the Top’s allocation for states that would cooperate by shifting their curricula and districts to be more high stakes testing and accountability based. Those who oppose Trump’s plan say that it “…would drain funds from public schools by cutting existing education programs by 16% to reduce the department’s overall budget while absorbing the new program…” (“Education: Trump Wants More Money for Vouchers…”, Web.). Of the $1.4 billion, $250 million will go to private schools, $168 million will go to new charters. The budget cuts to support these allocations will be taken out of federal school-aid programs (ex/ before and after school programs).
One of the most troubling parts of this $20 million yearly voucher program is that it necessitates the total dismantling of the current biggest existing system of federal support for public schools. Title I is a larger part of this system that Trump and DeVos plan to restructure. Title I comes from the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) passed in 1965 by President Lyndon B. Johnson. This act committed federal funding and attention to public elementary and secondary education. While Title I is rife with accountability and high stakes testing rhetoric it, nonetheless, explicitly states that federal money should be allocated to the public education. Trump and DeVos’ are working towards redefining public, framing the right to choose to divest from public schools as a citizen’s right and a public right. This twisted rhetoric and plan will lead to a voucher plan that would send the tax payer money contributing to Title I to private schools, taking away the Title I grants that “go to states and districts to pass on to schools based on the proportion of disadvantaged students those schools enroll…” (“Donald Trump's Huge, Ambitious School Voucher Plan”).
With Trump’s plan Title I grants will “follow the child” and be portable. More formally known as Title I Portability and less so ,the “backpack full of cash” method, the federal money that is allotted to each child will be moveable through vouchers when families/parents choose to take their student and federal money out of their current public school and invest in a private/religious school (Ravitch, 5). Title I money “is meant to help schools that face the challenge of education a lot of poor students; making it portable means some federal money would also go to schools that are generally wealthy but enroll a handful of kids from poor families” (“Donald Trump's Huge, Ambitious School Voucher Plan”). Additionally, this completely dismantles the communal and public intentions of Title I grants which rely on the fact that not every student will use or need their whole allocation thus making the money more liquid and applicable to students who need more institutional and financial support (ex/ students who need free-and-reduced lunch or students in special education classes). Title I Portability individualizes education, banking on an investment model that emphasizes school and student autonomy free from the reigns of the federal government and red tape.
While Race to the Top and Title I Portability seem very different in action they both rely on giving states power over federal money and are buttressed by marketized views of education. Both policies support the creation of new charters in the name of alternative schooling options and the proliferation of vouchers to exercise choice and divest from the public sphere. Currently, Trump and DeVos have stalled in deploying their educational platform. DeVos was elected with a 50-51 vote in Congress with Mike Pence breaking the tie, starting her off with very skeptical and polarized congressional support. Because of her controversiality, DeVos is struggling to pass legislation and work the bully pulpit. While things have been slow to start, it is important that liberals/progressives/democrats not celebrate this stagnancy. As we see everyday, Trump and his administration release legislation and policy (tax scam!) that drastically tamper with public goods, wellbeing, education and welfare. We must take this administration seriously as its decisions and ideological viewpoints have serious, tangible consequences for millions of people.