ICYMI – Laura LoGerfo, Kymyona Burke, Carol Jago and I talked NAEP on a LinkedIn Live earlier this week. I took a look at how the new federal education tax credits are playing in Virginia. Next Friday Ed Week and HMH hosting a discussion about teaching and learning in the AI-era. Jack Lynch will moderate … Continue reading "America Reads? A Simple Proposal For Democrats. Plus Parker Baxter On Why Denver Matters."
ICYMI – Laura LoGerfo, Kymyona Burke, Carol Jago and I talked NAEP on a LinkedIn Live earlier this week. I took a look at how the new federal education tax credits are playing in Virginia.
Next Friday Ed Week and HMH hosting a discussion about teaching and learning in the AI-era. Jack Lynch will moderate a conversation with Jean-Claude Brizard, Francie Alexander, and me.
New WonkyFolk. Jed and I talk with Colorado’s Parker Baxter who has evaluated reforms in Denver for a while. Denver is a weird mix of substantial gains and then also a surprising amount of indifference – not only from critics but from within the reform community.
You can listen on Spotify or on Apple, or wherever you get podcasts.
Let’s Read.
If you’re reading this, I suspect I don’t have to tell you about the importance of literacy to life success. As I noted in a pre-pandemic column for The 74,
But if we’re being honest, we’ve gotten reading wrong for a long time, in a lot of different ways. The Science of Reading isn’t all new; in some cases, it’s half-century-old research that struggled to gain traction in an education sector dominated by romantic ideas and adult politics. For a while, we coded reading instruction methods as Republican or Democratic. We still debate how much content and knowledge matter—even though they matter a lot to literacy. (James Traub’s new book is important on this point, as well as more generally.)
Politically, right now, Democrats have a predicate problem. You often have to embrace the predicate of an argument to drive a point home politically. For instance:
Yes, crime and disorder are a problem, but sending the National Guard into American cities is not the way to solve it.
Yes, immigration at the southern border was too unchecked, but what ICE is doing now violates our laws and customs and is profoundly un-American.
Yes, sports and safe private spaces for women are special cases, but transgender people in the United States should be able to live free from discrimination and harassment.
Yes, parents should have choices about where they send their kids to school, but we also need real accountability for all schools receiving public money.
The problem is obvious. The italicized parts of those statements are party-splitters for Democrats right now. They get you labeled racist, xenophobic, transphobic, or—in our part of the world—a “privatizer,” which for education activists might even be worse than any of the other labels.
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But here’s one that is not a party-splitter:
We need to make sure reading is taught according to the best available evidence and do far more to support teachers and schools in helping students become effective readers.
No italics.
In fact, the part of that statement that is a party-splitter is the part about resources. And it doesn’t split the Dems; it splits the Rs.
Democrats have more or less handed the reading issue to Republicans. The party killed George Bush’s billion-dollar reading program—which was Science of Reading—in a fit of political pique. And then, unless you believe that proximity to the Gulf of Mexico is linked to reading achievement, Democrats largely stood idly by as a set of Republican governors got serious about evidence-based instruction, high-quality materials, and support for teachers. Jared Polis (CO) has a good education story to tell. Gretchen Whitmer (MI) does too, to some extent, though she seems disinclined to run. Wes Moore brought the state chief who led Mississippi’s reading gains to Maryland, but he’s hamstrung by a budget mess. But most Democratic governors had better hope attention is focused elsewhere. Most Republicans, too—though some can lay claim to impressive work around reading and instructional materials, or at least hop into that slipstream.
Enter Rahm Emanuel. The former Democratic congressman, mayor, and White House chief of staff is out there, loudly talking about reading. And why not? The issue is sitting in plain sight. The Democratic play is obvious. And the lane is open.
By setting an ambitious goal on reading achievement, Democrats can get on the right side of the outcomes and achievement debate. Every kid should be reading early. We should support adolescent literacy for students who are still struggling, especially post-pandemic. We should pay more attention to reading and students with disabilities. It’s a big idea, it’s attainable, and it resonates—especially with parents of kids with special needs, boys, struggling readers, and parents more generally. And by getting on the right side of the resources argument—we need to support schools and teachers in doing this—Democrats can differentiate. Bonus: It doesn’t make you sound weird to the average parent and create a negative frame in the way that championing things like “equity grading” or deemphasizing math does.
I’m not suggesting this is the only issue Democrats should run on in 2028. Trump is handing Democrats big openings on civil liberties, foreign policy, and—of course—prices and affordability. Nor am I suggesting a national election will turn on education. That’s unlikely. But as we’ve discussed before, education issues can help frame a candidate’s larger case: Bill Clinton and charters as a “New” Democrat; George Bush and compassionate conservatism, signaling he wasn’t Newt Gingrich; Obama and education reform. Or, conversely, the devastating effect of the “they’re for they/them, and I’m for you” line of attack.
Set a bold goal for national literacy and then get to work. The politics and the policy line up. Bill Clinton once noted that if you do good policy, good politics will follow. It’s advice that still applies, even in these upside-down political times.
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