Jeb Bush wants to talk about education
Why your emphasis on education?
There is now increasing, irrefutable evidence linking our country’s prosperity to education outcomes. We’ve lost our leadership in education, and now we’re one of the least socially mobile countries in the world. You can directly link it to a variety of factors, but the solution has to include transformational education reform.I’ve believed that for a long while. Combine that with being governor, where we got a chance to implement pretty meaningful broad-based education reform and, seeing the results, it kind of cements my passion for this. [The foundation] started more to defend the reforms we had in place, but it’s gone way beyond that.
What grade would you give President Obama on education?
A passing grade. Which is better than I’d give him on economic policy or budget policy. He has a heart for kids. And he has Arne Duncan, and I think Arne deserves praise.
Blowback
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Good, he knows what he’s talking about. I’d have liked him as Education Secretary in a Romney white house.
vegconservative on December 8, 2012 at 4:22 PM
Jeb obviously hasn’t read the new core curriculum that Duncan is requiring states follow in exchange for federal dollars.
Literature such as To Kill a Mockingbird cut and “informational reading” increased, such informational reading like a New Yorker essay on the wonders of Obamacare.
Wethal on December 8, 2012 at 4:28 PM
I expect we’ll hear a lot from Jeb in the future, because the Bushies want to get back in power, and the Dems (and MSM) would just love to run against a Bush in 2016.
Wethal on December 8, 2012 at 4:31 PM
SO you are in the pocket of the teachers union thugs too jeb? You can fling trillions to help kids and education, but the libs teaching the kids will make them as stupid as the teachers are and under the same lib thinking? I SHOULD add, NOT all teachers fit what I said, but a vast majority do? I am sick of helping spend this money for the kids when the parents can’t get vouchers to send their kids to GOOD schools to help them! Guess why, the teacher’s unions, thats why!
L
letget on December 8, 2012 at 4:35 PM
Education, Mr Bush, is NOT the responsibility of the federal government. You are every bit the statist as Obama if you believe it is.
Charlemagne on December 8, 2012 at 4:37 PM
Talk about it after you go get some yourself, Bushie.
Or for that matter look at our national test results, see how badly foreign students are kicking our fannies, and take hints from them.
MelonCollie on December 8, 2012 at 4:39 PM
Spot on.
I’m convinced that if you polled every parent in America and asked them who was responsible for educating their children, a majority would answer “the government.”
Such is the sad state of subtle dependency — aside from the very overt kind — that has crept into the American mindset and corrupted its original values and virtues …
ShainS on December 8, 2012 at 4:43 PM
Ummm.. Seriously, you aren’t going to become President so please go and enjoy your retirement.
Illinidiva on December 8, 2012 at 4:46 PM
Question, aren’t foreign students getting their education from the government too?
thebrokenrattle on December 8, 2012 at 4:49 PM
Not in the same fashion. If we even did as little as tell parents “this is how much money we spend on your progeny each year, you get to choose what school to spend it at”, there would be MASSIVE improvements.
Hundreds of thousands of parents (if not more due to the Obama recession) simply do not have any choice but to send their children to the ‘free’ public skrewl system.
A painfully accurate depiction of our system was a political cartoon (I think by Ramirez) of a young black lady asking why she couldn’t go to private school like Chelsea Clinton, and her mother was telling her that she didn’t have a choice because they couldn’t afford it. In the background was a run-down wreck of a ‘school’ with all sorts of horrible things going on. What’s truly d@mning is that this is true every day of the week all across the nation.
MelonCollie on December 8, 2012 at 4:56 PM
You lost me right there, chump.
Knock off the federal intrusion in education already unless it is to promote voucher systems in states and localities.
onlineanalyst on December 8, 2012 at 5:01 PM
The federal government has ZERO place in education and there should not be a DoE.
Education is a local issue, even more than a state issue.
Given the Fed boys record with Education for oh, the last 30 years…I think it’s time to let them ALL go. Return the money to the states and let the entire DoE join the ranks of the FunEmployed.
Bill Bennett is about the only pseudo conservative on the planet who thinks the DoE is worth keeping, and that’s not surprising as it was the only way on earth he’d ever get a Cabinet job.
CorporatePiggy on December 8, 2012 at 5:07 PM
But no one wants to listen to Jeb Bush talk about education.
RoadRunner on December 8, 2012 at 5:13 PM
Suggest eliminating the DoE to a Leftist and they think you are literally advocating for the elimination of schools in America. They think that without the DoE, public education would cease to exist. They think you are “anti-education.”
How is it possible to have a reasonable, rational discussion with people (Lefties) that are so off-base and so detached from reality and history?
visions on December 8, 2012 at 5:17 PM
Just more proof that Jeb Bush is ill-suited to the presidency.
Pork-Chop on December 8, 2012 at 5:25 PM
No doubt.
Here 75% of our property taxes go directly to our school district. And even though property tax is high, most people seem at peace with that and our school district is well above the average if not world-beating. People have financial and social ‘skin in the game’ to borrow Barky’s slogan – they have zero interest in the DoE and very little in what Austin has to say.
People are very pro-education but they know this, like law enforcement, is a fundamentally local issue.
CorporatePiggy on December 8, 2012 at 5:27 PM
The DoE was Carter’s gift to the teachers’unions, which had not endorsed a candidate until 1976. Before that, it was just HEW. Now it’s DoE and HHS.
Wethal on December 8, 2012 at 5:30 PM