President delivers on education promises
President Trump made a point during the campaign to highlight the problems low-income families face in accessing a quality education. We cannot hope to get America back on track if we do nothing to improve education for the poorest among us.
The achievement gaps in education result in hundreds of billions of dollars of lost economic potential every year. And these gaps disproportionately harm minority students. More than 40% of African-American male students don’t graduate high school.
But the answer is not simply an increase in funding. One of the Obama administration’s main initiatives was “School Improvement Grants,” which pumped $7 billion into some of our most underserved schools. As the administration was walking out the door, however, it released a report showing that the grants had zero impact in improving test scores, graduation rates or college preparedness.
We cannot rely on throwing money at this problem like administrations past. Instead, we need to enact serious, substantive reforms that go to the source of the problem.
On Tuesday, the president signed an executive order that elevates the initiative on historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), giving them greater access to policymaking in the White House.
The HBCUs were born not out of mere choice but out of necessity, in the face of racism, and in the aftermath of the Civil War. HBCUs remain at the forefront of opening doors that had been unjustly closed.
We must follow their lead and apply that same thinking to our K-12 system because the same reality exists: Too many students live without access to quality schools. These children and teenagers are assigned to failing schools based solely on their ZIP codes. The numbers continue to show that increasing school options has a positive effect on students generally, and an even greater impact on poor and minority students. If we truly want to provide better education to underserved communities, then it must start with giving parents and students school choice.
President Trump has delivered on his promise to support school choice. Together, we can help our nation’s students: those trapped in underperforming schools and those slipping through the cracks.
One of those students was Denisha Merriweather, a guest of the first lady at the president’s address to Congress. As a result of Florida’s Tax Credit Scholarship Program, Denisha became the first in her family to graduate high school, college and, later this May, with a master’s degree in social work. Denisha’s story is but one example of the opportunity we should afford to millions of students across our country.
Kids are 100% of our future. It is imperative that we do everything we can to ensure they each have an equal opportunity to a school where they can learn and thrive. The next generation deserves no less.