all right. i think we are going to go ahead and get started. we are missing aft president randi winegarden. she will be joining us as soon as she gets here. i'm the education reporter at u.s. news. you're at the changing politics of k-12 panel discussion. thank you for being here. ewa wrangled a pretty awesome panelis panelists.

there's nothing really going on in dc right now, right? i am going to leave the bio to you guys. you can look in the program and see it. i will quickly run down the line here. we are lindsay burke. for those of you who are sort of like outside the beltways here jeffreys is the president of democrats for education reform. he is also a civil rights lawyer. next to him is marty west. the republican from tennessee. a quick housekeeping note, that is one of the first panels at ewa. please tweet using so it's fair

game. it's a little warning. we want you to make news. this is also being live streamed on periscope. because we have such big task today we want to provide lots of time for your questions. we are going to forego opening remarks and sort of dive right into this. i wanted to talk a minute to set the scene we are currently in. i'll just ask, six months ago how many of you guys thought we would be in this politics and policy we are in today? raise your hand? no one? really? okay. so the collective we kind of missed the ball on this. i don't think many of us expected to have president trump or maybe we expected a

republican would be in the white house but maybe not this republican. he is certainly doing things a little differently as he has pledged to do. we are transitioning from an administration that really prioritized education right from the get go really with race to the top super charging cool improvement grant, expanding the office for civil rights, pushing for universal k-12, so on and so forth. now we have an administration that so far has a singular agenda and focusing on ruling back the federal government and undoing a lot of these initiatives. his budget propose pal to slash from federal programs and eliminate things like teacher

preparation and after school programs. we will get to all of that. behave an education secretary who has proven controversial so far. the confirmation included a tie breaking vote from mike pence. similarly to trump her main focus has been school choice inclui including private school voucher. we'll dig into that as well. this is happening across the states the law was crafted with

bipartisanship in congress. irt seem to no longer really exist. we'll talk about that as well. despite republicans controlling both chambers of correct me if i'm wrong it's unclear whether any type of education legislation or any legislation, major legislation is going to be able to move given some of the fighting. we will get to that as well. where does this all leave us? a lot to cover. where does it leave teachers unions. most importantly, what should we be paying attention to? i will dive right into it. be thinking of questions. we'll save 20 minutes at the end for all of you guys. i want to start off and talk about school choice at the top

of everyone's agenda these days. linds lindsay, education savings accounts, tax credit scholarships. some people in this room though i feel like might be interested or might not be expecting the fact that you don't really want the trump administration going there. if you could maybe talk a little bit from that and where you come from there and give us a little idea of what states are doing interesting things and what we should be paying attention to. >> on the school choice front you totally nailed it. i have been a huge proponent of school choice. it really is -- our perspective is all of the pof on above on i.

whether it is tuition, tax credit scholarships. you mentioned education savings accounts which i think is where the education choice movement is going right now. we really see sort of an all of the above approach. any option that enables a parent to select a school that fits well with the needs of their child i think is a good option. >> prefacing this that i spend my waking hours, is it appropriate for the federal government to be engaged in a large scale push? i think it's really key is whether or not it's a new program. >> and i think that we have a fair amount to risk by engaging in a new large scale federal program. states are doing it on their own already. we are seeing state of state year after year adopt new

education choice options every legislative session and then there's just the practical matter that we are all aware of that 90% of all education funding is state and local. practically speaking that's where the dollars are unless you were to do a new program which is what i worry about a little bit. if we are establishing a new program it's hard to reconcile a new program. that is the other perspective that i hold.

i think we'll get into this later by maybe it's a tax credit approach that might be under consideration. we are talk about this but i think in every opportunity to make a decision about what that program looks like the federal government would likely regulate it. what does the impact end up being down to road? what sort of idea do we establish? i think maybe a view isn't worth the hype. >> i want to ask you about the viability of this, whether it is politically possible. we heard president trump pledge $20 billion. we saw in the budget a billion dollars boost for school

districts that promise to allow to follow the student to the school of their choice and $250 million private school voucher prachogram. we don't know how it could be structured. perhaps it is tax credit scholarship. is it even a reality? >> so republicans now control both the house and the senate and i think it lead a lot of people to expect that it would be politically very easy to push a major school choice agenda from washington. her damage is located 73 feet from the senate that works very hard. there is not overwhelming support for efforts to expand

school choice because of concerns for what it means for the federal role. we have seen in the past the house often being reluctant to bring up the vote to follow students to schools of their choice because they don't want to expose to fact downlothat th not support nar. it creates obstacles to advance school choice proposals. you mention add few ideas. they are all small ball ideas. there is this weighted student funding pilot program. it would allow up to 50 districts to apply to use funding systems that basically combine federal state and local

funds and allow them to follow children to the public school they attend. the public school wants to incentivize by taking site l one formula funds and proposal half a billion dollars to that and encouraging state to participate. you know, even that is not necessarily a school choice program. it's really a way to try to model out a way for administering federal aid programs that is more combata e combatable. i just really think that there's an uphill battle facing a lot of these proposals. >> so far we have heard a lot about empowering states to make these decisions on their own and not relying ton federal government to do it for them. it already is a huge them for

this adadministration. you'll see it more and more amid-the backdrop which ships a lot of power look to state and local school districts. i wanted to ask you to talk a little bit about what you have seen in terms of how to stakes are sort of getting higher as some of this shifts back to their realm. what should we be as state reporters be thinking about as some of that turns over to, you you know, their responsibility? >> yes. i think it should focus on core issues and the core work of

public schools. you know, obviously choice conversation is relevant and significant. i would push people to look at standards and accountability. what are the standards states are going to choose in terms of what they expect of kids? are those standards aligned with ensuring kids are college and career ready when they graduate from high school? are they aligned with ongoing shifts that is changing at a pretty rapid rate. how are school districts doing to hold individual schools to make sure kids are being educated against those standards. what does accountability mechanism look like? we have had a history.

people like me would support and ensure basic equity. kids generally haven't met those standards. whether the child may be a low-income kid. who invasions are schools going to use? if they haven't missing those kids what what have states going to do? if you just say this is a c or d or do something to make sure those young people have an opportunity to fulfill their potential. how will they make sure it has high loi number of qualified teachers in these classrooms?

we do a lot to have more clinical base aid proechs so educators can hit the ground running. how are states going about ensuring they have a strong supply of teachers and school leaders? who are states going to make sure universities in their state are admitting meaningful numbers of pell grant eligible kids? we have many universities -- and i'm talking about kids situated in terms of academic profile. again, i'm talking about kids with the same academic profile. many state universities under significant revenue pressure and so what are states going to do to make sure they are open to

all? we have over 3 million who attend public charter schools. so the conversation is absolutely important. we personally support a choice through the public education system through public charter schools. it is a strong track record of results there. we have the kind of core bread and butter work. we think it's important not to lose track of that because both kids in choice programs to the extent they will have access to college teachers.

>> how much more important is it for us to cover elections sorlt of moving from foe cussing on the federal government as years prior. it's trying to rewrite no child left behind. the tilt-a-whirl shifting towards state and local school districts. what pointers can you give us that we might see coming up, things like that? >> i'll tell you if i'm a reporter i'm thinking what she said is right. there are 400,000 kids in private school choices today. it includes scholarship programs. so 400,000 today but we have

seen several states adopt effectively universal options. so you look at nevada. there are programs currently. it's going through a legal battle right now. they are working out financing. if that all works itself out 473,000 kids in nevada will be eligible for an education savings account this fall. it immediately doubles that number. not all that we'll take it up but eligibility will be for esa. in arizona, arizona just took their savings account universal. there is still a cap on the number of kids who can participate. that's the trend that we are seeing. states adopt primarily and families love them and states move to make them more yuniver l universally available. yes, you can focus on school board elections and mayoral

races and all of that good stuff. we are getting to a tipping point particularly if nevada works itself out, if we see arizona continue to push, if texas gets a school choice program in place i think we'll be at a tipping point where the focus will be on kids who are exercising private school

choice. so choice for military families in desperate need of children who are relegated to schools. make dc on all choice district. there are things the federal government can do that respect federalism and that would do a lot of good far lot of kids. >> so i'll sort of embrace the premise of your question. i would say there's only so much you can learn from the planned

stage. the action will be when it comes to how the plans are implemented and what's done in schools that are done as underperforming. the federal government says nothing except you need to take evidence based actions at this point. so really power is in the hands of states and school districts to make those decisions. we have dozens of states that are in the process in response to obama administration policies of teacher evaluation systems. it will be interesting to see what decisions they make going forward or whether it's a develop alternatives. and the relevant battles over funding are also at the state level. we get worked up about proposed $9 billion in cuts. it's large as a percentage of federal aid. it is only about 10% of total

funding. you know, even a substantial cut really doesn't make that much of a difference in the grand scheme of things. that's where the action is when it comes to funding as well. it will be interesting to see the extent to which they do become nationalized. there was clearly an effort to do that in l.a. recently to sort of attach the reformist school board candidates who were supportive of expansion to charter schools to trump himself. there was an effort to do that in montana. it doesn't seem to me those are gained a lot of traction at this point. that is clearly something that opponents of the policies they have embraced and will try to use. >> let's talk a little bit about the people who are still in congress who have the decision making authority over education

issues. i'm thinking of lamar alexander, virginia fox, maybe luke messer. i would have said a few months ago senator patty murray but it seems like there's been a bit of a fracture that comes along with education issues. where do you guys see them standing on moving education legislation through the pipeline? i'm thinking maybe a career tech ed. there's bipartisan ship around that. what can we expect?

you know, are there folks who don't play who were not -- who were not really considering. there is a push ton part of the administration i this to streamline the tax code to lower rates. you know, does that run into a push far new federal tax credit scholarship which maybe could go in the opposite direction? i say that only to say there will be interesting dynamics that operate outside of the session space when it comes to something like a scholarship program. ata is up for reauthorization. we could see some removement in that direction. the calendar is pretty truncated into the fall. >> do you think there's any alignment from some of those republicans with the agenda of

secretary and trump administration in general? >> i was struck fwi fact that when the president's skinny proposal came out made that point of saying the last time he checked in that the president just proposes. >> a little shot. >> and i think it suggested to me that he was, you know, signaling he wasn't necessarily supportive of everything they were trying to do. you know, my sense is that senator alexander feels if they worked very hard to establish a new consensus on the federal role that that bill set authorization levels for programs that they want to see roughly followed because it was part of the compromised made to generate support for that legislation. even setting aside the fact that there is strong support from the

education establishment for the continuation of those formula funds, i think just the fact that we just did this deal means there's not on tight for moving forward. there may be opportunities to try to carve out something of a consensus. i don't see a set of ideas in that space that people are excited about when it comes to the federal role. i think where you're more likely to see potential for bipartisan ship would be with respect to higher education act where i think there is a set of ideas that are related to simplifying financial aid, that do provide sort of seeds of potential

collaboration. beyond that i don't see much. again, to go back to your original question i don't see an immediate embrace from the key republicans in congress of everything the trump administration has been talking about. >> okay. >> can i jump in one second? >> yeah. >> if our friends in congress were serious about limbing federal intervention. we were skeptical that it went nearly far enough. if it did that we would have seen some reductions in spending. we didn't see that at all. they spent roughly 24 billion. i don't see any real robust reductions and i think it's a 13.6% reduction. i think ed week reported it was the largest single year percentage reduction. that is getting serious at least a good first step of trimming

federal spending and trimming programs is a necessary condition. >> yeah. let's stay on this for a second. maybe you can help us out here. as education reporters, should some of these cuts come to light what should we be looking for? how should we be looking to portray how that is impacting teachers, students, schools. what do you think m so of the first things we'll see if some of those cuts come to life? >> i think reporters should follow the money and track the impact for kids. $10 million that's cut from everything from teacher prep to college aid for young people to after school programs for young people. you know, that's before you get to, you you know, some of the other cuts in this budget in terms of health care access, in terms of access to food security, in terms of access to job training proms. it is going to have an impact on

young people and families and commutes. it will have a clear impact on young people to be prepared for this local economy. i think it's very problematic at a time they are undergoing rapid disruptions folks expect million millions of jobs and we have an administration that thinks it's smart to disinvest ability to access college, thinks it's smart to disinvest how -- so i would encourage them to follow the impact. it will have a very specific and clear impact on children, family and communities. you have debates and i would encourage reporters to follow the facts.

these policy choices that are being made at state capitals have very clear and specific impact on young people. i'm from new jersey. i grew up in a very tough community. we despended on these prams. i spent most of my childhood in the boys and girls club because people were dealing crack in my neighborhood. i didn't know what pel and seog was. i know that's how i was able to pay for college. i wasn't the law kick. a big block of government cheese they would give you. we could use private public partnerships to get better food at some of these programs. my point is it will have a very

specific tanl jigible impact on kids. part of what with concerns me is these conversations can lose sight of the tangible impact it will have on real people. >> sorry. i agree, follow the impact. if we look at that we have sun kids participating. program participants said we would see. we would go on and on. andy wrote about the $7 million waste we have ever seen. we have all of the data, all of the evidence that shows that these programs when they are operated at the federal level aren't working for kids.

it is closer than being operated by those -- >> those are great talking points. i can point to all types of programs. is any program perfect? of course not. are there inefficiencieineffici? of course not. we can point to comparable programs. what you don't do is cut it entirely and eliminate it. you figure out a way to make the investments actually generate t -- i think it's illogical and doesn't make any sense. >> so moving from the money to maybe something a little more

abstract i wanted to get to really quickly before we open up for questions about what you guys see for the future of the to office for civil rights. there has been efforts to curtail some of the obama era initiativ initiatives. it is to examine places it is overreaching and maybe try to pull back a little bit on that. there has ban lot of i think concern about civil rights advocates about the future for the office of civil rights and how it will be monitoring tapd ability to continue to monitor. this could go to anyone. what should we be looking for? >> it is a political football in

the stance that it continues to switch. there won't be an exception to that pattern right now. the obama administration under the obama administration the office of civil rights took a stepped up approach to monitoring and enforcing civil rights protections. what that meant in brak tis, t putting together reours that if there were different that this would ort at risk. so the question question or the

dee thing to be looking for is whether the trump administration recends that guidance. i worry that the policies around discipline have caused districts to be overly cautious. that's an ongoing debate. it's interesting they have not taken the step of doing that given that it is something they can do overnight. >> not only should reporters look at the letters in terms of guidance that ecr provides, we

have already seen some recending. we even saw last week for choi ma'am they have the right to discriminate against ki sz based on exreel orientations. we have seen it there certain populations of rids are wetting ready. so it's really what actions are being taken. we have seen jeff sessions say it will be less committed to civil rights. it's never been good for imfa

immigran immigrants. i mean most of the federal laws that the department of ed is here to enforce. we had states and localities it was unsurprising that certain populations of kids were more likely classified as having a behavioral disability. the school, the prison pipeline is really rooted in discriminatory practices. we saw sort states. it difrply didn't do much at all. they were in underperforming schools. not really the resending of letters. there is no private right of

action. that means you need to feds and the ocr. the whole point is they forced the civil rights. if you have an administration and they put people in charge of departments they don't believe in chl in. if people don't believe in it they aren't going to enforce it. i will not menace words about that bauds i think facts are facts. there will be -- that nonlent pros cut tos. it will impact nar kids and communities. i would phone courage people to

tell these stories. p you can talk about how they are hit by this. because that's my concern, that in many of these conversations we lose sight of the regular people who are struggling already, off saul backgrounds and their toris respect being heard. >> okay there are two microphones here. tell us who you write for so we can give good educated answers for you. [ inaudible question ]

zblo >> thank you. it is a voucher program here in the district. roughly 11 kids or so are in the program today. the program did find after one year of being in the program that kids did worse. a couple of dugss. i is after one year. we have more if -- they are higher than the group. i would look at that 52% ended

up finding their ways to private schools anyways. there was contamination in the control group. we also cell a sort of overall improving over time, which may capture some of the improvemen.: just a few caveats. we now have 11 gold standard random assignment evaluations of school choice programs, vouchers and tax credits that finds statistically significant improvements on academic achievement. as a result of participating in a school choice program. we know that because of the study design, three programs that we have find no effects, as you mentioned three negative effects. the one you just mentioned dcosp and then the other two -- they're relatively new. they're about a year old and both out of louisiana. we could do an entire panel on louisiana. >> actually i'll interrupt you to say tomorrow there's an awesome school choice panel.

so this will be like the meat of it too. >> the last thing i'll say. many of us have argued those two evaluations that found negative impacts out of louisiana. lose runs a uniquely prescriptive regulatory environment. schools that accept a kid on a voucher have to take the state test, not just any old test, but the state test. we know a third of private schools participate. those third were experiencing some significant attrition before they entered the program, which suggests that maybe they were, you know, struggling schools prior to program entry, which could explain the negative effects that we found. so not to talk them away, but some caveats on the three negatives. >> did you have -- >> i'll be brief, a couple points on the d.c. evaluation. i am actually not worried about the fact that some of the control group kids ended up in private schools because the evaluation can take that into account. but most of the control group ended up in charter schools.

and that actually is the comparison that's being made. another interesting thing is that they asked the schools how much time they spend on various subjects. lindsay mentioned there were negative effects on reading achievement. if you look at how much times the school spent on reading it was far higher in the control group in charter than private schools. and so the question then becomes what are the private schools using that other time for? is it to offer additional coverage of other subjects that go untested in the evaluation? so i think we need to be very cautious about rushing to conclusions based on evaluations of choice programs very early on after one year. and we need to look at the bigger picture. >> all right. trish, do you want to -- >> sorry. trisha crane from alabama media group. ia i have a question about special

education. special education like it or not is a federal program. that's just the way it is. what do you say the role, you know, we've batted around more funding for special education, federal government has never stepped up and funded the full 40%. it's very expensive. i know in alabama they've looked at esas as a way to sort of avoid this idea that they have to provide special education. all of these school choice initiatives seem to avoid the issue of providing special education. what -- i'm interested in your take on special education as a federal sort of function. yeah. thanks. >> i think that's critical. i mean, i think -- again ida is a civil rights era laws designed to make sure all kids receive a public education. and, you know, even in the public charter school sector, there's been some struggle to make sure that that right is

vindicated. but there's been a lot of progress where many public charter schools have done a very strong job. some have not. i was involved in a lawsuit for north public schools for ten years where i have a special monitor who had to monitor the way with in which the traditional school district was delivering special ed because there's a lot of issues there. again, you know, what we would say is that any school that has a public dollar has to serve all kids. period. public charter school, any other iteration of school, if you're going to receive a public dollar you have to serve all children. and part of the federal role in partnership with states and school district is to have accountability to make sure that's happening. there's a lot of levers to insure that happens. the worst lever is a lawsuit that means years after kids don't receive what they should receive people step in and intervene. every public school has to wrestle with. as folks talk about these new

providers, that obligation has to be there. i think it's disappointing whether we talked about it earlier in the context of kids who may be lbgtq accessing a public education. some seem to believe a school that receive as public dollar can say we're not going to serve you. perhaps some may say the same thing. we don't have to serve you. we would strongly disagree with that. that would be contrary to what we think public education ought to mean. again, what we would say if you get a public dollar you got to serve every baby that comes through that door. obviously you can have a cap. any individual school can only serve so many kids. but what you can do is pick and choose based upon the identity or a special need who you're going to serve. that's where we would come from on that. >> one point on that, i actually -- the standard that he just articulated any school that receives public dollars should anticipate all kids.

we hold school districts responsible but we don't say each individual campus needs to be prepared to serve every learner. sometimes districts make provision for the students' needs by sending them to a private school. so i think there are real questions about the ability of school choice programs that are not specifically designed for students with disabilities to serve those students well. they need to be designed would funding levels that make it feasible for them to find other alternatives. we need to be fair when we're setting up the standards we hold schools participating in choice programs whether they be private schools or charter schools, too. >> they can't deny admission in the -- >> that's right. >> the kid can come in, you go through the cst process -- >> you're making -- my apologies for my flight being late. you're making the distinction between the -- the underlying

distinction here is an unregulated market that can do anything it wants to do, versus a public obligation. and so, yes, in terms of special ed, think about it, we never got enough money. yet there's still a public obligation and the buck stops with the school district, regardless. and trying to figure out how to do it even if it means taxing its inhabitants more. the so-called choice programs can do whatever they want, kind of like swimming, whichever way they want to swim. i think that long term, and janet and others were telling me what, you know, the discussion was here. long term, the question that is now posed by devos trump administration is, is public education a public good anymore? is it foundational to a democracy? or is it a commodity that can be bought and sold in an unregulated market. and long term, that is the

debate that's going to happen in the next few years. that's the debate that jonah and i tried to address in our op-ed, but that's the debate that's going to happen and special ed is a perfect example. >> as you can imagine we spent a significant portion of this panel early on talking about school choice. and i did want to get your take on a couple things now that you're here. i'm going to steal the floor back if you guys don't mind for a sec. you recently toured a rural public school with secretary devos. i would love to hear whether you had any, you know, insightful take aways from that? you're now apparently -- >> i probably spent more time with her than any reporter in the room collectively. >> i think that's probably fair. >> if you add up every reporter here, i probably spent more time -- >> so we're dying to hear. but have you scheduled the tradeoff, you were going to then tour a school of choice with

secretary devos? has that been scheduled? >> she asked me -- she actually asked me to go to the school she was doing in indiana. but i was already scheduled. i'm in school visits a lot. and i was scheduled in mcdowell county west virginia, so am not going to move a school visit i already had. >> in the future -- >> i gave her a couple more dates, we'll see -- >> to be determined. >> she's -- the ball is in her court. >> do you think that there -- what were you insights from that school visit with her? >> i would have liked for her to come to the school that i was at in mcdowell county, "the wall street journal" -- west virginia. the school visit was fantastic. meaning, it was fantastic because first off, people really tried to give her the benefit of the doubt. and i don't think she heard a

thing that people were saying to her. and that was really -- at the end, she said she was completely inspired by what she had just seen. she kept on saying to people i want to work on this, i want to work on this and then nothing happened. in fact, what happened was the cuts to the budget of things that were really important. so i think people -- if you ask the people today what happened at the visit, they would have been incredibly disappointed that she took nothing from that visit in terms of informing her own itology. the stuff that you saw there, the project based instruction, the early childhood learning, the questions from a round table of parents and teachers of special needs kids, the amount of time, effort, and energy that

this rural district had put into this visit and showing her, wanting to show her what worked and what didn't work in a place that was completely republican dominant. but i do think she just -- she didn't -- if you look at the actions since, it was clear that it had absolutely no bearing on her learning. >> do you have any other questions? we'll stay a couple minutes laets. the next panel doesn't start for a half an hour. putting that out there. anyone else have a question? i have lots of them, i can keep going. [ inaudible question ] >> is that demoralizing to schools, refreshing or something in between? >> i'm not familiar with that one -- >> so in the last two days, the school itself on monday or

tuesday -- what is today? today is wednesday, right? so tuesday. people fought back and were livid. because the -- looking at what the problems are in public education and how to solve them is a legitimate exercise. but calling all of public education a dead end, or actually calling that school can, which as i understand it, we don't represent them has done a whole bunch of other things since that student was there. and not actually trying to figure out before she just branded it, you know, in a demoralizing way is not what the secretary of education should be doing. raising issues, what we're seeing now is that issues that should be legitimately raised are being used as a pretext to

get rid of public education. and it goes back to the original piece i said, which is, is this the great equalizer? knowing full well we have problems that need to be solved. or are we like what the republicans did with healthcare, are we going to make this an unregulated market? so the kids who actually need the most will never get it. and that is the debate in front of america right now. betsy devos is idloloon the sid unregulated markets. >> the kids who aren't getting it now are assigned to schools where their parents live. i don't think anyone is saying abolish public education spending. the public dollars we're

spending, instead of sending them to institutions, separate it. separate the financing of education from the delivery of services. allow those dollars to follow children to whatever option meets their unique learning needs and every kid -- >> if that -- so the two nations that have done that, chile and sweden, have found that to be a terrible exercise and kids have actually been very disserved. in sweden, they're trying to change that system now. because what has happened in sweden is that the scores have gone downhill. not to say that there are things that we have to do to change education. but what devos is doing with the federal dollars is it's not actually saying let's lift up some experiments and provide more funding for it. what she's doing is what she did in michigan. which is taking funding that is absolutely essential like -- i disagree with you is the funding

for 21st century schools in mcdowell county, west virginia, has turned around the school that has 100% poverty. and if you went with me to that school you would change your mind about 21st century schools. the levels of kids' success in math, in english, is remarkable in a place that is devastated by poverty. >> can i just say one more thing. if we're talking about test scores, let's look how our u.s. education system, the public system performs internationally. we're in the middle of the pack. they were hovering where they were for decades. >> if you look at the last results, they will tell you and oecd will tell you if you actually started separating out socio economic issues in the places like massachusetts that have worked on this for several years without having the reform of the moment and actually really focuses on equity, they are at the top of the pack.

>> all right. next question. >> thank you, hi, thanks for doing the panel. i'm with the the wall street journal. i'm curious what your thoughts would be on that interchange last week where the secretary was asked to say when she thought it was appropriate for the federal government to step in, if a school taking vouchers discriminated against a child for sexual orientation or religion or racial background. i thought that interchange was murky, she did say the office of civil rights entitlements still applies. what specifically would you say about the federal's role in preventing discrimination with a voucher school? >> so we do have civil rights g laws in place, right? beyond that, i think the great thing about school choice, right. schools can be clear up front about their priorities, beliefs, expectations, what they teach

and parents have the option to choose those schools. i think we have to respect freedom. we have to respect freedom of belief, freedom of religion. that goes across the board. and that means the freedom for private religious organizations to operate according to their values and beliefs and that goes for private schools as well. federal civil rights laws in place, but, you know, i think beyond that we have to respect the freedom for schools of religious organizations to operate to their value and beliefs. >> could you be more specific. what about a racial discrimination in a voucher school? >> that's happened, federal civil rights law. >> some people, religious beliefs they believe black people were cursed by ham, it's true. so just as some read, they believe that gay and lesbian is -- cursed in the old

testament and their problematic. if that's their religious practice maybe they can discriminate, too. i think sometimes some of these conversations get to extremes. there's a big middle ground, a strong bipartisan consensus between some of the things you talked about. you can have choice and accountability. that's really what the public charter framework is about. part of the reason that so many young people got left behind because the middle school already has a choice. in new jersey where i am from the middle class has moved out looking for better school systems for their kids. they exercised choice. what was left behind were low income, african-american and latinos by and large, who were in school systems that unfortunately for many decades were not operating at a high level. that does not mean you need to have unregulated markets where private actors can discriminate where they're not going to serve kids based on their sexual orientation.

that's what president obama and some on the senate right as well, have aligned around for many decades. what i want to emphasize that's the space where i think one there's amazing results in terms of that working for kids. you have the accountability built in, equity built in, you have transparency built in. provide some amount of choice to poor people. i for one would oppose choice for poor people. as long as they can move out and go where they want to go, and pursue choice, we can't then go to the low income people say you're going to be trapped based on your zip code that we wouldn't allow our children to spend one day in. that's very different from what we now see from devos. right. what we see from the trump administration. they are perverting that. right, they are undermining that bipartisan consensus. and on top of that, not even investing significantly either. it's the worst of all worlds. what i really emphasize is that

kind of tradition, it's a part of the public education system, not an attempt to dismantle it. it's a space where everybody have supported it. that's where we can get a lot of things done. that will be great for kids. >> we'll have to leave it there. >> can i ask -- just to be totally clear you would say it's okay for a school that take as voucher to discriminate. >> my opinions aside, reasonable people can disagree about some of these sensitive issues. and i think marriage is a sensitive issue. at the end of the day, you know, we have federal civil rights laws in place, and yeah. >> we are past our time. i'm sorry. thank you, guys all for coming. i really appreciate it. if you didn't sign in, if you could sign in on the sign in sheet that would be very helpful for us. thanks. [ applause ]

the education conference taking a brief break. when they return, a look at changes in judging school quality and academic progress. during this break, we'll show you a portion from last week's congressional hearing on the administration's proposed education budget. the education secretary betsy devos answered questions from a house subcommittee. thank you, mr. chairman and welcome secretary devos. i want to go back to topic that was raised by the ranking member which is how your department treats title i. i was disappoind