is coming. host: finishing off this program. and the route of calls. we appreciate all of you who participated. another round of washington journal comes at 7:00 tomorrow morning. ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2022] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2022] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪ >> here is coming up on c-span, live at 2:00 p.m. eastern, the white house monkeypox response team will provide updates on the disease and efforts to prevent further infections. live at 3:15, president biden will be in pennsylvania where he will deliver remarks on his plan for reducing gun violence.

and then live at 4:00 p.m., dr. rochelle walensky talks about the agency's role in preparing for the next pandemic. you can also watch on our free mobile video app, c-span now. ♪ host: it is the "washington journal" for august 30, that time of year when many kids are back in school, and some schools are facing teacher shortages while others are dealing with how the pandemic impacted educational quality. a recent poll looked at the overall quality of schools. we will show you that. also, we will ask what grade you would give your public schools. you can use the abcdf method or another great if you want. (202) 748-8000 for eastern and central time zones. (202) 748-8001 for mountain and pacific time zones.

for educators and parents, (202) 748-8002. if you want to text your thoughts on the grade you would give your public school, you can do so at (202) 748-8003. you can post on facebook and on twitter. you can also follow the show on instagram. a professional organization, five delta kappa, took a poll and just over 1000 responded to talk about the quality of schools and the grade they would give. you can find the pull at their website, pdkpoll.org. when it comes to views of overall schools, overall ratings, 54% would give their schools an "a" or a b, compared to 45%, which would rate them a c, d, or a fail. then the aston overall trust in

community school teachers, 56 percent saying they have a great deal or good amount of confidence in those teachers, with 37% saying just some or a little bit of confidence. the final question they asked, would you like a child of yours to become a public school teacher in your community, and only 37 percent saying yes and 62% saying no, they would not. that is just one view of public schools. that is from pdk. gallup took recent polling of confidence in public schools. they did it by a lot of metrics but broken down by political party. when they did this poll, only 43% of democrats saying, when asked about confidence in public schools, 43% saying they had a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in public schools. 29% of independents responding to that, and only 14% of

republicans responding as far as overall confidence in the public school system. overall, they asked adults about the confidence in public schools, great deal, quite a lot, or some, very little. only 28% of the respondents saying they had a great deal of confidence in public schools. you can give your public school system where you live a grade. you can use letters or other metrics. eastern and central time zones, call (202) 748-8000. if you live in the mountain and pacific time zones, (202) 748-8001. perhaps you are an educator or parent and you want to give your perspective on your public school system and the confidence and quality you see in it, (202) 748-8002. and you can text us at (202) 748-8003. recently on this program, the national educators association

president, just last week on the show, talking about one of the concerns many school systems are experiencing as school starts up again, the topic of teacher shortages and how those schools are dealing with it. this is from last week. [video clip] guest: this is accomplished problem, and we know there is not just one answer to it. but we do know that when educators talk to me about respect, they mean a couple of things. respecting them as professionals, so giving them professional pay. all over the country, teachers know if they are going to be able to do the jobs they love, they have to be able to take care of their own families without taking two or three or four jobs so we have to address that systemically and long-term. we also have to address the reality that so many of our students are coming to school with mental health issues.

that got worse during the pandemic. we do not have the counselors or mental health professionals to address the issues. and we know our parents need help, too, so they can give the support to students. so we are working with parents and communities to make sure we have those things for our students. those are the kinds of things we're focused on, and we know that when we advocate forever for those supports for our schools, educators, and our families, then we do not see those shortages grow to the dangerous levels we are seeing in some communities. [and of video clip] host: that full interview happened last week, and you can see her thoughts on teacher shortages and other issues involving public schools. you can maybe factor that in as a give your public school a grade. carmel, new york, talking about

the grading of public schools. go ahead. caller: good morning. i would give my school an f. that sounds really harsh. my teachers make over $100,000 a year. we have high property taxes. [inaudible] in the high school to students, and recently i filled a day form that showed boy, girl, or non-binary. i understand during covid lots of kids were depressed. teachers have also lost jobs. a lot were afraid of covid and there were a lot of restrictions on teachers. so many teachers wanted to go to school and teach but were not able to. a lot of my friends are now

homeschooled because of these crazy situations. i feel that instead of giving in to the mental health and making it seem like it is normal, kids do need a lot more counseling in schools. there is counseling at schools. but some students fill other students will look at them as they are abnormal. maybe they need to be more discreet about these students. one of my own sons was a really depressed student that always got 95 and above during covid and totally said i give up, 20, 30% grades. i struggled with that. one teacher in his elementary school actually knew he was struggling and stepped in and decided to talk my son into

being more confident and getting out of depression. but i think right now, it is a lot of things teachers do not want to do in school also, like teach kids there is more than one gender. there is a lot of problems. host: you made your point there. carmella in new york. greg in maryland is up next. caller: good morning. this is a lovely question. it is terribly open-ended. specifically, my school district, i would give it, like you, a b. i would not give it an excellent. the reason why -- this is what i wanted to talk about -- school means a lot of different things to a lot of different working parents' lifestyles. an school is tossed around, like it is always educational, but in

my experience, more often than not in lower income classes, and i went to mixed schools with low income and high income, but in the low income, there would be a lot more of a tendency towards the school being a daycare and a holding area, as opposed to what was going on next-door in my classroom, which was french immersion and everybody was on a totally different wavelength. like, you go to school and you get grades. the fact is that schools in america are doing like what the police do, they end up doing a whole bunch of different things. host: ok. caller: they end up doing a whole bunch of different things. the reality in america, they are more or less daycare systems for the working corps, which does not help the problem and general as far as breaking the cycle.

black-and-white, what needs to happen, america needs to find out about how great other schools are in other countries. and then instead of spending all this money on foreign wars that do absolutely nothing, let's spend trillions and trillions -- i mean let's spend several trillion dollars reimagining public schools. in my opinion, the schools should be accounting for two thirds of the budget in poor urban areas. so schools should be more than just education, they should be like kitchens teaching children how to make simple things like bread from around the world, like that could be taught in every school and then children would know how to make bread, would be able to order school and make bread for their family. host: got you. this is derek off of twitter saying when it comes to a grade, he puts an a= in there, left out

that she puts an a+ in there, love how they handled the pandemic and parents. this one says it is the hardest job for educators the way public funding is being diverted and challenges grow daily. another fear just adding the letter f when it comes to how they would rate their school as far as quality. you use a lot of different metrics when you rate your school. some of you heard from the previous two callers looking at various aspects. henry in california, you are next. caller: yes, i am very concerned about public schools. first off is that public schools is where the public pays for the school. now, we're siphoning money off

from public schools to charter schools, with the supreme court ruling or you can go to a private school, that money is gived to public education. my money should not be going to a charter school or private school. basically, that is what i wanted to say. host: as far as -- how would you seek schools specifically where you are in california? caller: i think the school system in california is good. host: so you are only concerned about the money that goes to school choice programs and the like? caller: well, the money -- my money that i save for the school system should go to public school, not charter schools, not private school. it is public money, not those money.

host: we had a school choice advocate on the program last week, as well, and he talked about schools from that's perspective, the debate over schools, particularly how they were impacted by covid in the united states. here is more from last week. [video clip] guest: for the first time ever in history, every parent in this country was intently focused on their kids' education all at the same time. and they had to make decisions all at the same time about their kids' education, whether or not they were going to participate in emergency remote learning, whether or not they could participate in emergency remote learning if they had several kids in the household but only one computer or maybe did not have internet access. they also got to see exactly what their kids were learning in the classrooms. so we had this incredibly heightened level of awareness about what was going on in schools and about education that every family has thought about at the same time. so education now is one of the

most discussed topics in our popular culture, and the culture right now. number two, we saw parents who were forced to make decisions, real-life decisions, during covid, saying that they want more options. they want to never be in a position where they felt stuck again. i mean stuck, based on getting their child to a school but having polluted -- having covid policies. some parents were upset about having to put masks on their kids. other parents were upset that they do not think schools were doing enough to mitigate covid. parents were all intently focused on education during the pandemic. also, there has been a ton of learning loss as a result of the pandemic that needs to be addressed. this learning loss has really hit black and hispanic students the worse. five months of missed and lost learning in reading and math,

that is in the can. [end of video clip] host: more of that on c-span.org . looking at school choice. we are asking you how you would grade your public schools where you live. eastern and central time zones, (202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific time zones, (202) 748-8001. a couple of stories in the papers this morning on how school districts are dealing with teacher shortages. "washington times" reporting that the american association of colleges for teacher education says the number of young people finishing teacher training programs fell like 20% between 2007 and 2011. 55% said new undergraduate enrollment dropped even further with covid restrictions. according to the bureau of labor statistics, 300,000 teachers and staff quit their jobs between february 2020 and may of 2022,

many setting covid-19 burnout for leaving. a follow-up story on specific districts and what they're doing to compensate for that, "new york times," adding that over the last two years, several states, including new mexico, florida, alabama, and mississippi have tried to address or preempt shortages by raising teacher salaries. others have new certification requirements. in arizona, a new law makes it easier for aspiring teachers without bachelors degrees to make -- gain work experience in the classroom. in florida last year, there were more than 400,000 teacher vacancies here and some veterans can get temporary teacher certificates. in some districts, school officials are putting in entire school days on the chopping block. more to that story in the "new york times" this morning. from indiana, this is david. caller: i just want to say down

here in louisiana, the schools are pretty good. the critical race theory -- [inaudible] not satisfied with the teacher school board -- satisfied with the teacher school board. i would like to commend them. i am republican. host: when you say you are satisfied, what do you base that on? caller: just on the performance of the teachers. host: ok. david there in louisiana. another call from louisiana, this is brenda. caller: hi, i am unsatisfied with the teacher shortage, real bad in louisiana. also, they are just taking people off of the streets to put them in the class to try to educate our children. i do not feel it is fair to the parents and the children. the teachers' pay sucks. the whole system, not just the

teachers, also the maintenance, cafeteria workers, the pay sucks. they make sure, the democratics and republicans, that they are paid good, but it is hard to try to maintain a family of four on $1000 a month. in the way it is paid monthly, that does not make any sense. you are getting all types of children -- all kinds of mental problems. the children, they are coming in outraged. they are taking it out on the teachers. they are lacking to learn. there is not enough electives. i can understand reading, english, and math is sufficient, but then you should have more electives in the middle of all of that to kind of give the

brain time to breathe. so i think that the democratics and republicans really need to sit down at the table and reevaluate all of that. they are taking people off the street that is not even educated to teach, to teach anybody. host: ok, you made that point there in louisiana. this is a viewer from twitter saying my sister is a lawyer, brother is a cpa, i am a retired college administrator, all public school educated. reagan defended mental health care facilities, which was the start of the decline. larry in chicago saying i lived in chicago for 32 years, 55% of my property taxes go to public schools. i never had a child go to those schools are tell me how that is right or fair. robert from twitter saying the best thing that happened to public schools is the parents getting involved in correcting the teacher behavior.

this one says we are participating in a poll with the grade system we talked about, and we are asking you to gauge that. if you go to twitter, you can participate in the poll. abcde, those kind of things. "a" taking the lead as far as those who have participated so far this morning. you can do that as well if you go to @cspanwj. ray in st. petersburg, florida. caller: hello. how are you doing? host: well, thanks. yourself? caller: not bad. to be honest, all you have to do is look at the statistics. overall, education in the united states's 20th overall in prosperity. i am not even going to break down english and math and how we are failing in all those things. the question itself to me is ridiculous. but i do have a kind of quick fix, and everyone will probably say, oh, my god, quick fix --

no, what you need is better early childhood development. we have all the fun elective things to do in school. let's get back to the math, back to the english, the science. what we really need to do is we need to get kids out of school in their sophomore year. that is the graduation point. your junior, senior year, you are doing nothing, basically hanging around playing football, doing the extra activities. at that point, all you really have to do is give people the two-your extra education, either a trade school, associates. if you do associates, we will give you the full year. we just need to base martyr. host: a call from california next, good morning. caller: i am a social studies teacher. the reason the democrats are against school choice is because the biggest contributor to them,

along with trial attorneys, is the teachers unions. so they will defend the public school system no matter what. far too pc in terms of the curriculum. so republicans vote for school choice, and it is just a political reality that i am glad to see come to the forefront. host: what grade would you give public schools? caller: d. d. far too much political correctness. down there in florida, teaching homosexuality to kindergartners through the fourth grade. host: but what about there in california? why a d there? caller: far too much political correctness src curriculum. -- as far as curriculum. for the most part, you have to

watch everything you say and everything you do. if you just put your hand on a student, it could be misinterpreted. it is far too much -- the demands are just extreme. host: ok. eric there in las vegas up next, we are asking you to greater public school. it is back-to-school time of year. go ahead. caller: good morning. absolutely an a+. i sent my children to a private school because of the neighborhoods i lived in, but now i am in an upper-class neighborhood. my grandchildren stay with me. the public school is as good as the private school. the curriculum, afterschool programs, music, dance. i am personally against school choice, simply because it is not like they are going to give special ed students $60,000 a

year to go to school. so ultimately, there will be a flight of -- what is left over our the students that they will not fund to go to a private school or to a different school. host: virtual public schooling, a commonplace event when it came to those extreme covid years. "wall street journal" looks at some districts across the u.s. still choosing to have virtual classes. this is saying that school districts in texas, new york, and california are creating permanent full-time virtual schools for the first time ever this year. a nationwide movement that has gained steam since the coronavirus print emmett -- ken dimmick, seesawing between in-person and remote learning. superintendent says virtual schools meant to enroll a minority of students with him

remote passes made more sense than going to school. students that had them in 2021, according to a rand survey. in mobile, alabama, this is sandra. caller: hello. how are you today? host: fine, thank you. caller: what i would like to say is that the kids that don't mind in school for the teachers because they are like daycare workers, that is all they are, they need to go to the reform school, and the ones that want to learn, let them stay in school. that would keep the teachers in the classrooms and everything like that. because some of them, they need to teach them for today's world. they are into technology and everything that we were not in two years ago, and that is what they need to teach the kids

today. they do not educate us poor people because they need us to work at mcdonald's, change tires, and do tuneups and everything, because they are not going to do that, that own the businesses. host: that was a call from alabama. the pdk poll also asked respondents about overall confidence in community public school teachers. when asked among all adults, 63% showing an overall confidence in those teachers. among public school parents, 72% showing that kind of confidence. they broke it down by subject matter. when it came to history, 56% of all adults saying they can appropriately handle the subject, compared to 67% of public school parents. social and emotional growth, 48 percent of adults saying that public school teachers have the

competence to take that on, 59% of public school parents saying that. history of racism and how it affects america today, 44% of adults saying public school teachers can take that on, 55% of public school parents saying teachers are capable of doing that. more of that pdk poll at pdkpoll.org. viewers of public schools overall, remember, they asked people to give a grade, 54% of respondents when it came to grading public schools gave them an "a" or b, 45% a c, d, or fail. (202) 748-8000 for eastern and central time zones. (202) 748-8001 for mountain and pacific time zones. parents and educators, (202) 748-8002. text us at (202) 748-8003. from west virginia, edward in

clarksburg. hello. caller: hello. how are you? first thing i would like to say is i think they ought to go back to reading, writing, and arithmetic. although when i went to school, it was reading, writing, and redacting. every time they change it, it just gets worse. they zero additional $100 bills on it to take care of it. but to really get it down, you go to the basics and get them taught, and then all this other stuff, like i got grandchildren in school -- i cannot believe the stuff they are having to learn. it will be totally useless by the time they get to high school.

you just got to teach the three r's. as far as teachers' wages, everybody says a year how much money they make. they work 200 days a year, not 365 days a year like you, like -- not me anymore. but other people work 300 625 days, they work 200 days. so that is my opinion. thank you. host: let's get an educator perspective, randy in virginia. caller: oh, good morning, america, and thank you for c-span. i am a little bit unique. i own my own education business that has been published by the cdc, and i'm a presidential fitness partner. after a personal injury, i realized in 1998 how unprepared the workforce was to return to work after injury or illness.

and that is the premise. i built a mobile fitness center to focus on children's health, k-12. inside this 50 foot trailer, i have 30 stationary bikes. they fit children pre-k through high school. i pull that rig around and connect dots. i go to schools, neighborhoods, and i work with other host organizations to promote health and wellness and make physical fitness joyful instead of punishment. host: as far as overall grades in public schools, what would you give? caller: i am going to give the schools that i participate with an "a," and the ones that do not participate with outside vendors that can bring unique earning experiences and change the morale of students a d or f.

if we do not start taking this education to the street and start providing resources that are not game playing - -because in football, the doctor does not say go home, eat right, and tackle somebody. host: one of the things that covid had students dealing with was the -- dealing with was with the wearing of masks. cnn reporting that there may be fewer discussions and fretting about masks and other medication measures. but most of the largest public school districts in the united states are not requiring masks for the school year, making them optional. the highly transmissible ba.5 variant is spreading across the country, but schools are more lax and domestic policies. a member of the school

association in new york, although there is a possibility that such policies could change if covid-19 case rates rise or fall, everyone in the district might not be receptive to that change. more from the cnn website if you want to read about those masks and the perspective on masks. from south carolina, this is william. caller: hello. this is william. can you hear me? host: go ahead. caller: the school districts -- i took a look at pay schedules. it depends on the county in south carolina what the teachers may it paid. i am in a poor county, so a few years ago i looked at the pay scale and teachers start off around $30,000 after four years of college. it is to the point now where that person could go get a job at a fast food restaurant and

make $30,000 a year. but overall, the competency and the great i would give the schools, probably a b. the teachers are educated and have to be recertified every few years. they do the best they can with what they have got. with the vouchers and things like that, that tends to take money away from public education because there is only still so much the state will take in for money. there's only so much of the county will take in for money. and people forget that. i do not mind vouchers. but if they do that, they need to put taxes on people so they can afford those not jeopardize the public schools. host: in the union, south carolina, a call. bloomberg reports on the money that school teachers -- school systems received from the biden administration for

covid-related issues, the largest school district's are spending more. on average, school district expenses rose 5.4% in fiscal 2023 from a year earlier. that is according to analysis from a new york-based company that tracks school data. 10.8% increase between 2022 and 2021, and districts plan is been $134 billion in the upcoming school year, up from $126 billion the previous year. there is a push to put money or work head of a september 2024 deadline that requires use of the allotted federal stimulus aid. it is suggested districts are not using the money fast enough to exhaust their funds. bloomberg has that story. rob in new york, hi. caller: good morning, pedro.

you know what, the fbi just went to facebook and stop to hunter biden investigation, and you guys talk about schools? can't you talk about a serious subject? host: you called in on this topic. what is your grade? caller: i think you need to find another subject. host: we will go to kelly then. kelly in coppell, texas. caller: hey, how are you doing? host: fine, thank you. caller: i love this program, "washington journal" on c-span, one of my favorite shows. host: what grade would you give schools? caller: well, the thing is, is that being an industrialized country in the west, out of the -- i can't quantify, cannot say

-- but i have seen in, like bloomberg weekly, i get that, we are -- of the top countries, we are down near the low, like low 40 to 50 in our -- host: how would you rate your school system? what kind of grade? caller: i would give it a d, our education level. i mean, there are third world countries in africa that educate their people, their students, much better than we do. when i am worried about is that we don't teach anything about

slavery or about the holocaust. i mean, our largest school district in texas is houston isd, and i recently saw this on the news, they don't teach anything about the holocaust on there. and i am in coppell, a top-five school district, very expensive place to live. top five school district in texas, and they barely teach anything about slavery. i mean, these kids don't know anything. and i am afraid of -- they don't know anything about slavery and what it was really like and about the holocaust and what that was really like. as someone said, we don't teach this, we're are doomed to repeat it. host: let's hear from heather, a

parent in bel air, maryland. caller: good morning. definitely, our county that we live in -- [inaudible] there is a teacher shortage across the nation. i believe i heard we are at a very, very -- i think all-time low for teachers. but here, we are really not affected by that. we're almost fully staffed. but a lot of other states around the country are being affected by this. to go back to what one of the callers said earlier, you know, everybody is being forced to

conform to standards. and everybody is so pc. i know many teachers that just do not want to deal with it anymore and are finding other carriers, and that is a shame. the result is, and this is all part of the plan, to me, the result is you look for another job. and they will push you out and bring the new teachers in that will teach what they are pushing. ok? so i think that is what we are seeing happening across-the-board. host: ok. that is heather in maryland with her perspective on schools, at least what grade she would give her school there, some of you, as well. we will continue for the next 20 minutes on this to participate, (202) 748-8000 for the eastern and central time zones, (202) 748-8001 for the mountain and pacific time zones. recently, randy weingart, president of the american

federation of teachers, talked about school closures during covid times, something that the union talked about and advocated for. also asked if there were any regrets on how the teacher unions handled school closures at the time during covid. here is some of her perspective for my recent interview. [video clip] guest: what i regret is covid. but i regret is the fear. what i regret is the misinformation. would i have liked us to have a crystal ball and know then what we know now so we could have been more firm about saying if you do x, y, and z, we can reopen schools and be in heaven present? yeah, because i think that is most important. could we overcome all the fears? i wish we could have. i do not think it is anybody's fault that we did not understand what was going on in terms of

schooling and in terms of covid. and i think it is not right or accurate to say that it was the unions, because look at how many of the districts that we worked with, we were able to get reopened for in-person learning between september and april of last year. [end of video clip. host: that was a recent interview. let's hear from rene, a public educator. caller: i am a veteran, speak three languages, and am a substitute teacher. yes, i was an educator. i live in my camry county, where i teach, and i give them an "a." like everywhere else in the country, we are back into a very fractured time. and we are seeing that schools are microcosms. a previous caller was trying to

blame pc culture. i give thanks everyday that i am not a teacher in florida. i happen to be a gay man and come to school every day with pride in what i teach students in my strict. i do not teach them to be gay, i teach them to be decent human beings, teach them self-respect, teach them tolerance for each other. at the end every class i teach, and i am so happy to be here, the kids come up to me and say, i wish you were my real teacher, not just a substitute. why? because i do not push, like this woman heather from bel air was saying, pushing an agenda. there is no agenda i am pushing, but trying to inculcate in my students the same elemental and basic decency that i received as an immigrant, the son of immigrants -- i was born here in miami, florida, and that is what i teach them, i teach them to

support each other, take care of each other, to not have this idea of each other as different because someone is black or chinese. the beautiful thing about montgomery county is that we have such an international student body. we are right outside of washington, d.c., and we have students from every stripe of life. what i bring to the classroom every day is that. i teach them pride. today we were doing introductions to get to know each other. where are you from? india, that is fascinating. so what i think we are doing, many of us, i get up everyday until you i do this, not for the pay, i assure you, because people complain about future pay -- what we give is invaluable. host: ok, renee there in maryland, giving his perspective as an educator. if you want to call and get that

perspective, (202) 748-8002 is the number you can call. a couple of events on the network today, the white house planning a conference today, press conference looking at monkeypox, an event happening across the united states, press conference at 2:00 this afternoon. you can see that on c-span, watch it on c-span now, and follow along at our website, c-span.org. that will be later on today, 2:00. mississippi, we will hear from marie, a grandmother. caller: good morning. i give our schools here lay in this -- here in the city an a-b. i think we have excellent teachers, despite the sabotage from the state department or talk to the teachers about how children are passing, doing

excellent, some say right in the middle of the school year, a truck will pull up to the school with boxes full of a whole different curriculum that they have to stop in the middle of the school year and change and start teaching the children all over again. so i feel like the schools are good, teachers are great, despite sabotage from our state department. also, i wanted to add, about the charter schools, these school choices, they make these schools , like they are the best schools since the light bulb. so if the charter school curriculum is such a good curriculum, is this curriculum a part of college courses? so teachers going to school college to teach, is this curriculum a part of the college courses that all teachers at every school could do, this charter school curriculum, since it is the best in the world? in about homeschooling, to be

honest, 50%, i did not say everybody, the majority of those children do not even qualify to go to college if they are homeschooled. they've been at home but really have not been schooled. host: ok, that perspective from mississippi. you can keep calling in and we will go until 8:00. a couple events featuring president biden today, he is expected to travel to pennsylvania to give a speech on gun violence and crime at 3:15. that will be on the main network, c-span, c-span now, and c-span.org. the president is planning on traveling quite a bit over the next week. later this week, he is expected to give a primetime speech on america's rights and freedoms and how he considers them still under attack emma returning to a message from his 2020 campaign. americans are getting ready to vote in midterm elections.

the thursday address in philadelphia would focus on the continued battle in the nation and how the presidency is the central argument over the 2020 candidacy remains with midterm elections. and labor day, the president traveling to pittsburgh, according to the white house, location not specifically given. that on monday, he is expected to deliver remarks to celebrate labor day and the dignity of american workers. that is president biden's travel agenda for the next couple of days. one thing to watch for later this afternoon, 4:00, dr. rochelle walensky, head of the cdc, will speak at the center for strategic and international studies on the topic of pandemic repair nests. you can -- pandemic preparedness. this says that locally, our public schools are doing well but a lot of room for improvement nationwide in public

schooling. we should pay teachers better, spread summer break time off across the year so that the year-round curriculum happens. another says reading is the key, i read to my daughter and got her a library card at the age two and a half, she could read by age three. at kindergarten, she read at a third-grade level. you have to work with teachers, it is a cooperative relationship. this viewer says quality education is available if disruptive students are properly managed. those left in the room with disruptions struggle. this is a call from san diego, california, a parent. caller: good morning, c-span. thank you for the great job you guys are doing. thank you for the information. the educational system in san diego, i give it a b. the fact that our great teachers, most of the great --

most of the teachers here are underqualified, not qualified to teach. students, when they come back home with homework, the homework is actually a little easier than what the schools are supposed to give. so the parents end up giving the students more homework than what the teacher gives to them. we have to look for a way to establish a religious education in our system here. look at these children. when they come back home, they have no knowledge about anything. why not give the students books to read and bring it back home? that is my opinion. host: let's hear from gail, and teacher in baltimore. caller: hi, c-span. thank you for being there.

i wanted to share that i have been working in baltimore county and baltimore city for about 21 years. the teachers are overqualified for the positions that they have. they know that reading and writing is important. we have that drilled into us at the beginning, middle, and end of every school year. so the major issue, in my mind, is that we are in old school buildings. you cannot even drink the water in the school buildings. we have bottled water brought in. the buildings are 70 and 80 years old, not beautiful places to be, sometimes not healthy places to be. i know the school system is doing the best they can in baltimore city and baltimore county. but if you do not offer a beautiful place for child to learn, it is just not a good place to be. i will be spending $1500 this year on my classroom to make it beautiful and inviting for a

child to feel good about learning. host: where does most of that expense go? what do you spend it most on? caller: supplies. i used to be a history teacher, now an art teacher. so i do not have the supplies that i need. i do not have the facility, it is not what it needs to be. and i know the school system is doing its best to provide things for me, but i don't mind spending money. i believe out of my salary, if i take $1500 and put it toward my children, it is a gift i am giving to them that i love giving. i am a very generous person, and i do not mind giving it. i had a great education, great education. i have two masters degrees. i can teach history, art, special education. schools, we have everything as far as education, we have

everything we need to offer students. we just need to show them that we care more. we need to give them an environment that is much better. baltimore city, baltimore county. host: ok, it teacher perspective. one more perspective from andrew campanella about school choice, talking about student performance on the relation he saw with the topic of school choice. [video clip] guest: the reason we do this work is because we want to see students have every opportunity to succeed. and what we know, based on research, is that when parents actively choose schools and learning environments for their kids, students succeed in schools at higher rates than if parents do not actively choose those schools. it does not matter what type of school apparent chooses, just the act of going through the process and making a decision is what matters.

so what we see is if a parent participates in an open enrollment program or in public charter school program or a private school or online school or magnet school or home schooling, the fact that they exercise their options and the options were available lose to higher student graduation rates, higher college acceptance rates, higher lifetime earnings, and all the other good things we want out of education. that is why we do this. [end of video clip] host: sue texting from new jersey, saying thank goodness our kids are done with the local school system or little support, too many superintendents with handsome salaries in a mediocre school system. overall, a c. a fewer on twitter saying i have been out of touch with my area schools for a long time, my concerns are on well-rounded classical teachings, writing a

coherent and cogent paragraph, with math and science principles. artwork and soundtracks are welcomed. some folks making a point via twitter and participating in our twitter poll, where overall, respondents give a b. you can participate in the poll, too, on our twitter feed at @cspanwj. carolyn in tyler, texas, a retired teacher. good morning. having a little bit of trouble with the button here. can you punch that, guys? good morning. caller: can you hear me? host: yep, go ahead. caller: it is interesting you have this question today, because the main educational agency in tyler just came out with grades for all school

districts in texas. where i live in tyler, tyler got a grade of a b. i thought that was real interesting because, from what i observe, and i kind of watch the school districts closely, i would have given it a grade of c. that is mainly because when you start looking at individual schools within the school district, you see that some of the schools with low socioeconomic minority kids are in the northern part of the city, and those schools are getting mainly 70's. it is in the southern part of the city where you will have more, say, white students. most of the white students in tyler go to colloquial schools, private schools. only about 20% of white students

in tyler isd are white students. about 50% are hispanic and 20% are african-american. at the same time, about 70% of our teachers are white teachers. over 90% of the central office, the personnel making the decisions about curriculum, instructions, strategies are not minority people. tyler is what you call a district of instruction, and tyler is allowed to hire teachers that are not certified. and this has been going on for about five years, and now we have about 100 teachers in the district that have degrees but are not certified teachers. host: ok, a retired teacher

giving us a perspective from texas. in chicago, another retired teacher. hello. caller: good morning. can i start? host: go ahead. caller: i taught for 34 years in the chicago school system. what i found is that class size matters as much as anything about children being successful in school. and when you have 25 to 30 children in an underprivileged neighborhood, you generally have low scores when it comes times to test and everything. the second thing is social security has a program that pays children to act out in the school. they call it ssi. teachers have to write anecdotal records on children every day to prove that they acted out in school. they take those records to social security, and the child is diagnosed with psychological or physiological problem. and that child no longer is fit

to be taught as a regular student and goes to a special ed class, and his parents deceive, as i understand, $700 per month for each child -- his parents receive $700 per month for each child. half of our students were on ssi and were receiving, at the time, $500 a month from the government for being in the social security program. host: one more call, john in baltimore, maryland, a parent. caller: i just wanted to respond to the teacher from baltimore that was on who -- 21 years, i cannot give enough respect for that person. but i think when we are saying that the school system is doing the best they can, they are not. and if she has to shell out $1500 of her own money to make

the classroom inviting, then the school system is not doing a good job. i think we are giving the school systems way too much credit and giving a free pass on not doing a good job. in baltimore, we have schools with no heat or not adequate heat, no air conditioning. the governor approved money for air-conditioning units for the schools in baltimore city almost seven years ago and nothing has been done. there was a study done about two years afterwards to make sure those air-conditioning units had even been ordered and they hadn't nothing has been done. so the school systems, central offices, are not doing their jobs. they are not doing their jobs for teachers. host: ok, last call. thank you to all of you who participated. coming up, two guests talking about two different aspects of the recently passed inflation reduction act. the first guest is indivar dutta-gupta from the center for

law and social policy, to talk about what the ledge of patient -- what the legislation means for lower income americans. later, avik roy from the foundation for equal opportunity to discuss the drug pricing reform aspects of the bill. ♪ >> in 2019 then rains discovered remains in a swamp. sunday night the best of q&a he talks about his book which details the history and how and why it transported 110 slaves to alabama in 1860. more than 50 years after the transit line was outlawed.

clicks we have the whole story and it serves as sort a proxy in the world for whoever arrived in the hull of the ship. we know nothing about them because their stories were not recorded. this is a proxy for lost history for the millions of people who were stolen from africa and spread all over the world. it is the whole story of the slavery all encapsulated in one piece and we know everything about these people and what happened to them in their lives. >> sunday night at 8 p.m. eastern on c-span's q&a. you can listen to q&a and all other podcasts on our new c-span now app. >> at least six presidents recorded conversations while in

office. here many of those conversations during season two of c-span podcast presidential recordings. >> they are part private conversations part deliberations and 100% unfiltered. >> let me say that the main thing is my heart goes out to those people who with the best of intentions were overzealous. as i'm sure you know if i could spend a little more time thing but a politician and this time being president i didn't know what they were doing. >> find presidential recordings season to wherever you get your podcasts. >> "washington journal" continues. host: indivar dutta-gupta we are joined by your to talk