U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy Devos delivered a stirring speech at Washington Policy Center’s sold-out Annual Dinner in Bellevue last Friday evening. Some 1,500 people attended. Outside the event, the best efforts of Kim Mead, president of the powerful WEA union, played host to a few hundred angry protesters, one holding a sign featuring that well-known Anglo-Saxon word that starts with “F”. These are the very few teachers, thankfully, who prefer protesting and swear words to discussing and debating school choice.     

In the real world, school choice is attractive to parents, and popular with the public. Today school officials and bureaucrats often decide the school most children attend, based on their zip code. Too many parents have little to no say over which school their child attends, or which teachers will teach their child. This monopoly-like arrangement suits the financial and political interests of the union, and protects unaccountable school officials.

School choice changes the power dynamic by giving parents access to public charter schools and to vouchers or scholarships to send their children to private schools. School choice gives parents the power to choose the school that best fits the needs of their individual children.  

Secretary Devos told WPC’s guests how school choice has helped three individual children: Austin, a charter school student at Excel Public Charter School in Kent, Washington; Sandeep Thomas, a virtual high school student in Washington; and Denisha, a public school student who received a Florida scholarship to attend a private school. These children needed an alternative to their blindly-assigned traditional public school. Without school choice, they would have failed in school.  

Betsy Devos’ full remarks are here:

https://www.ed.gov/news/speeches/prepared-remarks-secretary-devos-washington-policy-center

Here are Secretary Devos’ closing remarks:

When we are focused on the needs of each child, success can then be measured by what they are learning and mastering, not by how long they sit at their desks.

I fully recognize that I—we—represent change. And, change can be scary—particularly for staunch defenders of the current system.

But, what has the current system yielded? Average results for America's students when compared to their peers around the world.

Middle. Average. Those aren't words with which I'm comfortable describing America. It's not the future we should feel comfortable offering anyone.

That's why we must not be distracted by those who are afraid of change.

We owe it to our children to be fearless.

We owe it to them to be undeterred by the loud voices who say education in America is "good enough" and by those who shout that we should "leave the system alone".

We owe it to America's students to rethink school because they deserve a better education and a chance at a better life.

America is too great a country to deny any parent any option and it is too great to deny any student an equal opportunity to pursue a great education.

Let's continue to fight for students like Austin, and Sandeep and Denisha.

The rising generation represents 100 percent of our future; they deserve 100 percent of our effort.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless our future—America's students.

Secretary Betsy DeVos brilliantly described the promise of school choice, in one of the best speeches ever delivered at a WPC Annual Dinner. DeVos provides an example of leadership, courage and selflessness. She is a fearless champion for schoolchildren and their parents.

She is especially a champion for the low-income, minority families historically underserved by public schools. These are families that desperately need access to better schools. The protesters were fearful and angry, but the hopes of families have been raised by the inspiring visit of Betsy DeVos to Washington state.

For an overview of public school choice programs across the country, read our new Policy Brief here:  https://www.washingtonpolicy.org/publications/detail/overview-of-public-school-choice-programs.