How Will Michelle Rhee's Policy and Politics Work Fare in States? - State EdWatch - Education Week

How Will Michelle Rhee's Policy and Politics Work Fare in States? - State EdWatch - Education Week:

How Will Michelle Rhee's Policy and Politics Work Fare in States?

by Andrew Ujifusa

The biggest national education story of the past week was John Merrow's discussion of a memo about possible, even likely cheating in D.C. Public Schools under former Chancellor Michelle Rhee, and how she may have swept the issue under the rug, or just passively let it get buried and lost under other paperwork, depending on how you look at it. (As my colleague Lesli Maxwell documents, Rhee claims not to remember the memo.)
But it's important to remember that Rhee is not an abstraction, and she hasn't retired—she's the leader of a K-12 advocacy group that is steadily expanding its role in many states, getting involved in both policy lobbying and campaign donations. StudentsFirst's website now says it is active in 18 states, including California, New York, and Florida, three of the five biggest states in the country by public school enrollment. It has also begun grading state policies, a key component of older groups with similar views like the Center for Education Reform and the American Legislative Exchange Council. So the important question on that front is, will doubts about the integrity of D.C. schools under her tenure damage StudentsFirst's work in statehouses and with elections?
On the one hand, the "brand" of StudentsFirst could be permanently tainted by Rhee's association with possible widespread cheating. To put it in general but concrete terms, it's easy to imagine someone testifying against a bill backed by StudentsFirst in a state capital inserting a few choice lines about the legislation's tainted association with a woman who allegedly ignored a cheating scandal even as she rose to education stardom.

On Twitter, for example, Andy Ford, the president of the Florida Education Association, branded Rhee the