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Saturday, July 22, 2017

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: DeVos in Twitter war with AFT

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: DeVos in Twitter war with AFT:

DeVos in Twitter war with AFT



Does this mean, no more school visits together with Randi and Betsy?

Jack Roskopp at Detroit Metro Times reports that Education Secretary Betsy DeVos "is taking a note from her boss by firing back at her critics on Twitter".


The AFT teacher's union sent out a tweet today saying "@BetsyDeVos says public $ should invest in indiv students. NO we should invest in a system of great public schools for all kids." This prompted DeVos to tweet back at the union with a series of tweets that don't exactly add up. 


Hard to believe. They have made clear that they care more about the system than about individual students. (1/3) https://twitter.com/AFTunion/status/884206162765389824 
This isn’t about school “systems.” This is about ind. students & families. Schools are at the service of students, not the other way around.
AFT responds.

Education isn't an individual privilege, it's a right for all. Public systems serve all, private vouchers serve few. https://twitter.com/BetsyDeVosED/status/888113497770348544 
I admit, it's not much of a war. For those who have a hard time making any sense of this tweetspat,  let me try and break it down. Under the direction of Betsy DeVos, the DOE has become little more than an engine for driving school privatization, religious fundamentalism, racism and gender discrimination. Trump's appointment of DeVos to oversee this country's public education system threatens a roll-back of every hard-won gain by the Civil Rights Movement in the past 70 years.

DeVos and her new OCR chief, Candice Jackson are waving the "civil rights" banner as a 
Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: DeVos in Twitter war with AFT: