In our new issue, @jenniferberkshire.bsky.social investigates the right-wing push toward “classical education,” a departure from the longstanding bipartisan agreement that school should first and foremost prepare students for the daily grind.

What the right gets right about what's gone wrong with public education open.substack.com/pub/educatio...

1) I had a lovely conversation about the #USSC Mahmoud decision with @jenniferberkshire.bsky.social concerning parental rights and why I think the Supreme Court may use the 1st amendment-- against history and tradition-- to render public schools unconstitutional.

Great essay from @jenniferberkshire.bsky.social. “If public education is to survive, Democrats will have to come up with an explanation for why we have public schools that goes beyond bloodless workforce preparation” Would add: Dems should listen to the teachers telling everyone that.

Sunday listen: states with ginormous religious school voucher programs are on a collision course with their own constitutions. @haveyouheard.bsky.social heads to Ohio where public education and democracy are both under threat soundcloud.com/haveyouheard...

More evidence education policy is now being driven by whims of billionaires. Here's Florida, which is about to get a whole lot more Success Academy charter schools because one of its wealthiest residents likes them. @jasongarcia.bsky.social has the receipts jasongarcia.substack.com/p/lobbyists-...

States with ginormous religious school voucher programs are increasingly on a collision course with their own constitutions. Latest Have You Heard heads to Ohio where public schools and democracy are on the line soundcloud.com/haveyouheard...

I had a student in a journalism class who was working on a podcast about his problem relationship with gambling and during the class he gambled away his entire student loan for the year

America’s public schools have long been hyperfocused on career readiness. Now, the right wing is embracing “classical education” instead. @jenniferberkshire.bsky.social considers what this means for the future of American schooling.

An absolutely vital piece providing the history and context of the corporatization of public education. This stuck out to me as something I increasingly see from AP classes: “They’re more likely to encounter these as decontextualized excerpts in corporate-produced test prep materials.”

Long weekend read: for decades there's been a bipartisan consensus that the purpose of school is workforce preparation. Now the right is abandoning that view. My latest for @thebaffler.com thebaffler.com/outbursts/un...

More evidence that red state voucher programs are riling the GOP. Conservative candidate for governor of Tennessee, running on 'liberty & less government,' wants to suspend TN's new voucher program. Hard to overstate how angry much of the grassroots right remains over vouchers

20 years after Hurricane Katrina, the sales pitch for New Orleans' education miracle is falling flat. An eye-opening new book by parent advocate Ashana Bigard explains why open.substack.com/pub/educatio...

And they tell you poetry majors won't make any money...

For a long time, @jenniferberkshire.bsky.social writes, it was a matter of stifling bipartisan consensus that public education’s primary goal should be to prepare students for the workforce. The right is changing its tune—now, it’s all about “classical education.”

I have a new essay up at @thebaffler.com about the right's turn against education-as-job-training. If you're wondering how we went from a decades-long national STEMergency to 'a flat earth curriculum is OK by us,' this is the piece for you! thebaffler.com/outbursts/un...

Will be interesting to see whether anger among grassroots conservatives over school vouchers and billionaire influence becomes a real thing

Spotted at Barbara's Books in downtown Chicago. The Education Wars is in excellent company!

One big reason Iowa Dems are bullish on turning the state blue(r) is the ginormous, and deeply controversial, school voucher program rammed through by the GOP. www.politico.com/news/2025/08...

1 takeaway from the Iowa special election: don't listen to centrist Dems on education. Caitlin Drey made defending and funding public schools a focal point of her campaign and called for rolling back Iowa's controversial school voucher program. IOW opposite day

Weekend listening: 'cut, fire and close' is the medicine on offer for cash-strapped school districts across the land. @schooldaves.bsky.social makes a return appearance on the pod to offer an alternative perspective and tools for fighting back. You need to hear this! soundcloud.com/haveyouheard...

Even if you're very excited about Mississippi's test score increases, pointing to the state as offering a *road map for how to genuinely let every child thrive* seems like a stretch. Is eliminating the state income tax, which MS just did, part of the road map? www.theargumentmag.com/p/mad-libs-b...

In 2020, @jackschneider.bsky.social & I wrote a book called A Wolf at the Schoolhouse Door. We warned that the vision of the future was *unbundling* in which school = whatever education content consumers purchase. As @flbaloney.bsky.social reports, the future is here substack.com/inbox/post/1...

Pumped to be back on @haveyouheard.bsky.social podcast with @jenniferberkshire.bsky.social this week! soundcloud.com/haveyouheard...

This story about Mark Zuckerberg running a private school out of his house is so a la mode. This is actually a hot new trend called a *micro school.* The part where they ignored all the city codes is trendy too - that's called *permissionless education* www.nytimes.com/2025/08/10/u...

A little weekend listening: I talked to 8 former inmates who have transitioned from prison to campus. What's it like to go from 30 years behind bars to a college quad? One of my all time fave episodes of the pod... podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/2...

This story connects to many old tech edu-biz favorites, even as it b lows up hundreds of mnillions of dollars. Giant Montessori School Chain Files For Bankruptcy 1/ www.forbes.com/sites/peterg...

kind of ironic that the most popular Dems - southerners like Roy Cooper and Andy Beshear - are popular in part because they led very visible fights against school vouchers. And yet there is intense pressure to get Dems to embrace vouchers in order to *stay relevant* www.politico.com/news/2025/08...

Trump caving on releasing funds for public schools just demonstrated - again - how vulnerable he is on the issue of public education. And yet, once again Democrats appear to be missing the boat - w/ a few notable exceptions open.substack.com/pub/educatio...

For the past couple of years I've been teaching inside a Massachusetts prison - part of the Boston College Prison Education Program. Latest episode of Have You Heard features my interviews w/ 8 former inmates who are now on campus. It is amazing if I do say so! soundcloud.com/haveyouheard...

The White House caving and having to release funds for public schools because of rare pressure from GOP senators is a big deal. Seems like an issue the Dems should really lean into... www.nytimes.com/2025/07/25/u...

Such a sign of our times that ALEC - which we still think of as the place where corporations go to buy government policy - now has a model bill requiring schools to let students leave for bible study

Listening to this amazing @jamestalarico.bsky.social interview with Joe Rogan and I keep thinking about the study that found that the ideal progressive candidate to win back working class voters is a middle school teacher podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/2...

Programs that make it easier for working class kids to attend college are also illegally woke because *it is well recognized that race and ethnicity are inseparable from socioeconomic status* Starting to get a real vibe about this whole *merit* thing... www.thebaltimorebanner.com/education/hi...

All of Trump’s education moves have a common theme: a kicking away of the ladder that will entrench privilege for those who already have the most. My latest open.substack.com/pub/educatio...

Donald Trump wants to eliminate the Department of Education, and the Supreme Court has given him the okay to keep making cuts. In February, @jenniferberkshire.bsky.social described the president’s dismantling of not just the department but public education itself.

they want to destroy higher education and do as much as they can to segregate what remains. basically, then the clock back to before the 1960s, when university education was reserved for a small slice of the public.

The local democracy conundrum - more essential than ever! Yet so often frustrating or disappointing. New episode of @haveyouheard.bsky.social digs in w/ help from @drrachelswhite.bsky.social @derekgottlieb.bsky.social @johannneem.bsky.social & @knightabo.bsky.social soundcloud.com/haveyouheard...

The irony of the Virginia GOP wanting to run like it's 2021 is that Dems have a whole wing making the same case: Dems have lost their education advantage, something about learning loss and bathrooms and that's why we need to embrace school vouchers & go hard at unions www.semafor.com/article/07/0...

Turns out that the $7 billion the Trump admin is withholding from K-12 schools will disproportionately hurt districts in red states. Districts in West Virginia, already reeling from tax cuts and school vouchers, will be the biggest losers www.newamerica.org/education-po...

Seeing lots of shock and surprise about the Trump admin's decision to withhold $7 billion in funds to K-12 schools. But when you consider how large *race science* looms for these folks, punishing kids who need the most has a cruel logic educationwars.substack.com/p/making-sen...

@jenniferberkshire.bsky.social provides the "why" behind these illegal cuts: "once you look beyond the chaos and the callousness, the same themes keep emerging, one of them being the roaring return of race science"

looking forward to some parents suing to demand segregated schools because integration violates their religious beliefs

Democrats have a winning issue in education, and it's NOT by repackaging the failed ed reform ideas of past decades. A must-read:

I wrote about why Whitney Tilson's crushing defeat in the NYC mayoral contest matters. (Hint: the education reform wing of the Democratic Party is spoiling for a comeback) open.substack.com/pub/educatio...

2nd poll in a row showing Dems handily outperforming GOP on education. Makes sense because 'we shouldn't have public schools' or 'we're going to cut programs at your kid's school cuz we're spending the $ on vouchers for affluent parents' aren't popular positions www.educationnext.org/which-party-...

Very helpful overview from @stephenodyer.bsky.social on why yesterday's court ruling that Ohio's billion dollar school voucher program is unconstitutional is so important. TLDR: voucher advocates have been too clever by half & the bill is now coming due open.substack.com/pub/10thperi...

Another noteable outcome from the NYC race: the dismal performance of Dems for Education Reform founder Whitney Tilson. Influential centrists/edu abundos insist that Dems need to run like Michael Bloomberg (charters! go hard at unions). Tilson did and he got .8 % of the vote

Worth your time.

What better way to celebrate episode 200 of Have You Heard than by dismantling the AI hype machine? Thanks @audreywatters.bsky.social, @biblioracle.bsky.social ‬& ‪‪@benjaminjriley.bsky.social‬ for making us smarter & to our listeners for making the pod a success! soundcloud.com/haveyouheard...