By Lisa Macfarlane, DFER Washington State Director
My bags are (nearly) packed and I’m ready to go. The Democratic National Convention is next week in Charlotte and I’m psyched.
It will be like visiting a foreign country because there will actually be Democrats – thousands of them – excited about education reform, jazzed about charter schools, and pumped about parental choice. These Democrats are all driven by passion to do better by our low income and minority school children.
Gentle Washington State readers know that we have a well-deserved reputation as a laggard when it comes to education reform. Even though Obama will win in this state by 10 or 15 percentage points, our Democratic Party establishment and liberal media have avoided Obama’s education reform agenda like the plague.
In our state, Democrats who support the kind of education reforms championed by President Barack Obama and loads of Democratic governors, mayors, and lawmakers need serious armor. It’s like taking on the NRA on the second amendment. The union and Party quickly turn on and eat their own, as they did with Seattle School Board president, Steve Sundquist and his colleague Peter Maier. Both Sundquist and Maier lost their school board seats after a bruising financial scandal and a steady pounding from the labor and Democratic Party establishment over their support for Teach for America.
Some days it feels like someone has poisoned our water (more likely our coffee) or implanted blinders to prevent us from knowing or caring about what is happening elsewhere in the country. It is like we have been afflicted with some kind of preserve-the-status-quo virus. At least in Charlotte, Washington State delegates will see that education reform is an issue that Democrats all over the country are leading on.
Jay Inslee (D, WA gubernatorial candidate) and our State Democratic Party have not seen the light on important reforms such as charter schools. So it’s more than a tad ironic that the Party is bringing in heavy hitters – and huge charter school supporters – President Bill Clinton and Newark Mayor Cory Booker to raise money for the D’s.
Then there is President Barack Obama, our fantastic Reformer-in-Chief. (See DFER’s Infographic: 6 Reasons Why Obama Has Proven Himself Reformer-in-Chief here.) He gets that schools need both reforms and resources. Now we just need Washington’s democratic policymakers to get the memo. If you want to get better results for kids, it is not just about more money.
Lisa Macfarlane is the Washington State Director for Democrats for Education Reform, a co-founder of the League of Education Voters, a past President of Schools First (Seattle’s levy and bond committee), the sponsor of two statewide education funding initiatives, and a PCO in the 46th District. After years of opposing and voting against charter schools, Lisa checked her ideological baggage at the door and visited a few charter schools. She is now convinced that high quality charter schools have an important role to play in successful school reform. Read more about Lisa here.