Headlines vs. Reality: Education
Education is something I'm excited to dig into. It should be in everyone's top priorities in this state. So let's see what the party I used to belong to has to say about it.
Headline: Education Savings Accounts and school choice
Reality: They want to update the school choice language by adding Education Savings Accounts, expanding tax credits and deductions to cover private, religious, and home schools. They also say every state mandate needs a funding path that doesn't burden school districts. That sounds nice, except we're not fully funding schools right now, so it's just a talking point.
I believe every parent should have a choice in where their kid gets educated. If you want to send your kid to private school because you think it's a better fit, or for the religious side of it, go ahead and do it if you can afford it. But I don't believe the money should follow the kid out of the public system. That system is already stretched thin enough.
Headline: Merit-based hiring, performance pay, and competency testing for teachers
Reality: Time for a soapbox rant. Teachers have a thankless job. They aren't given the support they need, they aren't paid what they're worth, and this party makes them the villain in every complaint they have about education. Most of us wouldn't last a week in a classroom with the students, the school board, the time commitment, and paying for supplies out of our own pocket. And now they want teachers to take time out of their schedule for competency testing, on top of everything else.
They want to pay teachers based on performance. Whose performance, the teacher's or the students'? Those aren't the same thing. Teaching is a profession. Treat it like one. Pay them like professionals, give them the support staff to do their job, and stop making them the scapegoat.
Headline: Repealing the $250 million special education cut
Reality: Here's where I want to be straight with you, because this is more complicated than it looks. In 2025, the Legislature created a Blue Ribbon Commission and told it to find $250 million in special education savings for the 2028-29 budget. If the commission comes up short, the cut happens automatically out of the cross-subsidy aid districts depend on.
I've seen this framed as a simple party fight, and it isn't. Some Republicans at the Capitol have actually introduced bills to undo that automatic cut, same as Democrats have. What I care about is the outcome: special education costs are growing because the need is real, and an automatic funding cliff three years out is no way to plan for kids who need help right now. I'm not in favor of any cut that lands on special education.
Headline: Opposing universal pre-K and health screenings in schools
Reality: They oppose universal pre-K programs and universal health screenings in K-12 schools. So no pre-K, and no health screenings. That sounds like a terrible idea to me. How is skipping health screenings good for a kid's education?
Headline: A "well-rounded curriculum" built on "traditional values"
Reality: They want a knowledge-based curriculum that emphasizes hard work, honesty, home and family, respect for America's religious and civic heritage, and the benefits of a free market over socialism. Free market versus socialism belongs in an economics class, and I'm fine teaching that. The rest of it isn't a school's job. Parents teach values at home. Schools are there to educate, not to raise kids' morals for them.
Headline: Restricting how schools teach about race and history
Reality: They want to prohibit teaching what they call sectarian religious or political viewpoints, and that includes how we talk about race in this country. I grew up on a farm in Kansas, and I didn't have to look far to see how history gets sanitized if you let it. At some point we have to have open, honest conversations about our past, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Keeping that knowledge from kids doesn't protect them. It just leaves them less prepared. Knowledge is power, and I don't think we should be in the business of keeping it from our kids.
My vision for public schools is simple. Fully fund them. Give a kid in rural Minnesota the same quality education as a kid in the Metro. Give an inner-city kid the same shot as a kid in the suburbs. Pay teachers like the professionals they are, and give them the support to do the job. Teach kids the real history of this country so they can form their own judgment about it. Build an education system other states look to for guidance. We don't have that yet. We should. That's my promise, to work toward the best education system for every single student in Minnesota.
