Background Information
This is a quote from Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, seemingly implying that generally better funded and higher quality private schools are somehow at risk of being discriminated against based on their wealth. To us, it makes sense that needier school districts should be prioritized above schools that are at far less risk of extended financial damage from the pandemic. However, this sentiment does not fit with President Trump’s appointed Secretary of Education’s “'plan to ‘replace public education with for-profit schools’”, as stated by a Trump Administration official (Weingarten).
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), addresses delegates on the first day of the Democratic National Convention at Wells Fargo Center on July 25, 2016 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Credit: SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images
What we begin to see is that there is a philosophical tension in regards to how education should be conducted in the United States, and multiple sides of this tension offer multiple approaches toward the allocation of funding between private and public institutions. There has been unregulated pandemic guidance and ultra capitalistic policy decisions from Betsy DeVos and the Trump administration. This uneven balance of capitalism and socialism aligns with differences of politics and reveals how contrasting philosophies of wealth allocation function during a crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic, specifically focusing on education and it's extended economic consequences.
In this Nov. 19, 2016 photo, President-elect Donald Trump stands with Education Secretary-designate Betsy DeVos in Bedminster, N.J. DeVos has spent over two decades advocating for school choice programs, which give students and parents an alternative to traditional public school education. Her confirmation hearing was scheduled for Jan. 17. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
There are tensions in the conversation of pandemic-era education between teachers and parents in that they have some different, and some similar, values in regard to the health and safety of students and themselves. There is a broader debate playing out in both federal and state governments as to what value public safety and economic well-being possess in the question of what regulations are best for the country during the pandemic. There is also tension mainly between politically left and right institutions that argue whether the state or federal government is responsible for different aspects of the pandemic response in schools and elsewhere.
Current Cases of the Pandemic.. Credit: John Hopkins University
To these points, the main question we’ve researched asks how the philosophies of capitalism and socialism contribute to differing ideologies on education (privatized/nationalized) and the allocation of it's funding in the United States. Also, in what ways do these ideologies present themselves in different responses to the pandemic both in terms of public safety and economic well being?