Dive Summary:
- In his keynote speech at the Mackinac Policy Conference in northern Michigan Wednesday, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush praised charter schools while blasting teachers unions and accusing traditional public education of dumbing down standards "to make adults look better."
- Bush said Michigan, with its 274 charter schools, leads the nation in charter school performance, though measuring charter school quality is difficult and an EdTrust Midwest study actually reports that many charters opening since Michigan lifted its cap on the schools in 2011 have below-average track records.
- Through his $19 million Foundation for Excellence in Education, Bush promotes online education, the use of test scores to grade schools and making students who perform poorly on standardized tests repeat grades.
From the article:
... "We must expand [school] choice," said Bush, delivering a keynote speech at the annual Mackinac Policy Conference in northern Michigan. "Our governance model includes over 13,000 government-run monopolies run by unions." ...
