By Betsy DeVos
November 12, 2021
There’s the potential for a new fault line in America’s ever-growing debate about parental rights: A schism between policymakers who believe parents have a right to know what’s being taught in public K-12 schools, and those who do not.
Wisconsin lawmakers recently passed overwhelmingly the nation’s first, most powerful Academic Transparency law to pull back the curtains on the content of classroom instruction. The bill requires schools to post online a listing of the specific instructional materials being presented—so that current and prospective parents can see for themselves whether the content awaiting their kids is academically rigorous, or ideologically extreme.
It remains to be seen if Wisconsin’s governor, Tony Evers, will take his veto pen to this common-sense measure or not.
Betsy DeVos served as the 11th United States Secretary of Education from 2017 to 2021.