President-elect Joe Biden is poised to nominate Connecticut
Education Commissioner Miguel Cardona for Education secretary,
adding another Latino to his roster of Cabinet appointees and
choosing a leader who has pressed schools to remain open for
in-person classes during the pandemic, according to people familiar
with the decision.
Cardona’s selection fulfills Biden’s campaign promise to
name an educator with public school experience as his nominee for
the post. He has spent his entire career in Connecticut, working as
an elementary school teacher, principal, district administrator and
assistant superintendent, as well as adjunct professor before being
named Connecticut’s state chief last year by Democratic Gov. Ned
Lamont.
About 70 percent of the state’s schools reopened for in-person
classes this fall. But when some Connecticut schools decided to
shut down in-person learning in November, Cardona and the state’s
acting Department of Health commissioner
wrote in an email to districts that they did not think
“arbitrary, date-based closures of school are warranted at this
time.”
The state health and education chiefs said the prevention
strategies schools are using are working, and the state wasn’t
seeing “sustained person to person transmission” of the virus
in schools, or outbreaks at schools, despite a surge in the state.
That put Cardona at odds with the state teachers union, although
decisions about remote or in-person classes have been left to local
districts.
The union has demanded statewide rules on sharing data about
school coronavirus cases, testing and availability of personal
protective equipment.
Still, the teachers union and other education unions in
Connecticut endorsed Cardona’s selection as head of the Education
Department.
“While this challenge has been a rocky road — and many
issues remain unresolved — teachers and school support staff have
appreciated his openness and collaboration. If selected as
Secretary of Education, Dr. Cardona would be a positive force for
public education — light years ahead of the dismal Betsy DeVos
track record,”
a coalition of the unions said.
Cardona also has said
the state plans to carry on with statewide testing later in the
school year. The pandemic led to federal waivers for all states on
testing last spring, but DeVos has held firm that testing should
proceed for the current school year, and Cardona’s position in
Connecticut could translate to the rest of the country if
confirmed.
One issue in many states where teaching has shifted online is
access to the internet and a device to use for school work from
home. Connecticut had the same problems last spring but spent
millions on laptops and internet connections, in part using federal
aid. The state declared earlier this month that
it is the first
to meet the needs of every student who had an issue accessing
online classes.
And to fill a demand for teachers made worse by the pandemic and
improve the diversity of the teaching workforce, Cardona
recruited college students to work in public schools.
Cardona’s parents moved to Connecticut from Puerto Rico and
were living in a housing project when he was born,
the Connecticut Mirror reported. He spoke only Spanish until he
started school.
He was named Connecticut’s principal of the year in 2012.
As Education secretary, Cardona would help lead
Biden’s charge to boost federal funding to education so a
majority of schools can reopen in the first 100 days of his
administration, which the president-elect has outlined as a
“national priority.”
If confirmed, Cardona would join Xavier Becerra as Secretary of
Health and Human Services and Alejandro Mayorkas as head of the
Department of Homeland Security as other Latinos in Biden’s
Cabinet.
The Congressional Hispanic Caucus,
which pressed Biden to appoint a Latino to the Education post
and other Cabinet-level positions, said only two Latinos in that
group of federal leaders wouldn’t properly represent the country.
It backed Cardona as well as former National Education Association
President Lily Eskelsen García, noting a Latina has never had the
job.
Other finalists for the Education secretary role included Leslie
Fenwick, the former dean of Howard University’s college of
education and Sharon Contreras, the superintendent of schools in
Guilford County, S.C.
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of
Teachers, who herself was seen as a potential contender for the
role early on, praised
Cardona in a tweet on Monday as a former AFT member who was
“committed to collaboration.”
Cardona would be the second Latino to run the Education
Department. Lauro Fred Cavazos Jr. was the first, working in the
post during the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations.
Cardona would replace DeVos, who was sharply critical of the
influence of labor unions and blamed the “establishment” for
issues in the U.S. education system. DeVos promoted alternatives to
traditional public schools as part of a school choice agenda that
was anathema to teachers unions.
Biden has called for eliminating federal funding to for-profit
charter schools and expanding scrutiny of federal dollars that help
create all types of new charter schools.
But some of the party’s charter school advocates, including
Democrats for Education Reform,
have criticized efforts to scale back federal support for
charter schools, saying it will cut off options for low-income
students.
On the campaign trail, Biden vowed to triple federal funding for
low-income schools through the Title I program, including boosting
teacher pay. The president-elect also has committed to swiftly
reversing DeVos’ policies at the Education Department, including
her Title IX rules governing sexual misconduct in schools and
colleges, rescission of guidance promoting the rights of
transgender students and rollbacks of Obama-era regulations
targeting for-profit colleges.
On higher education, Biden has promised to double the Pell Grant
and push for new federal funding to allow states to eliminate
tuition at community colleges for all students and at four-year
public universities for students from families earning $125,000 or
less.
Biden’s administration also will have to decide whether to
relent to growing progressive demands that he use executive powers
to cancel large swaths of outstanding debt owed by federal loan
borrowers.
