Miguel Cardona, Miseducation Secretary National history test scores plummet, and he attacks Republicans.
The federal Department of Education’s mission is supposed to be . . . what exactly? Apparently Education Secretary Miguel Cardona thinks it’s something other than improving educational results. New national test results this week showed eighth-grade U.S. history scores at an all-time low, and Mr. Cardona’s response was to attack the GOP.
The data released is from 2022 tests on U.S. history and civics under the National Assessment of Educational Progress, sometimes called the “nation’s report card.” The average eighth-grade history score is down five points from 2018 and nine points from 2014. It’s the lowest on record, going back to 1994. Scores dropped the most among the lower performers. Only 13% of students were deemed NAEP proficient. The civics results are similarly depressing.
This is a damning record for the educational establishment, on top of last year’s news that NAEP math scores for eighth-graders in 2022 fell to a 20-year low. For all the money the U.S. keeps pumping into education, surely somebody in authority ought to be embarrassed by these pitiful outcomes, working to reverse them, and explaining to the citizenry what is being done. Maybe that person is supposed to be the U.S. Education Secretary?
Mr. Cardona’s statement on the poor NAEP showing begins by saying that it “further affirms the profound impact the pandemic had on student learning in subjects beyond math and reading.” This might be a workable start if Mr. Cardona went on to acknowledge that Zoom classes were a generational error and that the teachers unions that lobbied to keep schools closed should accept some responsibility.
Instead Mr. Cardona turns to a partisan diversion. “Now is not the time for politicians to try to extract double-digit cuts to education funding, nor is it the time to limit what students learn in U.S. history and civics classes,” he says. “We need to provide every student with rich opportunities to learn about America’s history and understand the U.S. Constitution and how our system of government works. Banning history books and censoring educators from teaching these important subjects does our students a disservice.”
Who in America is “censoring” teachers from discussing “the U.S. Constitution and how our system of government works”? Mr. Cardona doesn’t say. The implication is that it’s those nasty Republicans, which is odd, since they’re the same people who are always talking about the Constitution and carrying around pocket versions of it.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis recently had a dust-up with the College Board about its new AP African-American Studies class, but the state didn’t object to history. It balked at lessons focused on “queer studies” and other overtheorized escapees from the college faculty lounge.
The NAEP test isn’t that. Here’s the U.S. history question given as an example of “basic” achievement: “Which of the following reasons best explains why many people supported the Eighteenth Amendment, which banned the sale of alcohol?” The right answer, picked by 58% of eighth-graders, was that prohibitionists thought alcohol had a negative effect on society.
Moving on to a “proficient” sample question: “What were European explorers such as Henry Hudson looking for when they sailed the coast and rivers of North America in the 1600s?” Only 47% of students correctly chose “a water trade route to Asia.”
Does Mr. Cardona imagine that red states are ripping pages from history books because they can’t abide the idea that their children will learn about Henry Hudson? Or is the Education Secretary, with his partisan talking points as our children flunk history, simply revealing himself to be a political hack?
Readers will probably ace that question.
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