David Brooks Quotes

Betsy DeVos is not the most informed person on education policy, but I have seen her present a few times, and she presents as a pretty respectable, intelligent person who has cared passionately about education and cares about charter schools.

Would [Betsy DeVos] be my first pick? No. Is she someone who has dedicated her life to education policy? Yes, actually, she has.

I have seen [Betsy DeVos] present a few times. I don't really know her. But I have seen her present on education policy, and she's not a stupid person.

My gut reaction [on Betsy DeVos] was, oh, my God. We are now back into the education wars.

I'm not sure Betsy DeVos has ever spent a day in a public school. And I don't - I'm pretty sure Donald Trump hasn't.

Get rid of Betsy DeVos.

On the [Betsy] DeVos case, I agree that the gun - her gun position is kind of weird, kind of crazy, but I do think she does know about public schools.

President-elect [Donald] Trump has made a provocative choice for secretary of education. Betsy DeVos comes from a wealthy Michigan family. She is an advocate for school choice. That phrase means, in essence, directing public education money to charter schools, private schools or parochial schools.

I believe public education is the new civil rights battle and I support charter schools.

The number one issue facing cities isn’t crimes or jobs anymore, it’s public education.

I think charter schools, choice, and frankly school standards need a champion.

The White House, in advancing the agenda for a [school] "choice" plan, rests its faith on market mechanisms. What reason have the black and very poor to lend their credence to a market system that has proved so obdurate and so resistant to their pleas at every turn?

I am going to provide school choice and put an end to common core and bring our education local.

[Betsy DeVos] does care about charter schools, which are public schools. She does care about choice, which is a perfectly legitimate thing to care about. It's because it's the one issue where the Democratic donor base was really energized, which was the teacher unions.

Support charters; insist on change for failing schools.

When you say you don't think we should have public schools, they can't believe you mean that. You must mean that they should be smaller. But you can't really mean no public schools.

The problem with K-12 education is socialism and the solution is capitalism.

I'm not one of those who thinks the only way to fix what's wrong with American education is to throw more money at it. We also need to do it much better.

The unions no longer control the education agenda of the Democratic Party.

Many of those who argue for vouchers say that they simply want to use competition to improve public education. I don't think it works that way, and I've been watching this for a longtime.

I'm a very big public school advocate.

Most high governmental officials who speak of education policy seem to conceive of education in this light - as a way to ensure economic competitiveness and continued economic growth. I strongly disagree with this approach.

While NCLB drove important progress on transparency and data disaggregation, I think it's clear that the status quo in public education is not working for our kids or our country.

There is a growing acceptance and interest in publicly funded school choice as a catalyst for education reform in general and a way to empower parents to be education reformers.

All I suggest is to make K-12 like higher education. Higher education in the United States is the best in the world because these institutions compete with each other for your tuition dollar. Let's just bring competition to public education.