So now, underpaid, disrespected teachers are supposed to save the economy for Trump

Potentially risking their lives in the process. It would be good if corporate media would more frequently note that Betsy DeVos and Donald Trump are remarkably ignorant, foolish people.

What’s sadly ironic about all this sudden newfound appreciation for teachers as essential to the economy is that government leaders and policy makers, from both major political parties, have spent years attacking the economic well-being of public schools and teachers.

School districts have never recovered from budget cuts states imposed during the Great Recession that started at the end of 2007. In an article for the Progressive, Nicholas Johnson from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities noted, “School districts have never recovered from the layoffs… [states] imposed back then. When COVID-19 hit, K-12 schools were employing 77,000 fewer teachers and other workers—even though they were teaching two million more children, and overall funding in many states was still below pre-2008 levels.”

Teachers now make 4.5 percent on average less than they did more than 10 years ago, according to the National Education Association, and public school teachers earn 17 percent less than what comparable workers earn, according to the Economic Policy Institute. - Jeff Bryant/Citizen Truth

DeVos contemplates grotesque, despicable abuse of power

If she does follow through, this would likely quickly fall to legal challenges. But that it's being considered is another indicator of what loathsome sociopaths are now running the federal executive branch.

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos said Tuesday that she is “very seriously” considering withholding federal funding from schools that don’t reopen in the fall...

She told (Tucker) Carlson on Tuesday that fears of coronavirus transmission from public health officials was an example of “fearmongering.” - The Hill

"If schools reopen this fall, more people will likely die. Full stop." - Truthout

Betsy DeVos gets a lump of coal for Christmas

Just a small lump, in context. But this is not disheartening, as far as it goes. It has been signed into law.

By contrast, the bill largely ignores the Trump administration's proposed Education Department budget, which would slash aid to the agency by about 10 percent. In fact, the spending bill continues to fund all the 29 programs the administration sought to eliminate. The spending deal also ignores Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos' signature proposal, Education Freedom Scholarships, which would use federal tax credits administered by the Department of the Treasury to pay for private school costs and a host of other educational services. The Treasury Department's budget under the deal includes no mention of new funds to administer these tax credits. - Education Week

Really inflicting their agenda on our education system has never been a big priority for Trump and his crowd of almost equally despicable witlings, so DeVos doesn’t have anyone’s ear at budget time. That said, she absolutely has done a lot of (under-reported, in corporate media), damage.

Further victimizing defrauded student borrowers

Basically, a sick, demented, vicious person who is not Trump - though this move undoubtedly has his explicit approval - is abusing her power, again.

Critics condemned Trump Education Secretary Betsy DeVos Friday for replacing Obama-era federal loan forgiveness regulations for student borrowers who claim that they were defrauded by their schools with new policies that could make it more difficult to access relief.

"On the Friday of Labor Day weekend, Betsy DeVos is gleefully forcing hundreds of thousands of students defrauded by for-profit colleges to suffer yet another indignity," Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said in a statement. "Shame on her."

...Since DeVos was narrowly confirmed by the Senate to lead the Education Department in early 2017, she has "refused to follow existing law and cancel the loans for these students, leaving them in debt they can't get away from," Eileen Connor, legal director of the Project on Predatory Student Lending, told the Times. "Now, she's shredding a set of fair, common-sense rules that level the playing field between students and those who take advantage of them." - Common Dreams