Editor’s Note: Corey DeAngelis, Ph.D., will be giving a speech and signing books at a Mackinac Center event on Tuesday, May 21.  

Most authors choose to dedicate their book to their spouse, their kids or at least their agent. But Corey DeAngelis dedicates his book, “The Parent Revolution: Rescuing Your Kids from the Radicals Ruining Our Schools,” to American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten and government teachers unions more broadly. DeAngelis, “public enemy #1 of the teachers unions,” writes of them:  “You’re doing more to advance freedom in education than anyone could have ever imagined. Thank you for overplaying your hand, showing your true colors, and sparking the Parent Revolution. ”

 The book mentions some distant history as well as some longstanding problems in the public educational system. But most of it focuses on the COVID-19 pandemic, the response from unions and their allies (in schools and legislatures), and the resulting backlash from parents.  

 The COVID-19 pandemic and officials’ responses to it were disasters for kids. Studies show dramatic drops in learning across the board, but especially for low-income students. Taxpayers got ripped off too. Spending on public schools skyrocketed, with little evidence it helped mitigate the spread of the virus or helped students recover academically.  

 The pandemic, however, may be the best thing that has ever happened to public education in America, according to DeAngelis. Why? Because it blew open the Overton Window for education policy and led to a dramatic increase in school choice. 

 Test scores plummeted in public schools during the pandemic, and schools have incurred many other problems. Private schools, however, have not been afflicted to nearly the same degree. Being responsive to parents, they were far more likely to weigh the risks and trade-offs of closing classrooms during the pandemic. They stayed open as much as possible.   

Why were public schools less responsive to parents? Many schools, DeAngelis argues, were not beholden to the students in the system, to their parents, or to taxpayers. Their chief concern rather was for the adults who run things — teachers unions and their elected political allies at the state and local level.  

 The evidence is immense, and DeAngelis does a good job showing his work. As his fans might say, “He has the receipts.” Among the worst:   

• The Chicago Teachers Union leaders vacationed in Puerto Rico while fighting to keep the district closed. (This came after they tweeted that “the push to reopen schools is rooted in sexism, racism and misogyny.”)

• AFT President Weingarten oversaw local unions that repeatedly fought to keep schools closed, but during congressional testimony in 2023, she claimed, “We spent every day … trying to get schools open.” (The reality was that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention often took its lead from the union in urging schools to stay shut to in-person learning).  

• Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolfe not only ordered all public and private schools to close during the pandemic, but he also closed online charter schools that served 37,000 students. Why? To “protect public schools from competition,” DeAngelis says.   

• Districts and regions with stronger teachers unions stayed closed longer than those elsewhere. But even more politically conservative states got run over by unions and their allies. Arizona, North Carolina and Virginia shut their doors for education while, ironically, being open for day-care services.  

“Parent Revolution” gives a bit of a history lesson on education, but its emphasis is on the era from the start of the pandemic until now. Advocates for school choice had secured small wins over the decades, but the pandemic and the years since then greatly increased educational options.  

States’ and schools’ responses to the pandemic highlighted the extreme positions of teachers unions, state and federal bureaucrats and many school administrators. Parents saw firsthand how the public school system is often run in the interest of adults, rather than kids. This realization united a groundswell of opposition, in conservative and liberal areas alike. Major policy changes resulted, at both the local and state policy level.  

Three years after the start of the pandemic, in 2023, school choice programs in 20 states expanded. Fourteen states now have nearly universal school choice programs. In these states, nearly all parents can get financial support, such as a voucher or tax credit, to pick from a variety of private and public school options.  

 DeAngelis thinks the opposition to school choice is confusing and hypocritical. Opponents of choice make a great fuss about allowing students to take a voucher or a tax credit and spend it at any school option they want. DeAngelis points out that this has been allowed, without controversy, in many other parallel situations: Pell grants and the GI Bill; Head Start and state-funded pre-K programs; food stamps and housing subsidies; and a host of other public programs. In all of these, the government picks up the tab but allows the beneficiary to spend the money with private entities.  

 So, what drives the opposition to school choice for K-12 education? The same thing, DeAngelis supposes, that drove the opposition to schools re-opening: the system has long been built to benefit adults rather than kids. These adults are backed by public sector unions, who fund the campaigns of those officials who then pass the rules. The unions’ efforts often result in higher pay, more benefits, and contracts favorable to themselves, not taxpayers or children.

DeAngelis grew up attending public schools, as I did. Like me, he had a parent who worked in public schools. Like me, he had a mixed experience. And also like me, he came to learn that the United States runs its education system in a nonsensical fashion. So we both favor reforms to that system. He writes, “I came to the conclusion that in America, nowhere was the problem of monopoly power more pronounced — and more harmful to our society — than the nation’s government-run school system.”  

My wife and I received a public school education, from kindergarten through to high school graduation. Our school-age children are in local public schools. My father and mother, sister and brother all work or worked in the public school system. Still, I agree with DeAngelis and support school choice. Families and individual children are very different from each other, and they need a variety of options that fit their needs. The pandemic showed the full extent of the problem. Competition and choice will prevent it from happening again.  

Permission to reprint this blog post in whole or in part is hereby granted, provided that the author (or authors) and the Mackinac Center for Public Policy are properly cited.