Voter polarization increases when presidential candidates take a stand on K-12 education issues

When Vice President Kamala Harris visited Florida in July 2023, criticized a state-approved lesson on black history It claimed that “slaves developed skills which they could, in some cases, use for their personal benefit.”

“Come on – adults know what slavery means,” Harris said in Jacksonville. “In the midst of these atrocities, how can anyone claim there was any benefit to being subjected to this kind of dehumanization?”

Donald Trump also handled the handling of race in K-12 classrooms, but from a special angle. In January 2023, he called for cutting federal funding to any schools or programs that “impose critical race theory, gender ideology, or other inappropriate racist, sexual, or political content on our children.” Critical race theory posits that racism is embedded in American society and law.

When U.S. presidents and presidential candidates become involved in debates about K-12 education policy – ​​as several have done throughout the country’s history – The results are sometimes polarizing.

At least that’s what we discovered in our recent study. examines the impact of presidential rhetoric on public educationWe are researchers who study Education policy and politics. We have found that presidents are generally unable to steer the general public as a complete, but that they’re tremendously successful at exacerbating the division of public opinion along party lines.

There is, nevertheless, one necessary exception. When a president supports a policy that’s traditionally more popular with members of the opposite party, partisan polarization on the problem tends to ease somewhat. Public opinion overall also tends to shift toward the president's position.

Education policy and presidential policy

There are quite a few examples of presidents extolling the worth of their respective educational programs.

For example, when signing the Primary and Secondary Education Act 1965federal funds went to low-income schools, Lyndon B. Johnson noted“I am deeply convinced that no law I have signed or will ever sign means more to the future of America.” More than 20 years later, in the course of the 1988 election campaign, George HW Bush declared: “I want to be education president. I want to lead a renaissance of quality in our schools.” In 2011, when he spoke concerning the Race to the highest program that provided incentives to states for reforms comparable to common academic standards and charter schools, Barack Obama claimed “This is probably the most significant education reform initiative we have seen in a generation.”

Although the eye from the Oval Office may make it seem otherwise, the federal government plays a comparatively small role in K-12 education policy. The overwhelming majority of spending and decisions are made on the state and native level. In the 2020-21 school 12 months, only about 11 cents of each dollar spent got here from federal sources. This figure also applies after bearing in mind the primary wave of Federal money in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic to enable a secure and effective reopening of faculties.

Yet K-12 education policy plays an outsized role in presidential politics. Incumbents and future White House occupants present their visions for public education, explaining why their approach will lead the nation to a more prosperous future while their opponent will plunge the country into disaster. They often use K-12 education policy as a medium to make clear their very own political identity.

George W. Bush used his position on education reform – a more assertive role for the federal government and more emphasis on school accountability – as a part of his efforts to position himself as “compassionate conservative.” On his second day in officeBush laid out these priorities by submitting to Congress a draft bill that might develop into the landmark No Child Left Behind Act.

Obama's support for Charter schools, performance-related teacher remuneration And annual tests allowed him to define himself as a democrat who less committed to the teachers' unions.

Trump and Joe Biden have similarly used their education platforms to burnish their political brands. Trump founded the 1776 Commission to Promote a “Patriotic Education,” with less emphasis on the role of slavery in early American history or ongoing racial inequalities. Biden, who’s attempting to distance himself from Obama’s reform agenda, told delegates of the country’s largest teachers’ union“You will not find a president in American history who is more committed to teachers or more supportive of them than I am.”

Presidents and public opinion

We desired to know the way the general public reacts when presidents engage in education policy. To answer this query, we analyzed the outcomes of 18 experiments that were included within the annual, nationally representative Education Next Survey from 2009 to 2021. In each experiment, some respondents were randomly chosen to learn the president's position on a specific education policy before all respondents were asked to point their support or opposition to that policy.

When we combined all 18 experiments, the typical effect of endorsing the president's policies on public opinion was zero. For the general public as a complete, information concerning the president's positions on K-12 education policy didn’t appear to make a difference. However, when members of the president's own party learned of his position, they increased their support for that approach by almost half a degree on a five-point scale. Conversely, when members of the opposite party received the identical information, their opposition increased by concerning the same amount.

There was one necessary exception to this polarizing pattern. When presidents took a position that was more popular with members of the opposite party—as when Obama endorsed charter schools, which have traditionally been more popular with Republicans—it helped close the partisan gap. Specifically, the result was a small but not insignificant reduction in the typical difference between Democrats' and Republicans' views on the problem. Moreover, such signals also tended to extend the general public's overall approval of the president's position. Presidents could reduce partisan polarization and influence public opinion, but only once they took a position that was politically surprising.

On the campaign trail

When presidential candidates advocate positions typically related to their very own party – comparable to when Trump argued that teachers ought to be allowed to carry concealed weapons or when Biden spoke out against a policy that might prohibit transgender students from using a Bathrooms in step with their gender identity – Americans use these comments to learn what Democrats and Republicans generally consider. In some cases People update their own beliefs in keeping withIn the present political context, the President's engagement largely serves to bolster partisan divisions.

But concentrate when a candidate deviates from the party line. These are the moments when the president's influence could steer the talk in a brand new direction.

Trump, for instance, emphasized his support for historically black colleges and universities, which usually are not normally a priority for Republican presidents. In the primary days of her presidential campaign, Harris closely hewn to the Democratic Party's traditional priorities in education: raising teacher salaries and forgiving student loan debt.

As the 2024 elections approach, we are going to watch to see whether candidates depend on their parties' teaching programs or whether or not they adopt recent positions that disrupt party lines and reshape the general public debate.