Texas Democratic Party: Moving Texas Forward

Rick Perry’s handpicked appointees at the Texas Education Agency (TEA) and his right-wing cronies on the State Board of Education (SBOE) have plagued the two state governing bodies that oversee Texas schools with cronyism, mismanagement and “flat-earth” ideology that fails to prepare our children to meet the challenges of the 21st Century economy.

• Perry’s handpicked TEA Commissioner Robert Scott tried to overreach his authority and go around the state legislature by removing caps on the number of charter schools authorized to operate in the state. These caps were placed by the state legislature to ensure effective oversight of Texas charter schools after several charters had failed to follow proper financial and accountability practices. (Source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram)

• Texas educators warned that the so-called “incentive” pay program for teachers, designed by the Governor and Republican legislators, was an inadequate gesture that would not attract the best and the brightest to teach our children. As overseen by Perry’s appointees at the TEA, this ill-advised “incentive” program has cost Texas taxpayers over $300 million over the last three years and failed to improve student achievement. (Source: Dallas Morning News)

• The same Republican State Board of Education extremists who previously attempted to gut science standards (Source: Dallas Morning News) are at it again, having appointed a team of six so-called “experts” to advise the SBOE on new social studies curriculum standards. Three of these “experts” are right wing ideologues who lack appropriate academic qualifications, and they are trying to force their ideology into our children’s classrooms by recommending that historical figures such as civil rights leaders Caesar Chavez and Thurgood Marshall be removed from textbooks and replaced by others that share their political philosophy. (Source: Dallas Morning News)

Under one party Republican rule, political indoctrination, cronyism and mismanagement have become the cornerstones of the TEA and SBOE.  So long as these bodies are overseen by Perry’s right-wing cronies, our children’s education will continue to suffer under the politically-driven ideological whims of Republican partisans.

Next : #5: Perry’s Political Cover-up Continues at Forensic Science Commission

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To read more about Republican mismanagement, corruption, and  pay-to-play politics, visit the TDP’s “Top Ten State Agency Scandals” campaign by clicking here.