Speaking this past week at a conversation among education leaders in Washington, D.C. about the recent elections, Luis Huerta, Associate Professor of Education & Public Policy, noted that "a call for [school] choice is one of the few knowns in [President-elect Donald] Trump's [education] agenda, but that fact invites at least as many questions as answers." A quarter-century of experience with vouchers and charters offers results that are "mixed and quite uneven" for kids," Huerta says. Meanwhile, at-risk, lower-income neighborhoods are saddled with the yet-to-be proven concept of choice, while affluent suburbia has shown no appetite for abandoning strong traditional public schools for choice plans.

The event at which Huerta spoke was co-hosted at the headquarters of the American Federation of Teachers by the union and the Albert Shanker Institute. Speakers included AFT President Randi Weingarten; Catherine Brown, vice president of education policy at the Center for American Progress; and Frederick M. Hess, resident scholar and director of education policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute.