If you grew up in a lower-income community, or less well-off, the belief is that the way to change that circumstance is through education.
Michelle RheeThereโs a belief now that the problem with our schools is parents, that if we just had better parents we would have better performing kids and, therefore, we wouldnโt have a problem at all. But whatโs missing in that equation is that you do have a lot of parents in this country who are very involved in their childrenโs education and who do want something better. They want to see better for their kids. They know that theyโre in schools that arenโt performing particularly well and if you look at how we treat those parents, it is quite poorly.
Michelle RheeI believe that the teachers unions are doing exactly what they're supposed to be doing. They were designed to be professional organizations that protect the rights and privileges and pay of their members. The problem is that we don't have an organized national interest group with the same heft as the teachers union that's advocating on behalf of children.
Michelle RheeMy parents came from an environment where everyone knew that the way to be successful was to get a great education, and that was going to be your ticket in life. If you could succeed in education then you would succeed in life, so that was sort of the driving force behind my parents' upbringing, and therefore kind of how they brought me up.
Michelle RheeThe reality in Washington D.C. is if you live in Tenleytown versus if you live in Anacostia, you get two wildly different educational experiences. Itโs the biggest social injustice imaginable. What we are allowing to happen in this day and age, we are still allowing the color of a childโs skin and the Zip code they live in to dictate their educational outcome, and therefore their life outcome. We are robbing them every single day of their futures. And everybody in this country should be infuriated by that.
Michelle Rhee