Romney's Education Stance as Governor

Romney on October 3, 2012 said he wants to make sure our people have the skills to succeed - get us to the best schools. He also said the primary responsibility for educations is at the state and local level but the federal government can play an important role but the parent/child should decide what school to go to – let’s grade our schools so parents can take their child to the best schools. Romney continues to take credit for Massachusetts (MA) being #1 in the nation for education - take a look at what happened when he was Governor (January 2, 2003 to January 4, 2007). When Mitt became Governor, MA was #1 and it remained in that position for 2 years; from 2005-06 it dropped to #3 and in his last year it came up to #2. MA is again #1 but it’s not because of Romney – he had to leave for them to return to the #1 spot.

During Romney's tenure as MA’s Governor the per capita funding for public higher education decreased from $158 to $137 (13.3% drop). So I’m not surprised that Obama said the Romney/Ryan budget will cut 20% in education.

Romney has said in the past, "I really believe that the failure of our urban schools and, in some cases our suburban schools, to help minority students achieve the levels that are necessary for success in the workplace is the civil rights issue of our time." Romney has also advocated for a nationwide focus on education to close the "excellence gap with the rest of the world". As governor, Romney's plan allowed state governments to take control of under performing schools after 3 years; an intervention program for failing schools – a cause he apparently no longer seems to believe in as he thinks parents should be able to pick the school a child should attend. This does not fix the problems in our nation’s schools, it only allows those parents that can take their child to a school out of their district to find a better school and it will leave all those that can’t transport their child to have their child suffer in a sub-graded school. This approach will NOT as he said – make sure our people have the skills to succeed.