What?!

The DC Opportunity Scholarship Program provides supplemental funding for scholarships that are made available to the District’s poorest families, offering them a lifeline out of failing neighborhood schools.

And it doesn’t stop there.

The legislation (supplemental, remember, above and beyond typical funding for DCPS) provides $40 million EXTRA dollars a year to traditional DC public schools and charter schools.

So…

POP QUIZ

This means:

A) He is a liar

B) He has never taken the time read the legislation (then or now) and his staff is lying to him

C) The teachers union contributed handsomely to his campaign war chest

D) He will say anything to appease his supporters, even if it means robbing traditional public and charter schools of tens of millions of dollars, and thousands of kids of their educational future

(Answer: Thee of these answers are correct, but it is unclear as to which three.)

(In another bit of Maine news, yesterday, the state legislature again denied families another form school choice when their Education Committee endorsed an “innovative schools” bill which had all references to charter school removed before moving on to the main body.)

“You’ve got to face facts, Jeff. I’ve served our state well, haven’t I? We have the lowest unemployment and the highest federal grants. But, well, I’ve had to compromise, had to play ball. You can’t count on people voting, half the time they don’t vote anyway. That’s how states and empires have been built since time began. Don’t you understand? Well, Jeff, you can take my word for it, that’s how things are … Now, when the (bill) comes up in the Senate tomorrow you stay away from it. Don’t say a word. Great powers are behind it, and they’ll destroy you before you can even get started.”

Translation: Vote like we tell you, not how you think you should.

This, not the famous filibuster scene, is actually my favorite. It’s not made-up Hollywood stuff. It really happens this way, amidst a long cast of characters that descend on the new Member of Congress. And every two years, when a new Congress is created from the hundreds of districts our leaders have sprinkled throughout the land to represent us, it’s our job to remind them why we sent them there.

(Tune in tomorrow for Part 2 – Welcome to Washington’s Food Fight, Mr. Smith)

Now comes the hard part.

Frankly, you’re one of the few national education leaders I do not know, which gives me some rare objectivity in the matter. That, and the fact that my organization has no horse in the race, no member group to protect, no current ties to you at all.

So, let me offer some fresh advice about what you can expect – and what might take you by surprise.

1) Everyone will want to claim you as his own.  Allowing them to do so will compromise your efforts.

From where you will sit just across from the Capitol building you’ll see dozens of advocates converge on your department. They’ll arrive at the invitation of career department employees, who will beckon them to provide ideas for the new Secretary. Your incoming advisors will have little control over this. The bureaucracy has a way of creating environments and momentum entirely on its own.

As these groups come and go, they will tell journalists about their sense of your department. They will say, “We’ve been told he’ll fully fund our program” or “the Secretary is working hard to ensure all three year olds eat before school.” Some might say “he’s the biggest charter school supporter we’ve ever had and he’ll show that soon.”

And the Congress, just a few blocks away, will attribute all of these comments directly to you. The solution:

• Let the hard working career pool know upon your arrival that you and the others appointed by the President are the only ones allowed to speak about policy (though, of course, you’ll consult them regularly)

•Articulate your agenda and your priorities in the first week to avoid speculation and dissension

2) The Department of Education’s most senior level staff, from the attorney general’s office to the division manager in charge of state data collection, operates differently than your staff in Chicago.  They are seasoned employees who focus on implementing the law as it is written, not as it should be. Change comes slowly to them and their colleagues.

The first advice I was given when I arrived at my newly appointed post in the education department years ago was illustrative – “Things take time here,” they said. “Don’t expect to change policy overnight. It takes years.”

Yeah. Thanks. No.

You must choose two kinds of people to join you –Washington insiders who know the ropes and passionate reformers.  Both types are necessary to ensure key agenda items do not get lost in an “it takes time” comfort zone.

3) Saying you are “for” charters and performance pay will not make you a national reformer.

Supporting increases in the federal grant programs for charters does not constitute a reform pedigree. Directing those funds to states where charter laws are strong – as the law requires – gives you that pedigree. Likewise, backing and pushing through Congress a performance pay plan will not make you a reformer.  Using your bully pulpit to urge the unions to give up seniority and embrace comprehensive pay for performance will.

You can demonstrate how much you really do want to achieve by doing a few simple things that cost no money:

• Deliver an early “State of Education” speech, to follow the President-elect’s first major address as President. Making education the subject of the first major cabinet address after the President speaks puts the priority where it should be—at the top.

• Articulate the role of the Education Secretary versus a local superintendent, taking care to be bold about a national vision that embraces accountability and choice.  Make it clear that you will expect superintendents to do their part in making such ideas flourish.

Just like on the basketball court you cherish, Washington requires skilled players who learn their opponents’ moves before they act.

We reformers look forward to the tip off as well as getting in the game, Mr. almost-Secretary.

While there’s nothing glamorous about firing nearly 300 teachers and principals, Rhee has made more changes within DCPS in one year than most could even dream about over several decades. She’s not your typical cover girl, as TIME points out. She’s been called a “nightmare” but Chancellor Rhee seems okay with that. “Have I rubbed people the wrong way? Definitely. If I changed my style, I might make people a little more comfortable… but I think there’s real danger in acting in a way that makes adults feel better.”

A piece in today’s Washington Post shows that this new style can work, but with folks like AFT boss Randi Weingarten highly critical of this new trend, it is unlikely to catch on without bold leadership from our elected officials.

It reminds us that you can have anything you want in America – unless you’re poor, that is.

Nowhere is this more clear than when it comes to schooling your child. Much has been written about where the Obamas might send their babies to school. As they are looking at private schools, their new hometown paper, The Washington Post, is reminding them that there are other people who want such a choice, but the President-elect doesn’t support the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program that allows such a choice with taxpayer dollars.

There are others who want him to go to a charter school. One of his biggest fans, Democrats for Education Reform, a group which really believes he will carry their agenda, is pleading for him to choose a charter school in D.C., one of the 62 or so high quality schools currently serving almost 30 percent of the D.C. public school population.

While my organization is the nation’s leading advocate for charter school choices, I’m not so sure I want to see the Obamas choose a charter school. Though I disagree with our president-elect on many issues and fear that obsessive government solutions and spending will push us further into a government dependency, I want the best for him and his family when they come to Washington. I want him to have no distractions other than those that impact us all.

And frankly, if Sasha and Malia were to attend a charter school, here are just a few of the problems they’d encounter that are documented from schools here and throughout the country:

• Every month or so they’d learn that a city council member or their own member of Congress was pushing legislation to curb the freedom of the school to provide the kind of quality programs that such freedom encourages. They’d worry that such a move might hurt their school, and they’d have to wonder whether their choice was safe.

• They’d read in the newspaper about some study from some ivory tower institution, claiming that charters do well because they cream the best students. Even though Malia and Sasha would be sitting next to the most diverse student body they’d probably ever have encountered, from an income and possibly a color perspective, the Obamas would be told that their daughters are only doing well because the school creams.

• The head of the teachers union nationally, a friend otherwise to the Obamas, might say at a national convention (as she has numerous times) that charters don’t play by the same rules as other public schools, that they are mostly likely to reject special ed kids, when in fact most special ed children sitting along side Malia or Sasha may have hidden their disability at a traditional public school because their parents feared the dreaded IEP process of the school administration.

• The girls might be in a building that is less than stellar. The cafeteria probably doubles for the gym and the school meeting space where the choirs sing at Christmas or holidays. Unless the charter has a big fat grant from the Gates Foundation, there’s probably no nurse’s station because the public pays for only traditional public school facilities and not charter public facilities in most places.

• If the Obamas lived in Delaware they might wake up one day to learn of a moratorium on charters, making it possible that the legislature will further roll back the law. In South Carolina, they’d know that after two years, the state and school boards still refuse to give each charter more than 65 percent of what other schools receive. This would compromise just about every program they deliver.

• Mrs. Obama, as first lady of a child at a charter, you might also find the most dedicated, involved and passionate parents you’ll ever meet. Despite most being lower income and not having been involved at a school ever before, you’ll be overjoyed to learn that parents who choose are parents with power and they use it wisely. However, they often have to go to The Hill or show up at rallies at the city council to prove that they matter. That’s because there are city council members who really don’t believe that we should “do” public education in any other way than the one system that was created by Horace Mann back in the 1800s.

For these reasons, and more we could go into at great length, I’d prefer you find a place like Sidwell Friends or Georgetown Day (even though teachers are addressed by their first name there – you won’t find that kind of lower expectation of kids at a charter school) because for some strange reason, no one criticizes those schools. They are strong and deserve your patronage. There are lots of good private schools in the area of course. The Catholic schools offer a quality education for almost a quarter of what you’d pay at Georgetown Day. There are schools like the nonsectarian Nannie Helen Burroughs School, which has educated African-American children in their community for more than 20 years and is almost on a par with a Georgetown Day, minus the sports and international activities, APs, etc. They do it with whatever funds they can find. Thankfully the Opportunity Scholarship Program helps their children get the education they deserve.

I for one know that the Obamas will come to believe that. Meanwhile, I found the most difficult and important choices I’ve made are the schools to which I’ve sent my four children. Unfortunately, Maryland came to charter schools too late for me and in my county the only proposal ever sought was denied on arrival by a school board that just couldn’t figure out why parents might need a choice. I’m one of the estimated 25 percent in Montgomery County, MD that sends my children to private schools, so clearly there’s a demand.

But back to the President-elect and his family. Charter schools are working for about 1.5 million children, and in the District they are the key to why Chancellor Rhee can do what she is doing. They have opened up minds and hearts to a better way for children. The few that haven’t worked have, like any failing school should be, closed. But despite working 20 hours a day, on less funding and still meeting the needs of the vast majority of their kids, these schools have to fight every day for the right to exist and must put up with political shenanigans that have more to do with adult jobs than children’s welfare.

So stay out of that one, Mr. President-elect. We don’t need you to have more worries than the ones you’ll already have upon arrival.