Four Takeaways from the Passage of Education Reform

1. Even Democrats Realize AEA is Significantly Weakened

“Everything Henry just said told you all you need to know about AEA now and what we know is that it’s weak. When you say things like ‘we were railroaded, we were lied to’ by everybody from the governor to the janitor, those are statements of weakness, not strength. This was an awful loss for AEA in about every way it could be.”

Until recently it would have been unimaginable for those words to come out of the mouth of a Republican, much less a Democrat. But today’s AEA is but a shell of its former self. And as the events of this past Thursday illustrated, legislators are realizing it.

“We’ve seen the polling numbers in our caucus meetings and we know they can’t hurt us anymore,” one House member emailed Yellowhammer over the weekend. “They still have a lot of money to spend in campaigns, but they can’t attack us on our record because the overwhelming majority of Alabamians agree with what we’re doing.”

It’s become clear that detractors are having trouble attacking the GOP’s education reform bill on its merits as almost every criticism has centered on the process by which it was passed, not the policy itself. But even those criticisms ring hollow. Did Republicans tactically use the rules of the legislative process to their advantage? Absolutely. Did they break a single rule or do anything illegal or unethical? Absolutely not.

Legislators aren’t the only ones who’ve noticed the AEA’s decline.

Sally Howell, executive director of the Alabama Association of School Boards, says the difference between the AEA now and the AEA of the past is like the difference between night and day. “Three years ago, if AASB had a bill, the first thing we would hear would be, ‘Have you talked with [former AEA head] Paul (Hubbert)? What does Paul say?'” Howell told AL.com. “Today, if we have legislation, nobody says, ‘Have you talked with [current AEA head] Henry (Mabry)? What does Henry say?'”

The GOP is taking on the AEA, the Democrats and their liberal allies in the media and are still winning because the people believe in what they’re doing.

2. AEA Tactics Backfired

Members of the legislature have over the years grown accustomed to the teachers union’s process. They start by publishing vicious propaganda in the AEA Journal attacking conservative legislators. Then they send out emails to their members with legislators’ personal contact info. Then they implore their members to flood legislators with calls and emails reciting the AEA talking points. Throughout the process, AEA members corner legislators at church and other places accusing them of hating educators.

Many legislators have grown callous to the onslaught, but it’s proven to be effective at times. This time legislators had clearly had enough of the lies and personal attacks, and it played a role in the AEA receiving the biggest loss of their 40+ years of existence.

3. Del Marsh Should Have Been Higher on the Power & Influence 40

Senator Marsh this year came in 4th on Yellowhammer’s list of the most powerful & influential people in Alabama politics. He should have been higher. “His leadership philosophy compels him to delegate and empower others to succeed,” we said in his write-up for the list. That may be true, but Thursday was Del Marsh’s show and everyone else was a secondary player at best. “Del is the only guy who could have pulled that off,” one of Marsh’s Senate colleagues said Monday morning.

Marsh has been so fair to Democrats (overly fair some would say) this session that, in spite of the GOP holding a super majority, until Thursday they had not invoked cloture one single time during the 2013 session.

Marsh held off until exactly the right moment and then delivered the biggest conservative education reform in a generation.

4. Lost in the politics and process, Alabama school children and their parents are the biggest winners

Parents in struggling school districts have felt stuck for decades. They had no recourse if their local school was stuck in a perpetual state of failure. When Governor Bentley signs the Accountability Act of 2013 on Tuesday, that will no longer be the case.

According to the Heritage Foundation, “This means that children attending schools graded with three consecutive D’s or one F on the school grading card, or labeled ‘persistently low-performing’ on the state’s School Improvement Grant application will be able to leave their school for a private or public school of their choice.”
Senator Marsh and the Republicans in the legislature may have won the biggest political victory with the passage of the Thursday’s landmark education reform, but Alabama’s school children and their parents are the real winners.