Education reform.
Education reform used to be a good thing. Back in the 1800s, education reform meant making education available to all. That was a good thing. In the 1950s and 1960, education reform meant school desegregation. Another good thing.
But now? Well, it's mostly Republicans behind education reform. Which should tell you everything you need to know. Because Republican education "reform" isn't about making the schools better.
Nope. They're Republicans; of course their motives are far more sinister than that.
The immediate thing you notice about modern-day education reform movements is that, seemingly, every single reformer is in agreement that teachers' unions are a problem.
How are they a problem? Because they allow teachers to live a middle-class lifestyle?
Well, no, that's not the problem. The problem with teachers' unions is that teachers' unions want to make it more difficult (or impossible, in the reformers' words) to fire "underperforming" teachers. What does "underperforming" mean? Usually, it means that the teachers can't get their students to pass state-mandated tests.
The state-mandated tests were one of the early reforms that Republicans proposed, and passed into law -- first at the state level, then at the federal level in the form of No Child Left Behind. The rationale behind all the testing was that people have a right to know just how much their children are learning in school. But, I suspect the real rationale was to convince everybody that the schools are bad and must be reformed.
Because that's exactly what happened. As soon as state-mandated testing became widespread (and then universal, under NCLB), more and more people began clamoring for education reform. Charter schools, school vouchers, school choice. Pick your poison -- all of them lead to the same place.
Privatization of education.
Because of course the Republicans don't really care about the students. It's all about figuring out a way to steer tax dollars into the hands of their big business cronies. Why throw government cheese at public schools when there's a way to get it into the hands of big business?