Statement by Sandra Feldman
President, American Federation of Teachers
on Education Secretary Roderick Paige's Remarks to the
Baptist Press News about Christian Schools and Values
 

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Secretary Paige is right about one thing. Our public schools are filled with "so many different kinds of kids with different values." But it is insulting for the Secretary, who should be the advocate for the 50 million-plus children in our public schools, to say their diversity somehow compromises those schools. Nothing could be further from the truth. This very diversity is precisely what makes our public schools great and so fundamental to American democracy.

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The AFT represents more than 1.3 million pre-K through 12th-grade teachers, paraprofessionals and other school support employees, higher education faculty, nurses and other healthcare workers, and state and local government employees.