In this episode of State of Choice, host Ed Tarnowski talks with Valeria Gurr, Senior Fellow at the American Federation for Children (AFC) and founder of La Federación Americana para los Niños, which helps Hispanic families access high-quality education.
Ed Tarnowski: Welcome back to the State of Choice podcast. I’m your host, Ed Tarnowski, also known as Ed with Ed Choice. On today’s episode, it’s just going to be me and our guest, who I’ll introduce right now.
Valeria Gurr serves as a senior fellow at the American Federation for Children and is the founder of La Federación Americana por los Niños, which helps Hispanic families access high-quality education. After working for and subsequently leaving the teachers union, Valeria has become a nationally recognized expert on advancing educational choice for underserved families. She understands the profound impact that school choice programs can have on students’ lives, particularly those from low-income households.
As a first-generation American from Chile, she witnessed firsthand the struggles of poverty. Her mother, a maid, was not taught how to read or write, and Valeria, like others, was passed from grade level to grade level without attaining proficiency in any subject. Thankfully, with opportunities to access a higher-quality education, Valeria’s trajectory changed.
She earned her master’s degree in journalism and media studies at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, in 2013, and her bachelor’s degree in public relations with a minor in marketing at DUOC-UC of the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile in 2009. We’ve talked a lot about your background, so why don’t we start with you just telling us how you got inspired to be part of this movement and a little bit about your personal background.
Valeria Gurr: Yeah. Thank you, first, for having me. I’m super excited to be here with you today.
I love this podcast, and I hope we get some people to listen to what we have to share today. But I think my background always inspired me. I faced some of the discrepancies of the public education system in my own country, and when I came to the U.S., I always wanted to pursue higher education. But I had an incredible opportunity when I was working at the university at the Nevada Institute for Research and Policy to visit some of the most underserved public schools in my state. What I saw, it seems to me, it was eye-opening. I saw students that were in overcrowded classrooms, like 35, 40, and teachers being overwhelmed, really not being able to do the job that they signed up to do.
And I don’t blame them. I felt like, how can they do a really great job when they have so much to do and no support, no help? I also saw students…
One eye-opening moment for me was I went to give a class, a little class for parents, and the students were in the background eating their breakfast, and they were rushed from one subject to another, rubbing the food and putting it in their pockets. And I felt like I’ve been living in a bubble because once I pursued my higher education, my things were good for me, and you forget what you even go through. And I was like, this is no different than the education I had in Chile, but the US claims to be a powerhouse, a leading country in our economy, supposedly better than other countries in South America.
But when it came to education, it didn’t seem to be better. So I was inspired by what I saw and wanted to make a difference. So I was like, well, this is not going to help kids to access poverty, or this is not going to help them to succeed.
So that inspired me to want to work, and then I discovered School Choice. I didn’t know what it was at the time. And I thought it was a great idea to be able to break the monopoly that the public schools have, and to break the system a little bit and bring competition to it.
And I thought it will help teachers too to have options. So I joined the movement for School Choice shortly after.
Ed: Thank you so much for that perspective. We talk a lot about equality of opportunity on this podcast. Something that I’ve long said is, in so many ways, remember, America was founded on equality of opportunity, on people being able to build their own future.
And I think in many ways, America has lived up to that. But in one way that we’ve fallen short is on education. Too many kids are being left behind and they’re trapped in a monopolistic system.
Do you think there’s anything to that?
Valeria: Yeah, I think one of the things that happens in the US, which is unfortunate, is our kids come with a tag, basically. Each kid is assigned a certain amount of money, and the public schools have come to the realization that they need to have a lot of funding to be able to educate these kids, which is unfortunate. It has become a fight for the money and not a fight for what is best for the kids.
And we as a taxpayer, I’m a mom myself, I believe that I came to the United States because where I grew up was not giving me the opportunities that I needed to be successful. For example, we don’t have access to… If you come from a lower performing public school at the time that I grew up, there was no such a thing as financial aid.
So literally, if you came unprepared to get to higher education, simply your doors were closed, and that was it. And I see some of the same things happening here. Essentially, these kids stop believing in themselves, stop thinking that they can pursue their dreams simply because they’re poor.
Okay. That couldn’t be further from the truth. I believe that if you provide them options, opportunities, kids can actually exit the circumstances that they were born into.
But unfortunately, we continue doing education the same way that we had. I’m in my 40s now, and I’m amazed that the same problems that I had growing up still persist. And when you look at the gaps, you look at Hispanic…
I’m Hispanic, as you mentioned, from Chile. Hispanic students and African students are the ones that often suffer the most, and their reading scores and math levels are behind their counterparts as much as two years. And we continue saying that we need more money to fix the problem.
And we’ve seen in a state like New York, we’ve seen in many different states that money is not the only way to solve the problem. We have to be able to give… And I’m not saying that we shouldn’t continue funding public education.
I believe we should if it’s underfunded in certain areas. But also, we need something that is called accountability. And accountability comes with giving parents the power to choose what’s best.
That itself is going to help the accountability issues that we have. In the state that I live, we’re behind in educational rankings. Every single year, we’re dead last, nothing changed.
The argument I hear is more money for public schools and not options. And in Florida, for example, we fund everything. And we believe that options are an important part of the discussion.
And you’ve seen the public education system thrive and do better thanks to the competition, thanks to options is helping families. And everybody’s happy, teachers, parents, and students. But in a state like the one I live, Nevada, for example, we’re a clear example that we can continue just funding traditional public schools and hoping that the system is going to fit itself because it hasn’t happened.
And quite frankly, it won’t happen.
Ed: And I love that you mentioned how school choice helps teachers too. You mentioned that when we were speaking offline and in your bio, you used to be part of a teachers union. Could you tell us a little bit about that experience and how educational choice is really good for students and teachers alike?
Valeria: So let’s start with teachers. Teachers are phenomenal humans that want to change the world. They come into this profession because they love children.
They love teaching.
Ed: Absolutely.
Valeria: Yes. They’re incredible. They know all the struggles of the profession.
They’re not naive to what they’re signing up to do, right? But what I hear when I was working at the teachers union is that they were tired about with the bureaucracy of the system. They were giving and assigned certain curriculum and they had to teach students to pass a test.
And that to them wasn’t effective because they want to measure success in different ways that are beyond a test score. And in many different cases, they prefer like leaving to go to work in a different system, like a charter school, for example, simply because they’re allowed to change the rules and they don’t have to be subjected to like what the school district is telling them that they have to do. And that particular itself, like in talking with teachers that work in charter schools that have like five stars, which in my state is like a higher ranking for a school, they basically say the only reason why we’re more successful here than in a traditional public school is because when we see that something is not working, we change it.
When we look at the market and what they need, like we teach our students to be ready for what we’re going through as a society. So let’s say we need to be working more in STEAM programs or we need to prepare our kids to be ready for the workforce. We do those things and we involve parents on those discussions.
So like I hear from even teachers in micro schools, they have created their own environments in where they teach with their own educational models that is beyond passing and is beyond test scores and just being subjected to a grade level. And I know that I mentioned how our kids are behind math and reading and it’s because in so many of these cases, their tactics are not working. They’re just test, test, after test, test, test, after test.
That doesn’t allow kids to be creative and teaching them to be successful.
Ed: Right. No, absolutely. And again, thank you so much for that perspective, especially as someone who was in the teaching profession.
You really have a special perspective on that.
Valeria: Also like working for the teachers union. So those were things, for example, I agree with them helping teachers, for example, to advocate for their teaching conditions. I think that that is absolutely always necessary.
Howsoever, I left the teachers union because I felt like they were in the business of holding power at the expense of options. They are completely against a school choice. They are afraid of competition.
They’re afraid of what this means to them. And it’s very unjustified. But also they get involved, like they’re also a very political entity.
And most of the public think that the teachers unions are only there to support teachers, which is further from the truth. They have a really great name, and people get confused what the teachers union really is, and they don’t really understand what this organization does. And they get involved in elections.
And 99% of the time, they ask the people that they support financially in their political careers to vote against school choice programs. And also they get involved in many different educational decisions that have nothing to do with teachers and it has everything to do with students and parents. And they hold way too much power.
And I didn’t feel like that was moving the needle, at least it’s not what I signed up to do. I wanted to empower families and empower students and fix the educational system that failed me when I was growing up, and it’s failing hundreds of the students, and it’s failing teachers as well and parents. And I didn’t think that I was really making a change in this organization.
And that’s really why I left.
Ed: Thank you for sharing. And shifting now into elections, Latino Americans have become one of the most powerful voting blocs in America. And polling often shows that school choice is one of the biggest driving issues for this demographic group.
I’m wondering your perspective on how this impacted the 2024 election.
Valeria: Yeah, that’s a really great question. So 71% of Hispanics, like national polling shows, support school choice. And the polling continued, like the support for school choice among Latinos has continued to increase.
And it was very fascinating to watch this particular elections in where you saw Latino states like Arizona, Florida, Texas, Nevada, among others. Those are not the only ones, but like those are the ones like I was like paying clear attention because they have a high percentage of Latinos for the school choice agenda, Texas being, you know, particularly one where the governor, it wasn’t not just at the federal level that like a school choice was, you know, in the ballot, but also at the state level. And Governor Abbott actually said clearly and loudly several times that after they were people that voted against a school choice during the legislative session that he was going to replace those people and put people that support a school choice to run against them.
And he won every single, pretty much every single race where he said like, these people didn’t support them, like vote them out, and the public supported him. And this is a particular case for like, you know, Latinos in this particular state have a high percentage, most of the, it were Latinos voting for this saying, you know, we need to bring change. It’s a great, it’s a great case to show the rest of the country, you know, how like, how popular this issue is among Latinos.
We saw it in Florida, Florida already has a school choice, but continue voting for this particular issue and supporting it. The same is Arizona. In Arizona, they continue voting because now they have options.
And in Nevada, that doesn’t have options. Actually, one person that voted, like that spoke loudly about the issue was actually the elect president, Donald Trump. He said that he was going to support school choice.
Nevada doesn’t have it. And among the tickets, he was like the one candidate that came victorious in a state that is, you know, a swing state, very, very difficult for like Republicans to win. And he’s among one of the only ones that won in that ticket.
And he was outspoken about a school choice, like the first time that he talked about a school choice was here in Nevada. But in during his presidential campaign, he talks about how he wanted to pass ESAs. He thought education savings accounts were a great thing, and he wanted to bring them back.
But also he recently after like later during the campaign, he started talking about the ECA bill, which is a tax credit bill that like will bring 1 million of like scholarships for students nationwide. And it would be on top of a school choice programs that already exist. And he, you know, loudly talk about this.
And he said, like, how can be that we are, you know, a country that performs very, very well in many different other issues. And we are, you know, a powerful house in different issues. But when it comes to education, we continue to being at the bottom.
And he knows as a businessman, that he has to change how the system is working in order to bring the educational at the level that the US families deserve to have it.
Ed: And let’s dive a little deeper into what we saw happen in Texas, we saw some major moves in, particularly in South Texas. What’s your perspective on that?
Valeria: Yeah, we saw major moves, thanks to Governor Abbott. He’s a strong school choice supporter. And he’s been trying to pass a school choice for a while now.
And he actually was really outspoken. And basically, you know, put he put his, like, he basically did what he said he was going to do. He said, if you don’t support a school choice, I’m going to make sure I run candidates that support it, because I know that this is the way that we’re going to change the educational system in Texas.
And he knows that families need it, and for several different reasons. And he understands his community. And he’s just listening to the parents.
And what he show is that he invested a lot in the elections. And he’s basically put a school choice candidates, and they’d run campaigns saying that they if they were elected, they will come and bring educational freedom, freedom for every single family in the state. And what we saw happening is tremendous, like the voters voted with him and supported his agenda.
But it is amazing. I’m like, at the personal level, I’m really happy. I’m someone that has worked in Texas for a little while now.
And last year, during session, when we were trying to pass the education savings account bill, I got the incredible opportunity to visit one one school, a school that helps children that learn differently. It’s River City Christian Academy, I got to visit that that particular school. And this is cool.
That’s so much with less families. They’re like have to even sometimes work two jobs to be able to afford this is, this is a this is a school for no, you know, like for like middle class families, but their kids have like a learning disability. And it was a beautiful experience I ever seen.
This school was so well run, the kids were very happy, and they all learned differently. And one of the teachers, his name is Diego. He actually told me that he and he works there.
He told me that he, you know, went to a public school, went to a charter school, and like he was behind in her reading levels. And he like he just learned differently. But he was able to earn his bachelor’s degree and decided to come back to teaching this school and give back to the community that supported him and allowing him to go to college.
The most beautiful experience often you hear from like the people that opposes, you know, options that, you know, like a school choice doesn’t help children with disabilities. And here you have a clear example from River City Christian School, on how this school is making a difference in a community that needs it. The majority of the students there like very diverse school.
But a lot of these students were also minority students that are underserved in the in the public school system. And all they want to do is just see their kids being successful. We also did a panel discussion.
And people came and spoke loudly about how they wanted a school choice. And these candidates all run campaigns, saying, hey, like the status quo is not going to work any longer. And we have to do something differently.
And the public supported. So excited to see this excited to see the Latinos voted for the school choice agenda. In this particular state, this was the main topic, the main the main topic that families and I think it’s connected to the American dream, right?
It’s connected, like we know there’s a clear line in, you know, in order to be successful, you have to have an education or you have to be able and if you come from poverty, if you’re not able to have a good job or access to a good job, or like the knowledge that you need, then the idea of your American dream is broken. And in a state that are particularly Hispanics, I can speak, you know, for myself, we’re like a hardworking community that wants to provide what is best for children. And without a quality education, the American dream is broken.
Ed: Absolutely. And access to a high quality education is absolutely essential to upper mobility. And I’d love to hear you talk about the American dream because I do, I truly do believe that a high quality education and true marketplace of education is the best way to getting there.
So over the years, you’ve sat down with a lot of lawmakers from different levels of government from governors to legislators and beyond. I’m curious to hear how you’ve seen the reception to school choice change over the years. Has it has it improved?
Have you seen lawmakers across the country becoming more open to the idea?
Valeria: Yeah, I that’s funny that you mentioned this. Like I actually, you know, I’ve been working the school choice for a long time now. And I have never seen so much momentum.
I think that the pandemic opened the eyes of many families, students, lawmakers that like were like maybe hesitant to the idea to like actually pass the school. Like we when I started working, they were like half a million of the students participate in a school choice programs. And now we’re over a million.
And I’m just excited to see like what can happen during this next next administration to maybe to take it to two million students and like for every family to have a school choice programs, if the ECA bill, which is a is a is a bill that is, you know, like has the possibility to pass. And it’s the first time we have like anything like this happening. So I think the film like I think lawmakers have always been open to school choice.
I just think the teachers unions have always done a job to block it. But we have seen momentum, like even bipartisan support, like more legislators talking about like, hey, we have to do this is the right thing to do for kids. I saw it in states like Nebraska.
For example, we had legislators that were outspoken defending a school choice during the last legislative session. And I think more people will come as we continue speaking about the issue and how it’s changing lives, instead of focusing on what the teachers union wants to do on how they believe that this is not good for them. But we have clear examples now, like in Arizona, and like Florida, where like universal school choice programs are running in how this is good for all students.
And we have to have to continue moving the needle towards that in order to change and modernize education. But yeah, I think like excited to what I see. And I think also like even when you talk about charter schools, a lot of momentum there, a lot of bipartisan support for charter schools, and a lot of support for like coming our way for private school choice too.
Ed: Yeah, we’ve seen it become much more politically difficult for politicians to oppose school choice. And we’ve even seen politicians who traditionally wouldn’t support school choice moving in that direction. In Louisiana, we saw five Democrats join their Republican colleagues in voting for universal ESA, which was a huge deal and really shows that I think that the anti school choice wall is starting to break in America.
Valeria: Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. And I think like, you know, like I work in legislatures in the past, right? And what I hear even from Democrats is that they support it.
But often like they’re afraid to be outspoken about the issue because the teachers union will come and unseat them. And I think that we also have to like stop talking about partisanship, like school choice, and we have polling that shows that school choice is supported by all demographics. So like, and I think that’s why they know that they can like be outspoken against it, because that essentially can cost them their seat.
So like the public support school choice, the problem that we have is that the teachers union doesn’t and they’re involved in politics. So the minute that we continue talking about that, and understanding that the teachers union shouldn’t be making all the decisions, like with reference to education, I think that we’ll find more support and more people will like feel comfortable on being outspoken about the issue.
Ed: And on our last subject today, you and I spoke a little bit offline about the school choice movement outside of the United States. What would you like our listeners to take away and learn about school choice movement in Chile?
Valeria: I said that’s an interesting question. So, you know, Chile, we have, we always have like a sort of a school choice is different. It’s not a private choice.
But what we have there is a concept that is called escuela subvencionadas, which essentially is a type of charter school, is semi private. So essentially, they get a portion of funding from the government and parents pay a smaller portion. So which essentially is like a tuition, but it’s a smaller percentage.
These schools have done a tremendous job, just like us charters have done here. But it’s a mixture. And we also have, you know, like the other interesting piece about Chile is families get to choose whatever they like.
Like we have even public schools, for example, I went to a public school that it was a Catholic school. Families get to choose whatever they like, like, whenever they wanted, we have different models. And we have less of like a political input, like the unions are not that involved in these decisions, which has allowed to have more diversity on our educational system.
And I attribute that reason to be on why we are like one of the most, you know, educated community in South America, and like why our system has performed better than others, like, like with the economy and with respect to the economy, we talk about how the economy is tied to education. But Chileans are highly educated, we have like a really strong system when it comes to K to 12. And something that I really enjoy is like how you know, like languages is a huge aspect for us.
Like, for example, in my school, we had access to learning English, learning French, like very, very diverse. And I think we have a lot to learn sometimes. And you know, like, also, like you’re seeing, you know, Argentina trying to and South America in general, like looking at what we’re doing in the US and trying to learn from us, because they want to have a school choice too.
And they believe that school choice will change their economies and will help them to allow the kids to be more prepared to the labor force later on.
Ed: I love that perspective. And I love that you brought up the language issue, because it’s so interesting in the US. I went to public school, and I know that I’ve heard from a other people across the country that most people have taken a foreign language, but most people don’t walk out of American high school speaking a foreign language.
So I always say that the beauty of the market is learning from on what has worked. And I love to hear that in Chile, that kids are walking out bilingual, because I think that’s so important. It’s something that I wish we could, we would see more in the US.
Valeria: Trilingual, like honestly, in Chile, like kids, like they have access to, and it’s beyond, it’s like a more holistic, you know, like, like one of the things that I’ve done, particularly like in when I tried to enroll my kid, like the school options that I had was either like highly academic, like if I wanted to, or like, all the other way around, there was like no middle, like at least in the area that I lived. And there was no bilingual education.
And you know, Spanish is my first language. So like, me teaching my child how to speak a second language was very important. So he can speak to grandma.
So I know, and there’s only and this is an important issue for like, the Hispanic community, like there’s a lot of pulling on this that like families feel like, like take is like taking away part of your heritage. So like in Texas, there was pulling, like they were talking about this, like how they would like to see more bilingual education and schools actually integrated, but it’s not just, you know, one one fully way or the other, like, like, there’s a lot of immersion programs. And in my like, for me, that wouldn’t work.
Like, I want my kid to speak English very well. But I also want him to understand and to speak Spanish at least a little bit, so he can communicate enough. And in Chile, that was like a norm.
So like you have you when you go to school, you have to speak multiple language. And there’s a lot of research that shows what how that helps you in processing information, critical thinking is beyond is just beyond about is just beyond talking about a second language is more like what it does to you, and how it develops you as a human as a human being. So Chile has options, and we attribute the success of Chile in certain areas, you know, like I’m not saying that our educational system is perfect, because it’s not we have like similar similar issues that the US has, when it comes to like the public education, like the school that I went, it was overcrowded.
It was a better public school than others, but it still wasn’t the greatest public school. So but I think like, it’s exciting. I’m part of like a coalition in South America of like different universities, like over there is completely different than here universities are trying to fix the K to 12 system because they know in order to get more students that want to sign up to their programs and pursue higher education that they need to fix the problem that they have in K to 12.
So here that it seems like we work in silos, like higher education doesn’t get very much involved with K to 12. And I would love to see more of that collaboration, because we have to fix K to 12 in order to fix higher education. There’s no other way around it.
And it’s always a start in pre K. So I love to even see more school choice programs helping students that are in pre K.
Ed: One of Milton Friedman’s biggest arguments in favor of school choice was creating a marketplace of education, so entrepreneurs, and innovation, and new ideas behind education can thrive. And before we go, would you mind elaborating a little bit on our, for our listeners might not know what a micro school is, tell us a little bit about how that model works.
Valeria: So a micro school is essentially a tiny school, essentially it’s a school that parents can pay tuition to, in some, in some states they might be able to use, if they’re licensed, they might be able to use private school choice programs for funding, like such a scholarship, but in some states just parents pay out of pocket, they’re usually, like I see in micro schools are like the entire amount of students are like 20, but in some of them is five. I actually had my own micro school during the pandemic, what we did is just we hire a teacher, and my my kid was learning in a, out of a house for like three hours every single day, and that’s how he started learning when he was in preschool, his ABCs, and socializing, and playing, and having a great time, and I was part, you know, I was able to be there, like so they’re like different models, a micro school is essentially, like the difference between a home school is like parents teach, in this particular case often they have a teacher that is teaching, but parents are able to like get involved in any way they would like to, and they’re a small setting.
Ed: That makes a lot of sense, so no, thank you for elaborating for that for our listeners, and I’d say that in, it’s really important to note that in so many states across the country, some examples that come to mind are Arizona, New Hampshire, the education savings accounts in those states can be used toward micro schools, and other, and alternative options like that, and we’re certainly seeing families use them.
Valeria: Yeah, and like, I mean it varies depending on the state, right, depending on the state, like each one have different policies, but I think is, you know, it’s one of the most rural scenarios system, and more affordable like than, you know, like than any others, so I think that they’re doing a tremendous job. Some of the struggles they have often is like funding, and a school choice program can help them with that, so I hope that like, as we’re considering school choice programs during the, during the country, like around the country, like that we involve, like incorporate micro schools into the conversation, so that they can have access to education savings accounts, as you mentioned, or like even the tax credit scholarship programs.
Ed: Absolutely, and Valeria, it has been an absolute pleasure having you on the show today. Where can our listeners go online to learn more about you and your work?
Valeria: They can go to the American Federation for Children, my bio is there, and if they ever want contact me, or like email me, my bio, like in my bio, so my contact information, but, but also they can call me at 702-351-3448.
Ed: And best of luck at the completion of your PhD, and congratulations, I know that you’re going to rock it. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast today, and that wraps up our show for today. For more information on EdChoice and our resources, always feel free to go to edchoice.org, and follow me on Twitter at Ed Tarnowski. Thank you for tuning in today, I’m your host, Ed Tarnowski, also known as Ed with EdChoice, I’ll see you next time.