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In this week's edition: In North Idaho, a homeschooling mom-turned advocate for public schools is challenging other conservatives she thinks will destroy them. States and companies have shed degree requirements for jobs, but evidence of actually hiring those without a bachelor’s is scant. Plus, how the Trump administration upended education research and statistics in one year. 

_{A freight train crosses the Idaho state line in Kootenai County, heading toward Washington state. Credit: Joan Morse for The Hechinger Report}

How a Republican homeschooling mom came to love her public schools

Moms answer other moms, especially when it involves their children and schools.

Yet here it was, Election Day in the parking lot of Lakeland High School in North Idaho and Suzanne Gallus — a hyperorganized Republican mom who once homeschooled her seven children and is now a public-school advocate and school board campaign operative — was staring at her phone. Stunned.

“Nobody’s responding,” she said, pacing in a teal puffer on the chilly November day. “I’m sending texts to these parents, right? Like ‘Hey, Tina, don’t forget to vote today.’ I sent 10 of those texts and nothing. And these are people I know!”

Not 20 feet away, Mary White sat in a tent with a heater, an “All Aboard the Trump Train” flag, and a sign identifying her as a “MAGA REPUBLICAN” who serves as the precinct 305 chair on the Kootenai County Republican Central Committee, known locally as the KCRCC. She was doing what Gallus was — only for the other side, reflecting a division unfolding around the country that has traditional conservative Republicans opposing MAGA Republicans.

As trucks and cars pulled into the driveway heading for the polls, White stepped up to provide cards listing KCRCC-backed candidates on the ballot. Sporting a “Kootenai County Republican Women” name tag, White said that about “70 percent of the time, people vote for who’s on this list.”

The candidates that Gallus was supporting and advising were not.

Headlines around the country after Election Day announced a blue backlash to President Donald Trump and his policies. Success by moderate school board candidates over ultraconservative ones, including in Texas, Ohio and Pennsylvania — and reported losses by Moms for Liberty-endorsed candidates in contested races — spurred talk of a tide turning away from extremists who in recent years have had success campaigning on efforts to control books, curricula and what teachers can say in classrooms.

But the race for two seats on Lakeland Joint School District 272 board offered a frank reminder that supporting the ordinary nonpartisan function of public schools remains a firefight.

No college degree, no problem? Not so fast

For a decade, workforce organizations, researchers and public officials have pushed employers to stop requiring bachelor’s degrees for jobs that don’t need them. That’s a response to a hiring trend that began during the Great Recession, when job seekers vastly outnumbered open positions and employers increased their use of bachelor’s degree requirements for many jobs — like administrative assistants, construction supervisors and insurance claims clerks — that people without college diplomas had capably handled. The so-called “paper ceiling,” advocates say, locks skilled workers without degrees out of good-paying jobs. Degree requirements hurt employers, too, advocates argue, by screening out valuable talent.

In recent years, at least 26 states, along with private companies like IBM and Accenture, began stripping degree requirements and focusing hiring practices on applicants’ skills. A job seeker’s market after Covid, plus labor shortages in the public sector, boosted momentum. Seven states showed double-digit percentage increases in job listings without a degree requirement between 2019 and 2024, according to the National Governors Association. A 2022 report from labor analytics firm Burning Glass (recently renamed Lightcast) found degree requirements disappearing from private sector listings too.

But less evidence has emerged of employers actually hiring nondegreed job seekers in substantial numbers, and a crumbling economic outlook could stall momentum.

How Trump 2.0 upended education research and statistics in one year

Decades of carefully built infrastructure aimed at improving and tracking how American children learn vanished in an ideological attack.

Reading list

5 cheat sheets for parents of preschooler

Finding a preschool, boosting math skills and other tips for caregivers

Tracking Trump: His actions on education

The president is working to eliminate the Education Department and fighting ‘woke’ ideology in schools. A week-by-week look at what he’s done

STUDENT VOICE: I earned my associate degree while still in high school, and it changed my life

Congress should help state legislatures establish strong dual-enrollment programs nationwide

OPINION: We must help the next generation get from classrooms to careers with real guidance, not guesswork
A top-to-bottom shift that reflects true pathways will help give our high school students the guidance that they need

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