Was Snow the best choice for Iowa superintendent?

These are words you don't often hear when a governor appoints someone from out of state to the position.

Nebraska and South Dakota have some historical examples.

Currently, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds is pinning her hopes on Mackenzie Snowe, a former Trump administration official, to become the Iowa Education Director.

The Republican governor appointed Snow on June 22nd. The Senate is expected to vote on her confirmation later this year. At a hearing held this week at the request of minority Democrats, Snow was praised by some of Iowa's public school leaders, but also criticized for her lack of experience in public education. Ta.

She is the former Virginia Deputy Secretary of Education and Director of the New Hampshire Department of Education. She is also the former policy director of the Foundation for Educational Excellence, a think tank founded by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush that advocated for charter school expansion and taxpayer support for private schools. The Foundation's mission aligns with elements of Reynolds' educational agenda.

Snow could be a great choice as head coach, but it seems strange that the Iowa State native wasn't given a chance to take the job down the stretch. Certainly, experience at a K-12 school in Iowa should come in handy. Given Iowa's longstanding reputation as an education leader, there would have been someone who could easily fill the position.

But Reynolds took a page out of Donald Trump's playbook and chose someone with less experience, risking a steeper learning curve.

Remember Betsy DeVos? President Trump selected her to be the U.S. Secretary of Education, but she has no experience in public education, and she behaved in a way that drew her protests when she visited some schools.

During the pandemic, she directed private schools to receive coronavirus relief aimed at public schools and universities. She also pushed for schools to reopen as cases soar, and she said her administration is considering pulling funding from public schools unless they offer full-time in-person learning during the pandemic. .

She formed a school safety committee (which included herself and three other ministers) but did not provide any concrete answers. Instead, she said, to combat school shootings, schools need “healthy relationships, caring communities, and an interconnected population.”

Snow worked under DeVos as K-12 policy director.

At this week's hearing, Snow received support from the superintendent of the Des Moines Public School District, the state's largest, the dean of the University of Iowa School of Education, the president of the Iowa State Board of Education, and the Des Moines area superintendent. community college. That's a sign of hope.

But why should we adopt a 'party first' approach when searching for people to fill key positions? 'Most qualified' should come first. Not “most faithful”.