From an education policy perspective, there’s not much to say about last night’s presidential debate.
The closest we got to a discussion on education was when former President Trump was asked what he would do about the rising cost of childcare. In his response, Trump never mentioned the words “child” or “parent” or “family” and instead gave a rambling answer about how he had fired some of his top assistants (in contrast to President Biden), and then pivoted to a line about border security.
Biden wasn’t much better. He started his response by pointing out how great America is and how some presidential historians felt about Trump before briefly discussing childcare.
Biden later fumbled some stats on Pell Grant recipients and mentioned some funding for HBCUs (historically Black colleges and universities), but that’s about it on the night for education.
Besides my alarm at Biden showing his age, my biggest takeaway was just how little we heard about the candidates’ plans for the future. What would they actually do on childcare costs, on health care, on the economy, or on education? We heard precious little of those details last night.
