You know the old joke: How do you know that _____ is lying? Their lips are moving. Insert the name of American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten and it’s no longer a joke. It is, in fact, the truth.

On Tuesday the Programme for International Student Scores released their 2022 results, and it revealed an ugly truth: that US students trail dismally behind students in other countries when it comes to math. In fact, the scores represent a 13-point drop when compared with 2018 results.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), an intergovernmental organization of industrialized countries which sponsors the exam, remarked that the scores were “among the lowest ever measured by PISA in mathematics” for the US.

Not all is lost, however; the US scored above the OECD average in science and reading. Then again, anyone who’s taken even a freshman-level college science class knows that math is essential. Those atrocious math skills will catch up with America’s students.

But don’t blame the teachers unions for this dismal news, says Randi Weingarten. Blame Covid. And yes, school closures played havoc on academics, but we tried, we really, really tried to open the schools.

In-person learning is where kids do best, which is why educators and their unions worked so hard to reopen U.S. schools for safe in-person learning beginning back in April 2020. And why we’ve spent the last several years following the pandemic prioritizing public schooling and investing in real solutions that help kids recover and thrive.

Believe Randi!

Giphy.com.

Randi Weingarten Gets Blowback

Thanks to Elon Musk taking over Twitter, users are able to call out BS statements through Community Notes. And boy, did they call Weingarten out on her lies.

Like this note which called her claim “revisionist” while bringing receipts from Ed Week and The Guardian US:

This is revisionist. Weingarten, along with nationwide and local teachers unions, advocated for school closures well into 2021. Weingarten was the public face of school closures during 2020 and 2021. She called plans to reopen schools in Fall 2020 “reckless” and “callous.”

Other notes included the following, also with links:

In July of 2020 Randi threatened strikes if schools returned in person

In August 2020 she was pushing to strengthen online learning

She only changed her tune when returning in person was inevitable

This NYC mom wrote at X:

If Randi had reopened schools (or had at least not fought tooth and nail to keep them closed), parents like me wouldn’t have had to sue… to reopen schools!

Finally, Ian Miller from Outkick posted this:

It’s impressive that Randi is willing to lie so brazenly considering everyone who was alive in 2020-2021 saw how hard she & her union worked to keep schools closed There are dozens of news stories & posts directly contradicting what she says and she just doesn’t care. Amazing.

But whom you gonna believe — Randi or your lying eyes?

Mike Pompeo Was Right About Weingarten

One year ago former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo sat down for an interview with David Weigel and Shelby Talcott from Semafor. And what he said was brazen, but over time he will be proved correct.

Pompeo said this about Randi Weingarten:

I get asked “Who’s the most dangerous person in the world? Is it Chairman Kim, is it Xi Jinping?” The most dangerous person in the world is Randi Weingarten. It’s not a close call. If you ask, “Who’s the most likely to take this republic down?” It would be the teacher’s unions, and the filth that they’re teaching our kids, and the fact that they don’t know math and reading or writing.

Pompeo’s comments naturally caused a furor, but in a comment for the New York Times Magazine in April, 2023, Pompeo stuck by his guns:

“Oh, goodness, no! Not at all!” Pompeo answered when I asked if he was, perhaps, being hyperbolic in his remarks about Weingarten. “It’s not just about Ms. Weingarten, but she has been the most visible face of the destruction of American education.”

Today we might view the trifecta of Russia, China, and Iran as the greatest threat to the United States. However, if we don’t produce students who will be able handle the technology needed to maintain our strength in the world, then we will fade. Mike Pompeo was absolutely correct about Weingarten.

Meanwhile Parochial Schools Succeed

While Randi Weingarten and her merry band of unionists made sure that public schools stayed closed, parochial schools reopened in fall of 2020. The largest number of such schools are Catholic, and their results are glowing.

For example, scores from fourth and eighth grade students from Catholic schools stayed the same or even improved after Covid. Meanwhile national scores from public school students declined dramatically — thanks to Randi Weingarten and her penchant for school closures.

I can attest to the success of one Catholic school student: my grandson. He was entering third grade when his family moved to the Washington, DC, area after his Navy officer dad was assigned to the Pentagon. Arriving there in June, 2020, my grandson entered a Catholic grade school in the fall.

The family is back in Washington State, where he is in sixth grade at the Catholic school he left in 2020. Academically he’s thriving, having been promoted into seventh grade math classes, which includes beginning algebra. He’s continuing with sports, too.

Meanwhile, Randi Weingarten continues to gaslight the parents of public school students. Unfortunately many of those kids are in poor areas of cities like Chicago — where not only does the Chicago Teachers Union rule but one of their own is now the bungling mayor of the city.

How long it will take to recover from the catastrophe that Weingarten and her union goons have inflicted upon America’s public school students? Maybe a generation will never recover. But weakening the deleterious effects of teachers unions can start with school choice, an idea whose implementation is long overdue.

Featured image: “Washington Teachers Union Rally for Respect” by mar is sea Y is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. Cropped.