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Linda McMahon: Ending Washington’s Grip on Education
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- [00:00]
Larry Arnn
Hello. Welcome to the Larry Arn Show. That would be I. I work here at Hillsdale College. My guest today is an awesome woman. She is the Secretary of Education. And it's a shocking thing that such a being would be in our studio, but this one deserves to be. Linda McMahon. In a minute. Hello America. I'm thrilled, thrilled to announce my new 10 part podcast series, Liberty and Learning with Mark Levin and Larry Arne. Join me and my dear friend Dr. Larry Arne, President of Hillsdale College, as we dive deep into the founding principles of our great nation. In these challenging times, understanding our history and the ideals of self government is more crucial than ever. We'll explore the core of America's current crises, the changes in our government and what it means for our lives and liberties. From education to borders, citizenship to the separation of powers, we'll cover it all. Tune in to Liberty and Learning with Mark Levin and Larry Arne of Hillsdale College. So subscribe now and join us on this wonderful journey to rediscover the principles that made America the freest, most prosperous nation in history. Don't miss it.
- [01:10]
Linda McMahon
Listen right now to Liberty and Learning with Mark Levin and Larry Arn at Podcast Hillsdale.
- [01:17]
Larry Arnn
Edu.
- [01:18]
Linda McMahon
That's Podcast Hillsdale. Edu or wherever you find your audio.
- [01:25]
Hillsdale College Announcer
Great books, great people, great, great ideas. Learning about these things is critical to being a well educated human being. And we can help with the Hillsdale Dialogues. Each week, Hillsdale College President Larry Arne joins radio veteran Hugh Hewitt to discuss topics of enduring relevance. And from time to time they also talk about current events, but always with an eye toward more fundamental truths. And they want you to tune in to a conversation like no other. The Hillsdale Dialogues are posted every Monday on the Hillsdale College Podcast Network at Podcast Hillsdale. That's Podcast Hillsdale. Edu or listen via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you find your audio.
- [02:13]
Larry Arnn
Secretary McMahon, we will cut this if she doesn't like it, but at round Hillsdale College, she is known as the Wrestling Mama because she was the founder with her husband of World Wrestling Entertainment. And she's a very remarkable woman and she's doing what I wouldn't believe, I would ever say a good job being the Secretary of Education. She was on the Connecticut State Board of Education. She was on the board of her college. She believes in worker training, studying the basics, local control, families and parents having a big say, states having the whip hand. And I do believe that the enrollment, the employee count at the Department of Education is down about a third since she Took it over. And that's remarkable. Welcome, Secretary. Great to see you.
- [03:07]
Linda McMahon
Thank you so much, Dr. Ahren, for having me here today. And the beautiful campus of Hillsdale College. This is my first trip. I certainly hope it's not my last because what I've seen so far is just absolutely beautiful and remarkable.
- [03:21]
Larry Arnn
Thank you. Thank you. What are you doing in Michigan?
- [03:24]
Linda McMahon
Well, first of all, I'm here.
- [03:25]
Larry Arnn
Yeah.
- [03:27]
Linda McMahon
I promised you when you and I spoke, as I was preparing to become the Secretary of Education, that I would look forward to visiting Hillsdale College and hearing all about the things that you do and visiting one of your K 12 schools, which I will enjoy doing tomorrow. That's going to be great. And from here, I'll go to Detroit. I'm visiting, I think, three additional schools and doing some roundtable discussions. And so it'll be a full day tomorrow as well. And I'm really looking forward to all of it.
- [03:53]
Larry Arnn
Super. Super. You have made some reductions at the Department of Education, and you have them on what's called their final mission, and that's a pregnant term. And you wrote in March 5, I think, a memo that you published to the employees and you ask their cooperation in this final mission to return education to its roots in the States. The parents managing. How's that working? How does the staff respond?
- [04:29]
Linda McMahon
We've just got an incredible group at the Department of Education. And even with the reduction, which is about half, not. Not quite down to a third, but we're down about a half. And we closed a lot of the buildings other than the primary building that is in Washington, D.C. now. And, you know, it probably is a little hard at first because one of the things that I was really concerned about was how would morale be if you were really talking about taking away a lot of jobs, you know, et cetera, for people who'd been there and working a long time, doing a lot of things, but there's or places for them to go. And we had good off ramps for those people. I think we really took good care of them. But the ones. The ones that are there are working very hard now to make sure that we do this transition of returning education to the States. And that is our goal. They're all on board with the mission. And I find nothing but the greatest devotion to the task from all of those who are working on it.
- [05:28]
Larry Arnn
I rejoice to hear that because you don't get much done by fighting. I mean, sometimes you have to fight, but it actually is, you know, if you care about education, it's exciting. Your Plan. Tell me the main elements of the plan. What are you doing? No, before that. What does the Department of Education actually do?
- [05:49]
Linda McMahon
Well, let me start with what it doesn't do, which I think a lot of people were confused about. What the Department of Education does. It does not control any curriculum in the states. It doesn't hire teachers, it doesn't buy books. It doesn't do any of those things. It is primarily an agency that is a pass through for the funds that are appropriated by Congress. It does have some supervisory oversight of grants that come from those appropriations that then go to the states. But primarily I think our job should be at this particular point is to focus on returning education to the states. And part of what I am doing, one of the reasons I'm in Michigan, one of the reasons I'll be in Texas on Tuesday and my visits to other states is that I am touring the country, all 50 states, many kinds of schools from K through 12 to higher ed. And I want to see what best practices are. I also want to see what practices aren't working. Because as we have looked and you and I have had this discussion about our NAEP scores around the country, our nation's report card, and how pitiful they are in looking at 8th and 4th graders and, you know, 8th graders only reading at 30% proficiency. Next week we will have the 12th grade scores come out and so we'll be taking a look at those as well. But as we have looked at those scores and knowing we're nowhere near where we need to be with education, and since the department was established, We've spent over $3 trillion and our scores have come down, they've plateaued a couple of times and they've continued to fall. We are clearly doing something wrong and we need to change. And I believe as the president that the best education is that that's closest to the child, that is controlled by parents and teachers and the local school chiefs working with governors on state policy. And it should not be controlled from Washington.
- [07:46]
Larry Arnn
Back in the Bush administration, the second Bush, I remember they had a scientific advisory panel and I knew some of the people on it big time scientists. And they studied the international math scores and they found that we were just one notch, a half a notch above third world levels, the worst in the development world. And that led Bush in some ways to go in the opposite direction. He thought we should get national standards. And then if people have national standards, they'll know their kids are doing bad and then they'll fix it. And you seem to be going the other way.
- [08:25]
Linda McMahon
Well, you know, I think no Child Left behind was done with the best of intentions under the Bush administration and probably the, you know, the next iteration of core curriculum that was tried to be put forth with that same sort of philosophy and Race to the Top, but it's just not worked. I think what we have found, what really does work is getting back to basics. The science of reading has been so proven now in Mississippi with the Mississippi miracle and how their reading scores came up. They were next to last, I think, and they're now about mid range and continuing to climb. The state of Louisiana has had remarkable improvement in its reading scores. I think they were number one in improvements last year. And so when we see that return to basics phonics for reading the basics of math, I mean there was something to be said for a little bit of that rote memorization and saying your times tables and things. Now that doesn't mean that we don't, we're not using new technology and that there aren't updated measures for it. In fact, I was in a school just recently and I think it was a third grade class and watching how phonics was being taught. And clearly it was a little different than when I was in school, you know, by use of the different technology, but it was the same sounding out effect and understanding of what, what vowels had, which sounds and what consonants, what sounds they had. And then sight reading and how you put it all together. And it just makes so much sense. It's so much easier when you do it that way. And as you know up until third grade, you're learning to read. And then by the end of the third grade, going into fourth, you're reading to learn. And if you have not learned how to read, you are just not going to be able to be successful throughout the rest of your courses.
- [10:09]
Larry Arnn
30 minutes before I came over here to see you, I was with my granddaughter and grandson. My granddaughter is 4 and I recognize that she's smarter than anybody else's granddaughter without saying, but she talks a blue streak. It's very elaborate. She used the expression to me a few minutes ago. I have just realized.
- [10:32]
Linda McMahon
I wonder where she heard that from.
- [10:34]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, there you go. And she's. And the thing is the sounds, she knows them, right? She can use them.
- [10:42]
Linda McMahon
Yes.
- [10:43]
Larry Arnn
And so take the sounds. The Greek word for sound is phonos phonics. Take the sounds that they learn by nature and apply them to the marks on the page and the next thing you know, you get a reader.
- [10:56]
Linda McMahon
Yeah.
- [10:57]
Larry Arnn
And how could we have Forgotten that. But we did.
- [11:01]
Linda McMahon
Well, again, as I say, I think probably with the best of intentions of trying new measures and wow, this theory sounds like it'll be good. And let's give it a shot and let's put a lot of money behind it and let's do a lot of training of teachers to see if we can make all this work. And it just didn't.
- [11:18]
Larry Arnn
We're in the school business around here, and I personally am a teacher, and I've learned a great lesson from that. And that is you don't teach them, they learn. And if they don't want to, if they're not paying attention, it doesn't make any difference what you do. And so you're right. You got to be close to them. And you know, if a parent stop loving their children, the world will die. But they're not likely to. So if they. And they're close to the children. So you're onto something there.
- [11:54]
Linda McMahon
Well, I would like to take credit for it, but there are others much smarter and wiser than I am who have put this fourth, and I've just adopted it.
- [12:02]
Larry Arnn
You're doing it. You're doing it. I was privileged to talk with you a few times as you were emerging as the secretary, and I thought, she's going to be really good, and you have a heart for it. And you're. I'll confess to our audience that one of my colleagues over there, Kyle, first time I went to meet you, he said, you should be careful. And I said, I'll try to be. And he said, she's been in the ring with Stone Cold Austin. You might be tough enough for this job.
- [12:35]
Linda McMahon
Yeah, I've never used any of those moves yet on Congress or on any of my travels. But I reserve the right. I have them. I know how to use them, and.
- [12:46]
Larry Arnn
They know they're there. So these reforms, because of what you said the department does, they're not changing how people. I mean, the lives of teachers are not going to be directly impacted. Is that fair to say?
- [13:05]
Linda McMahon
Well, I'm not sure exactly what you mean by that. What do you mean, the lives of teachers?
- [13:09]
Larry Arnn
Well, you don't hire them and you don't train them, but you do spend money. I mean, in public education, more people are not teachers than are teachers. And I just think that's a gross misappropriation. If you get the money closer to the schools, that should have a massive impact on teachers. But getting rid of the Department of Education will not have any direct negative impact on teachers, would you say?
- [13:37]
Linda McMahon
I Don't think it will have a negative impact as we return education to the states. And I've actually taken that as my motto. Instead of dismantling the department or taking down the department, it is really returning education to the states where it needs to be. And I'm just such a strong proponent of that. And as we, you know, when I had some, there were a couple of concerned parents who were asking me about special needs children and what would happen if the department had been totally returned to the states. And I would talk about other agencies that would take up some of the work that they do.
- [14:12]
Larry Arnn
But.
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Linda McMahon
But I asked her, I said, so let me ask you something. I said, you are standing next to your child. You have a teacher that's in that classroom who knows exactly the special needs of your child. Who is better to be their advocate in Washington? That person, you or some bureaucrat like me that's sitting in D.C. i said, because we don't know or understand what the needs of that child are. You. Are you be their advocate locally and. And wherever you need to take it. And I have found there is no better advocate in the world than moms. Moms have a good part in Moms and dads in America. But, boy, I'll tell you, when they're standing up and they are for their children and they are going to school board meetings and they are challenging what is being taught and they are challenging the board members and wanting to know what is going on in their schools and wanting to have a say. There is no more powerful force than.
- [15:05]
Larry Arnn
I've encountered than that, you know, that brings up dei. President Trump has signed some executive orders about that that you have praised. But the rebellion of parents against school systems hit national news in Loudoun County, Virginia.
- [15:22]
Linda McMahon
Yes.
- [15:22]
Larry Arnn
Which is close to the Capitol and full of people who work for the government, and they were doing things to their kids that the parents found offensive. Are you able to get rid of that stuff and why are you doing it?
- [15:35]
Linda McMahon
Well, I can do. Just recently, the Department of Education filed suit against five. Well, it didn't file suit, but we took action against five counties, one of them being Loudoun county in Northern Virginia. And There were Title 6 violations relative to the transgender issues. Just this past week, I had in my office several parents from some of those counties who were telling me about things that had happened. Two parents, particularly mothers of daughters who had daughters that went into the locker room. These were separate occasions. Two separate daughters went into a locker room. And there was a man in the locker room, fully undressed, who had gained access to the locker room by claiming to be transgender. How that happened, I don't know. But it was a man turned out, you know, that he was a sex offender and he was in the locker room. And this mother, you know, as she's telling me this, started to weep. And you could tell she was just still so emotionally charged, you know, by that incident for her child, a nine year old who came fleeing out of there, you know, into her mother's arms and just very upset. And, you know, Larry, if you just think about the common sense factor of that. I answered that question this morning on Shannon Bream's show on Fox, and she was asking me about that. And because she had read the law that those five states who had then sued the department of five counties, who had then sued the Department of Education, and she read the whole law and the basis of the law that they were speaking about, because it was a state law that they were citing. And I said, you know, Shannon, that's going to work itself out. Let's look at the common sense practicality of the effect that we are having on our children. That's the only thing we need to think about at this point. And I'm going to stand strong and tall for that.
- [17:24]
Larry Arnn
It was discovered on the Michigan Department of Education website. Teachers union started in Michigan a long time ago steps to take to counsel transgender kids and put them through therapy, which, you know, sometimes is life changing, and keep it from the parents. And there were steps there. Don't you. If you do it this way, parents won't have to know. And these are minor children. That's what broke out in Loudoun county. And apparently it's still there. I didn't.
- [18:00]
Linda McMahon
Yep. And it's just absolutely wrong. You can't give a child an aspirin or a Tylenol in school without calling the parents and getting permission. And yet you can talk to them about changing their sex, messing with their mind, pushing them in a way that they might not have thought about being pushed. I mean, there were club activities after school that were. Parents were being told there were art classes or art clubs, but yet they weren't. They were clubs to talk about transgender. And I just, I cannot imagine that. I really can't. And it's just beyond my imagination. That kind of thing would be kept from parents. Parents should be the deciding factor in that. And I would urge parents who have children who may need counseling or who are talking about these things to do it very carefully, mindfully that they are minors and that they're going to need time to grow up and to think through these things for themselves. I also probably a couple of months ago, had a group in my office who were transgender who had gone through some early on just psychological counseling, some who had physically made the change. And they were telling me how they felt that they were too young, they regretted their decision. That's not everyone. But these were people in my office who were telling me how emotionally and mentally they were struggling now because they made decisions when they really weren't old enough to make those kind of decisions. And so I would just counsel parents to make sure of and to think through that as their children are expressing some desires or teachers are talking on behalf of the children, I would just ask them to please remember these are minds that are not fully developed by any stretch of the imagination and are having difficulty, I think, thinking through what it is, you know, they want. I grew up. I was the best tomboy of all time. I was an only child. I was my dad's and my mother's daughter. I had the most wonderful childhood growing up. But what I thought was boys had more fun. So I didn't want to wear dresses. I wanted to wear jeans. I played on a couple of the boys teams. I never thought about. It never occurred to me about changing your sex. I just thought, this is just great fun. But I would have been no more ready at that time in my life to have thought about anything so drastic as that. And I just would caution parents, be thoughtful about it.
- [20:31]
Larry Arnn
You put that childhood together. Where does it lead? It leads to a charming lady who's been in the ring with Stole Cold Austin. You can actually have it all.
- [20:45]
Linda McMahon
Yes. The move that he performed on me was the stunner, which I was terrible at because it scared me to do it. It's one of the grabs around the neck and slams you down. And I was the worst performer. Having received the stone Cold stunner. I have no claim to glory with that at all.
- [21:04]
Larry Arnn
Live to tell the tale.
- [21:05]
Linda McMahon
Live to tell the tale.
- [21:07]
Larry Arnn
One of my colleagues when he was a student here is an all American football player, played a year in the NFL, and we have photographs of him wrestling a bear when he was a senior. He, too, lived to tell the tale.
- [21:18]
Linda McMahon
Yes. I was gonna say that was just plain stupid. Yeah, it was.
- [21:21]
Larry Arnn
Gorgeous George brought a bear to Hillsdale, Michigan, and two guys. The other one's Mark Law is his name. He's in our athletic hall of Fame. He wrestled him first, and he threw the bear, and the bear didn't like it. So John Cervini, my colleague, wrestled him second. He said, I didn't make the mistake of throwing the bear.
- [21:45]
Linda McMahon
Wise move.
- [21:45]
Larry Arnn
Wise move. Wise move. You talk a lot about special needs kids and you have a concern about that. How are you going to take care of the devolution you're talking about?
- [21:57]
Linda McMahon
Well, I believe that there are, you know, there's a rightful place for the IDEA funds that currently are channeled through the Department of Education. Haven't quite decided that yet. HHS seems to be a place where we might think about it. It was that that agency or that variation of that agency where those funds first funneled through, but it could be at another agency as well. And so we're just giving that a great deal of thought. But again, as I say, our job was just to funnel the money through and that money will continue to come. That should be the least concern of a state or a parent. There'd be any jeopardy to that funding. My goal, what I would like to see is that as we save some costs in other areas, we could increase the funding for idea, because I think we should. Congress has always said that it would like to fund it up to 40% of the idea budget and they've only come about 18 to 20% so far. So they have a ways to go.
- [22:57]
Larry Arnn
So might be able to double it. Yeah. Are you happy in the job? What do you like about it?
- [23:01]
Linda McMahon
I like it every day because I think we're making such good strides to improve education in our country. I would consider it a great legacy. It's funny to use that word, but I would consider it a great legacy if, when, at the right time, when I step down, when the mission is finished, that we would have made education better than it's been by providing states, as I mentioned earlier, with what I have seen to be best practices. I'd like to put together toolkits for different states and say these are things that I have seen that are working in other areas of the country. They're not mandates their opportunities take them for, you know, for the research that we have found that's been put into it. The practices that I have seen, the people who are actually embracing these skills and these techniques at this point, you know, and it's quite funny too, governors are a little competitive in these states, too. And when they see one state flourishing and doing well by a certain practice, they want to get on board with it or they'll take it, modify it for their state. And, you know, I absolutely believe there is no one size fits all in Education. And I think that education should serve the communities in which the schools, you know, are located, because I think that's really the first need. If there are jobs in those communities, whether it's higher education or, you know, K through 12, every community in the surrounding areas in that state really needs the students to graduate and have skills so they can get jobs, and that those jobs are part of the economy of that area, and that's what helps it all grow. And that can also lead into, you know, national jobs. There's so many states and communities that are really feeding the national need at this point. And so it starts locally.
- [24:50]
Larry Arnn
I'm going to go back to DEI for a minute. It's an interesting question comes up from that, because if a locality is doing that to people around parents, the federal government under Donald Trump, and you have moved to stop that, that's not exactly local control. How do you reconcile that?
- [25:12]
Linda McMahon
Well, I think it does turn out to be local control because there are so many ways for schools. You know, equity became kind of a bad word. But for many, many years, equity meant opportunity. And I don't think we should take opportunity away. And I think that is a local function. But there are many ways to handle diversity. There are many ways to have inclusion other than to have it mandated and taught that one side is an oppressor and the other side is the oppressed. And that one side is guilty of making sure that the other group does not rise to levels that it might. And we are teaching teachers to teach that. I just think that's wrong. And we've seen throughout our history that segregation was wrong and we brought people together. And I think we do that so well on a local level without it being mandated and ruled at this point.
- [26:08]
Larry Arnn
I've thought about that some myself. And the job of the federal government is things listed in Article 1, Section 8, of which education is not one. And it has a job through the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to protect the civil rights of people. And you could see these going around the parents as an invasion of their civil rights. And it could be that there's a federal responsibility for that that might not require a department of education. That can be done a lot of different ways. And, you know, another thing is most of the administrative state, most of the bureaucracy that outnumbers the teachers in education is at the state level. And some of that is funded with federal grants. And there might be pressure if this devolution on getting the money closer to the schools where it really ought to be. And that's not your Lookout. Exactly. You're a federal official.
- [27:07]
Linda McMahon
Well, I think that that's one of the things we're trying to accomplish in the competitive grants as we look to the new budgets that are coming up. One of the things that we are looking at at the Department of Education is that that grant process will be more at the governor's and the superintendent's levels at the states that they're not going to be so much strings attached to regulations. You'll be able to take this money and put it in the state. The governor can decide what part of the state he wants to do the competitive or she wants do the competitive grants within that state and take that grant money and do that instead of it just being saying from the federal government, you have to use this for this or you have to use this grant for this. But more of the block grant fashion that I think will improve what will happen in the states.
- [27:55]
Larry Arnn
Make them responsible.
- [27:57]
Linda McMahon
They make them responsible for the decisions they make. Absolutely. And put the money where the needs are in the states. They can better be judged at the state level by local superintendents of schools working with the, you know, the education commissioner of the state and working with the governor's office because they need to identify those needs. You know, is this, is this a failing school in this district that more money could go to this school or that children could be given more choice to get out of that failing school and go someplace else? And there's just so much that we cannot decide from Washington at the best level for states.
- [28:32]
Larry Arnn
Now you have been, I count four major actions encouraging school choice. Tell me about those and what your idea is behind them.
- [28:42]
Linda McMahon
Well, tell me which ones you're talking about specifically.
- [28:46]
Larry Arnn
Okay, I counted them up. There's one that provides grants specifically for.
- [28:52]
Linda McMahon
That, you know, that's under the, you know, the recent legislation that was passed. It was a big, beautiful bill that is, there's now going to be, you know, rebranded, you know, relative to tax cuts for families and. Because that's really what happened in the big, beautiful bill. But there are, you know, there are instances that the president is such a believer in school choice, he does not think that any child should be trapped in a failing school. He's been a proponent for school choice, you know, for so long. So as we look at those schools that are designated as a failing school. Okay, well, we're not quite sure why that's a failing school, but they'll know at the local level if that school is failing and, and that the children in that school should have the ability, you know, to use money within the states to go to other places, whether it's a charter school or another public school in their area. But they should be able to get out of that particular school and not fail along with the school. Schools that are deemed to be non safe environments now, and that can take many forms, it can be a physical non safe environment, it could be a mental non safe environment. But if there is a child and the parents look at that child and believe that that school is not the right environment, they should have the ability to take the funding and have money, follow the child and go to another school. And the president's incredibly supportive of all of that.
- [30:12]
Larry Arnn
There's a great couple of great movies. The one I've watched is called the Lottery and it's about the Harlem Success Academy and it's very touching. It shows the lottery day and tracks a few kids in their homes. They're all black kids and they're, they're, you know, getting new blue jeans to go to the lottery.
- [30:34]
Linda McMahon
Sure.
- [30:35]
Larry Arnn
And then on the lottery day, they lined up around a city block to get into the gymnasium. Some of them can't get in. And then they put the names on the board. We have lot, we have a bunch of charter schools at Hillsdale College and they all run by lottery. And when you put the list up on the board and the ones above the line are the ones that get in randomly chosen and the ones below didn't, and the list at the bottom is bigger and everybody gasps and the ones below and cries and cry. And it shows that in that movie. And I've seen it with my own eyes in several schools.
- [31:14]
Linda McMahon
Sure.
- [31:15]
Larry Arnn
And that means there's demand and that's, you know, it's a try. And then in that movie they show some public body given Eva Moskowitz, who's the founder of that, she actually, she's a Jewish lady.
- [31:28]
Linda McMahon
She's a success Academy in New York.
- [31:30]
Larry Arnn
Yeah. And she lives in Harlem.
- [31:32]
Linda McMahon
Yeah, I know her. I know her well.
- [31:33]
Larry Arnn
Do you? Yeah, she's galvanizing. I don't know her, but.
- [31:37]
Linda McMahon
And I've been to a couple of her schools.
- [31:39]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, well, she's something I. In the film, they show some public body raking her over the coals and people are dying to get into those schools.
- [31:49]
Linda McMahon
Oh, unbelievable. And because the schools perform, that's the issue. The schools perform. Their children come out of being way below being able to read to suddenly not only being able to read, but excelling at reading and excelling at their other courses. Because she has a proven formula that works. And she was really pleased to see. Well, I think the legislation didn't go as far as she had hoped. But now to be able to have individuals contribute to these educational scholarships to the 501s in different states and then those C3s can offer those scholarships to students for different schools, that's an incredible thing now to be able to participate in. And the donor gets a tax write off dollar for dollar. And that can stack right on top of any state deduction as well for that. So I think there are going to be many people encouraged to donate, to provide. So this is a great public, private way to get more scholarship funding for kids. You know, I think one of the things that I'm really grateful for, the president and his focus on what we're doing, returning it to the states, it has really shone a light on education and allowed us to talk about how we are failing our kids. We have failed our children in this country. For us to be so far down the totem pole compared to the rest of the world and our education in science and math and reading, the president was not only embarrassed by that, he was angry about that. How can we be doing this to our kids? And what we're doing, as I said earlier, is not working. Let's change, let's turn it upside down. Let's bring all the measures, you know that states can be. Let's let them be innovative. Let's show them the best in technology. I'm going Tuesday to Austin, Texas to tour a school and to sit down with the founders there. And it's the Alpha School and it is an AI driven curriculum. And I want to see how that works, how those children are progressing. For the first couple of hours in the day, I'm told, haven't seen it yet. They spend their studies with AI teaching and AI tutoring. And then the rest of the day they're spent in their other activities. Longer recesses, life skill training, things that they're interested in. So I want to see how that works. But, you know, let's allow the states to be those laboratories. Let's let teachers be innovative. Let's let teachers teach. Let's not have them just be shackled by, I think, a lot of the regulatory environment that they operate in today.
- [34:42]
Hillsdale College Announcer
Great books, great people, great ideas. Learning about these things is critical to being a well educated human being. And we can help with the Hillsdale dialogues. Each week, Hillsdale College president Larry Arne joins radio veteran Hugh Hewitt to discuss topics of enduring relevance. And from time to time, they Also talk about current events, but always with an eye toward more fundamental truths. And they want you to tune in to a conversation like no other. The Hillsdale dialogues are posted every Monday on the Hillsdale College Podcast network at Podcast Hillsdale Eduardo. That's podcast hillsdale.edu. or listen via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you find your audio.
- [35:27]
Larry Arnn
Hillsdale College is a small, Christian classical liberal arts college that operates independently of government funding.
- [35:33]
Hillsdale College Announcer
And we want you or your son.
- [35:35]
Larry Arnn
Or daughter to apply.
- [35:36]
Hillsdale College Announcer
At Hillsdale, students grow in heart and mind by studying timeless truths in a.
- [35:40]
Larry Arnn
Supportive community dedicated to the highest things.
- [35:43]
Hillsdale College Announcer
Hillsdale College costs significantly less than other.
- [35:46]
Larry Arnn
Nationally ranked private liberal arts colleges and receives regular recognition as a best value.
- [35:52]
Hillsdale College Announcer
And nearly all students receive financial aid.
- [35:54]
Larry Arnn
Our robust core curriculum, vibrant student life, and 8 to 1 student to faculty ratio make for an education like no other. For more information or to fill out an application, visit Hillsdale.
- [36:05]
Hillsdale College Announcer
Edu Info. That's Hillsdale Edu Info.
- [36:25]
Larry Arnn
We'Re sponsoring at Hillsdale College. We don't take any money from the government, so these schools never give us any money. But 80 some charter schools, they're all classically oriented, the opposite of AI oriented, I guess.
- [36:37]
Linda McMahon
Sure.
- [36:38]
Larry Arnn
But they get, you know, you got to get good at reading, writing, and arithmetic. You do, and then you can conquer the world, you know. And what classical basically means is basic.
- [36:48]
Linda McMahon
And I've toured a couple of classical schools already.
- [36:51]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, yeah, they're, you know, they're pretty good. One of them is ours, and they're, of course, proud to have you. And, you know, it's an interesting thing. You're your job, and the way you do it is, you know, like I can tell you, because I know some of the people in this one of the schools you went to, they talk about that for months because it's a blessing on what they do. And they're, you know, they don't do it to get recognition, but then when they get some, good for you. In some of the red states, some of the purple states, too, education choice is moving very fast. And when you start a charter school, and we've helped start many now, there's always controversy. It always. And there was a wonderfully candid thing in a Florida newspaper. A man said, if we let this school choice go the way it's going, we're going to have to let go a lot of these administrators.
- [37:48]
Linda McMahon
Whoopee.
- [37:48]
Larry Arnn
Whoopee. I didn't think that man had committed. Brilliant act of marketing.
- [37:58]
Linda McMahon
Well, it's like you said a few minutes ago, administrators outnumber teachers in schools, when I think we need more teaching assistance, we need more even parents to come in and participate sometimes when they have the time in classroom activities. I think all of that is so great. But teachers, they need help in the classroom because they're one person or two people or maybe three people. And if class sizes are bigger in some areas, they just need help with these students, which is one thing I think that AI does help with a lot because you can do some individual tutoring. And I have seen that in an operation, one teacher is viewing many screens and each child has their own screen and she or he can be looking at that screen and tell if that child is a little behind the rest of the class or a little ahead of the rest of the class and can actually then program more problems or whatever the course is to that particular child for that period of time. It's not for the entire class, but it's amazing what that one on one tutoring can do. I'm anxious to see some more of that.
- [39:13]
Larry Arnn
When our own children, we have four, we're in elementary school. My wife basically lived at the elementary school for about 10 years and she's just helping out all the time. And you know, that's awesome, right? Sure. Because you can help, you can help.
- [39:31]
Linda McMahon
And not only that, but you know, what's going on in the school, you know, what's being taught, how it's being taught. You can see and have your own, you know, barometer on how the classrooms are or are not being successful.
- [39:43]
Larry Arnn
There's some fundamental. You have reversed. How many times in my life have I heard the argument, well, families are broken and parents don't care and so we have to take care of the children. And I've never heard anybody, I've heard many people say that. I never heard that saying, you know, that's not really plausible, is it? I mean, is it plausible that you would care about the children more than their parents?
- [40:09]
Linda McMahon
Well, it certainly shouldn't be. I know that there are children from broken homes, latchkey kids from disadvantaged and lower economic areas that are not the same as other schools or other parents. But I would hope that as we put the kind of value into schools on a local level, that we can attract more and more. When you're talking about those charter schools and the lottery day, those parents know the only chance that their child has to get out of poverty and to be successful in life is to get out of the school that they're in and get that opportunity for education. Because education is the key. It is absolutely the key to success. And I remember telling the president in one of our meetings, I said, you know, Mr. President, it is the cornerstone of everything that goes on in our country. And we have to make sure that our children are the best educated because they are going to run defense and the economy and everything in our country. And we have to, I think we have to continue to stress families and family relationships and all of that, because it's all part of having a successful country. You teach that here at Hillsdale all the time.
- [41:24]
Larry Arnn
You need, we need more kids in this country.
- [41:29]
Linda McMahon
We do.
- [41:30]
Larry Arnn
And we need families to have them and they need to be good families. And it's a calling for people, makes their life richer. I always say to students at Hillsville College, if you don't get married and have kids, the chances are you're going to die alone. And it'll be an incredible pain having kids, as you know well, and it'll be richly rewarding. We have two or three, four maybe inner city schools and we've learned something from a great guy named Russell Gregg who started, he was in the, in the investment business and he gave it up and moved into the central city of Minneapolis and started a private Christian school called the Hope Academy. And the first thing he did was hired a full time staff person to keep the parents involved. He calls them, invites them to the school, he tells them what the homework is, checks on the kid. Once in a while, there's no place for a kid to go. Finds them a place to live. They still go to school. Sometimes they live with him. Anyway, the point is, if there's broken homes, that's a tragedy. The answer is try to keep as few of them as possible and try to put the ones that are broken back together and get them involved, you know.
- [42:55]
Linda McMahon
You know, in the government we called that stakeholder outreach.
- [42:58]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, that's right. There you go. I think, you know, we learned ourselves because we got some of them where there's a lot of broken families and, you know, the divorce rate's 50% or something like that. 55, maybe 45 maybe. And that's a problem. Well, you gotta. And I can tell you if it. Hillsdale College, we have very high success rates in the college. But if a kid has a deep problem, either they're sick or there's something wrong in their family. And first, two things you ask about.
- [43:34]
Linda McMahon
Sure.
- [43:35]
Larry Arnn
What have you learned doing this?
- [43:38]
Linda McMahon
Well, I, you know, I sort of made it my personal mission to say about myself, if I don't learn something new every day, you know, I just don't consider that day a success. Now, that may be a new recipe. It may be whatever it is, but I'd like to learn something new every day. But what I've learned really specific to education is that I do believe that there is a national concern now about the education of the children in our country. And I think that President Trump has helped raise that level of focus on education. And I'm proud to work, you know, in this office. I think a lot of things that are happening would not have happened but for Donald Trump being elected. I think a lot of what we're doing at higher education and on campuses, he campaigned talking about a lot of those things, the changes he wanted to make. And he's certainly doing them and has charged me to do them and given me the wherewithal, you know, to do them. And so I really do think that I've. I continue to learn about the good, the goodness of people, I think, all around our country. And I do believe that most everyone wants to bring out the goodness in people. They just have a different way of doing it. I would like to think that anyway, maybe I'm a little Pollyanni ish and that, you know, in that regard, but I like to look for the good in people. And when you show them a different way, oftentimes they'll take it and they'll improve on it or accept it or punch in the nose or whatever. But at least you have to keep trying. So I'm learning every day, I think, how are the best ways of approach, and that's very satisfying.
- [45:20]
Larry Arnn
What's the end game here? What do you hope Congress will do in the next two years, and what are you going to do?
- [45:26]
Linda McMahon
I really do hope that in the end, Congress will vote to return education to the states and to move the different departments that we're working on into agencies. For instance, we've already signed a memo of understanding with the Department of Labor because I do think so much of our education now, we are not looking at, in terms of job development. And I look at education K through 12. And in the end of, when you finish either 12th grade or higher education, you want to be prepared to have a job. How are you going to support your family, how are you going to live? And so I think that we've not focused on that enough. I think it has to get all the way down into grade school, middle school, follow through high school. What are the pathways that you will get to, what you want to do in life, whether you want to be an educator, an engineer or a doctor or a lawyer or an aerospace scientist. How do we identify that earlier on in education and help direct and guide you in that way? And I think a lot of that does reside in the Department of Labor. So Secretary Duramer and I are already working together on how we can move a portion of, like, Pell Grant management, et cetera, out of the Department of Education into Labor. And we are. We've signed this movement of understanding, and I have the authority to move people into labor and to help fund it, out of educational funds for the operation of it. Not. I don't have the authority without congressional approval, to say we are removing this from education and permanently putting it here. But my goal is that we will show how effective this can be with the push from education and the sharing of what we're doing and the development of these factors at the Department of Labor so that when it is time for Congress to vote, they will say, you know what? This works. This is right. And so if we do some of that with the Department of Labor, maybe we'll do part of it with Department of Defense. Some of it could be with hhs. So we are thinking and looking and positioning these different functions as to where they will best serve our children.
- [47:43]
Larry Arnn
There's a fellow graduate of the college who's starting a trade school here in town, and Donald Trump has said something nice about trade school, so he's very interested in that. I think that's a good development. And I think shop class in high school, like, whether you learn a trade or not, learning to work with your hands.
- [48:02]
Linda McMahon
Make something.
- [48:03]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, make something. I like to say the most valuable employees at Hillstock College are the maintenance workers. And it's my favorite joke. I'll say to the faculty members sometimes, you know, they're different from us. They know how to do stuff.
- [48:16]
Linda McMahon
They can fix stuff.
- [48:17]
Larry Arnn
They can fix it.
- [48:19]
Linda McMahon
You know, in part of the touring that I'm doing, I have been now to. I can't tell you how many community tech colleges where they are absolutely working with high schools, training students that are in, you know, juniors or seniors in high school. And when those students graduate, they not only have their diploma, but they have a certificate for a skill for one of the trades, or they can continue their education at a community college as Wake Tech that I've been to in North Carolina. There was Arapahoe Community College in Colorado that is more focused on aerospace and quantum computing and that sort of thing. But the kids are in these schools working to gain college credit at the Same time they're getting their diploma and they're going to be trained for the workforce. The skills of H vac, electricians, welders, carpenters. All of that are being in conjunction with these community colleges, which I think are just. It's an incredibly successful formula to have.
- [49:21]
Larry Arnn
Yeah. In Alpena, Michigan, there's a community college that's an international center for the study of concrete, which means how to make it, how to fix it, how to pour it. I've toured that place and I. It's been a while now, but I said to the president, I said, wow, this is useful.
- [49:44]
Linda McMahon
He said, a lot of sand and water. It's a lot of sand and water out there.
- [49:54]
Larry Arnn
You know. No, see, I think people are going to be fixing robots well, and it's.
- [49:58]
Linda McMahon
So important that as we look at education now, we have to understand that we are going to have to reskill our workforce because there will be people that will be put out of a job by more technology. But we need to reskill that middle class sector because those are the ones that are likely to be put out of a job at this particular point. So if we reskill them for that next level, you know, we're going to just continue to create more and more jobs. I mean, you know, when we went through our first evolution of manufacturing age and all of that, everyone thought that everybody's job is going to go away and the economy would go away. But what we learned was that we created new jobs, we reskilled laborers, and that's what we'll do with greater technology.
- [50:44]
Larry Arnn
The justification for the Department of Education, which started in the 19th century, the first justification was one that you state, and it seemed to me to make sense. It's a clearinghouse. We're going to see what the states are doing and share the information. But it grew into fix the problem all at once, everywhere the same. Yeah, we can study it here. It'll be very efficient and then we'll figure out the right way and then we'll roll it out across the nation all at once. And what you're talking about is it's a very fluid situation in the world today, in America today. And so maybe fixing it all at once is exactly the wrong thing. It could be. Let people figure it out and adapt and learn from each other. Because I drive a cybertruck.
- [51:37]
Linda McMahon
I know you and I talked about that and I saw it when I pulled in.
- [51:40]
Larry Arnn
I'll give you a ride in it today. It's very fun. And you know, it does drive, drive itself Reliably. It's amazing. And I'm very charmed by Elon Musk. I like him better when he's getting along with Donald Trump than when he's not. And he's, you know, that kind of goes like that. But he's a galvanizing guy and he just thought a lot of that stuff up and he's building it and nobody told him to. There wasn't a bill, there wasn't a, you know, and he sees, you know, I'm talking to Palantir this week, and that's Alex Karp, defense guy, and they're inventing drones and stuff. Nobody told him to do that. He's not in the defense procurement process in the same way most are. He just makes up stuff and then tries to sell it to them. And some of it's good. Anyway. The point is, the heart of America, isn't it always bottom up? People can think it's competition, everybody's empowered. And this idea of a national plan about local things is, you know, it is not native to America, although it's been around for a hundred years now.
- [52:53]
Linda McMahon
Well, that's not the way our republic was set up. That's why, you know, we have 50 states that are republics that are part of our democracy, and they are the laboratories of innovation and invention. And that's the way it should stay. Because what's discovered in rural America may not be what's necessary in New York City or Los Angeles, California, but it is absolutely critical to the survival of our country. And it'll become a trade or a skill or a product that is produced and grown and tended there that will be distributed throughout the country and throughout the world. And that's what has made America so great.
- [53:37]
Larry Arnn
I had an argument with a predecessor of yours in your job one time because she said, I won't name who it is. She said, we have to have a large federal program in order to compete with China. And I said, you know, aren't they better at that than we are? I mean, their doctrine is central control Communism. We have a lot of central control in America. Do we prosper under it, or don't things happen because people think them up and feel empowered to do it? Tocqueville says, you seem to me, by the way, the revival of some wonderful earlier arguments. One of them that if the federal government has a role in education, it's sharing information. But here's another one, and it's more profound. Tocqueville writes, the spirit of administration in America is bigger than in France. The first modern nation's first centralized nation state. But its spirit is every community is the best judge of the things that concern mainly itself. And you're preaching that gospel and that's true democracy.
- [54:51]
Linda McMahon
I do agree that, I do agree with that. Absolutely.
- [54:54]
Larry Arnn
I guess I have to mention student loans. It's a trillion some dollars, right?
- [54:59]
Linda McMahon
1.7 trillion.
- [55:00]
Larry Arnn
1.7 trillion. And growing, growing.
- [55:04]
Linda McMahon
But you know, one of the things that, you know, under the new bill, the big beautiful bill, there are caps now or there will be caps on the amount of loans, you know, that you can take out, which I think is a good thing.
- [55:15]
Larry Arnn
Yeah.
- [55:15]
Linda McMahon
And graduate programs, you know, that had literally no cap. And if a university said this is how much it costs to do this, you could borrow up to that amount. So there will, you won't be able to do that as much anymore. And I hope, you know, you don't experience that here at Hillsdale because you've kept all of your tuitions and rates low. You manage this and you don't take any federal funding. God bless. But you know, for a student to be able to take out a loan with what the college says is what it's going to cost, the rates just keep going up and going up and going up. And hopefully these new rules will help put some downward pressure on colleges that the cost can start to come down. I think we're going to see that too. Because while it's not the case here at Hillsdale, enrollments are declining in our universities around the country. And I think there are a lot of reasons for that too. One of them I'm a proponent of from this regard, and that is that not everyone needs to go to a four year college because you can develop the skills that you're going to need to do the kind of life's work that you want to do through certificate process, through apprenticeships, through other trainings, and you can finish that kind of schooling in a shorter period of time at a reduced cost and you're into the job market sooner. But for those students who can have the opportunity, experience to go to college and they can afford to be there and do that, and for those professions that continue to require it, medicine, engineering, lawyers, all of that, then I certainly understand and promote the best, you know, four year universities or five years or six years, and want to see that continue to grow and to serve the needs of those students. But for those who don't need to go there, and I think we've changed the paradigm and the culture of education, I talk about that a lot you know, there's, you know, after the war and after World War II, and there were so many parents that work so hard so that their child one day could go to college and they wouldn't have to have that kind of blue collar job and work so hard every day. Manufacturing was such a grind and that sort of thing. So you arrived when you could go to college. And so we kind of made the skills and the trades in our country kind of a default position for education. And now today, we need to understand that the greatest new class of millionaires in our country are those that are involved in the skills and the trades industry because they can learn, start their own businesses, start a chain of companies or whatever they want to do. And it's something that we should all have a sense of pride in. It's like you said, the mechanics here at Hillsdale, you think are some of the most valuable people, the maintenance people who are here. And they are respected and cherished and encouraged, you know, in their jobs. And they get paid well, and we should pay them all well. And those jobs and those businesses are the ones that are, you know, today, because you can. Because those needs never go away. They're always going to be here.
- [58:34]
Larry Arnn
I think that's, you know, first of all, these charter schools we run, help to run. Everybody learns Latin, everybody learns math, up to calculus. Right. And that means they turn 18 and they've got. And they've read the great books and they've read great literature and their reading skills and writing skills are excellent. Right. They can learn the best things, the permanent things, for the rest of their life. And if they want to go to college, they're ready. If they don't want to go to college, there'll be serious people in a trade. And that's the model, right?
- [59:20]
Linda McMahon
Sure.
- [59:21]
Larry Arnn
And if you have a cookie cutter approach, everybody's supposed to go to college. You have to change what college means. And we have done that. Right? I mean, some of these colleges, what do in fact, they learn and they take out a lot of debt. So you know what you're talking about. A secretary is a revolution and you are just the woman to lead it. And I have one last word of praise for you. If somebody told me six months ago that I, on behalf of Hillsdale College, was going to sign a contract with the Department of Education, I would have laughed in their face. But now I have done that because we're making these videos in the White House about the Declaration Independence. And they asked me to do it and I said, love to do it can do it. And they said, how much will it cost? And I said, that will be of no concern to you. And they said, well, that's a problem, because if we don't pay for it, we don't know if you can use the facility. And I said, maybe you should figure that out. And they said. Three days later, they called up and said, Linda McMahon has figured it out. So we have a contract that says we'll make these videos and be in charge of them. You're going to be on one, and they will be the joint property of both of us, and we can both use them however we please. And I thank you for that. Another sign that you are a revolutionary woman.
- [61:00]
Linda McMahon
Thank you very much. I think that's kind of being a good businesswoman as well, but thank you so much. I appreciate those kind words. But again, you know, the president gave me a charge and gave me leeway to take on this task, and I feel very honored to be doing it.
- [61:19]
Larry Arnn
It Bless you. Thank you very much on behalf of America. Thank you.
- [61:23]
Linda McMahon
Thank you so much. Thank you for having me today.