The person that U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos recently put in charge of her agency’s Office of Civil Rights is drawing a chorus of criticism from civil rights advocates and scholars over her historical hostility to racial preferences and other ideological stances — including having once complained that she was discriminated against for being White.
The Department of Education announced last week that attorney Candice Jackson had been appointed by DeVos as deputy assistant secretary in the Office for Civil Rights, as well as acting assistant secretary.
That is problematic for Wade Henderson, president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, who said the appointment proves that Secretary DeVos is “not taking her civil rights responsibilities seriously.”
“The civil rights community has seen troubling signs in Ms. Jackson’s writings and in her past hostility to civil rights and the value of diverse student bodies,” Henderson said. “This appointment calls into question Secretary DeVos’ understanding of, and commitment to, the mission of the Department of Education and its Office for Civil Rights — to ensure all students equal access to education.”
Dr. Erica Frankenberg, associate professor of education and demography and co-director at the Center for Education and Civil Rights at Pennsylvania State University, said it is concerning that Jackson once claimed she was discriminated against for being White.
“The equating of being conscious of race (e.g., the practice that she was protesting) with discrimination on the basis of race/ethnicity that many students continue to experience in our nation’s public schools and universities is very misleading,” Frankenberg wrote in an e-mail response to Diverse.
“I am concerned that it reflects a belief that may stifle efforts to further the implementation of policies and practices that will try to remedy the racial inequality that exists, and does not show an understanding of the ways in which the nation’s history of racial discrimination have resulted in a society in which opportunity is not equally available,” Frankenberg said.
