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We already knew that Gov. Greg Abbott has a problem understanding that his constitutional duty to provide for public education doesn’t include promoting a multi-billion-dollar tax giveaway for private schools.

We also knew that Abbott has a problem with the truth. Most recently, during his GOP primary campaign to purge the Texas House of the Republicans who helped kill his voucher plan last year, he and his pro-voucher allies wrongly accused his targets of killing additional funding for public schools.

Abbott himself, of course, was responsible for killing the additional funding because of his vow not to increase state funding for public education without approval of a voucher plan, which he did not get.

Now that Democratic lawmakers are urging him to call a special session to provide the extra funding that is desperately needed by school districts fighting budget deficits, the governor’s problem with the truth has erupted again.

Now, he is blaming schools’ budgetary problems on local issues and the pending expiration of federal pandemic funding. Those issues are secondary. The main problem is Abbott’s refusal to approve increased state funding for public schools without a voucher program – even with a record, $33 billion state budget surplus.

“You’ll be shocked to hear this, but it’s not me that ‘s responsible for this (school funding crisis),” Abbott said, as reported by KXAN-TV and the Nexstar network.

No, I am not shocked to hear Abbott’s denial. It is what he does – deny blame and ignore the truth.

Liar is a strong word. But how do you have any confidence in a governor who, out of sheer political spite, creates an emergency for public schools, then denies any responsibility and wrongly shifts the blame?

Clay Robison

This is Teacher Appreciation Week, a few days of cheap freebies from fast food joints and other businesses working to increase their customers while giving educators some well-deserved attention.

That’s the commercial version anyway, and it is certainly better than the political version from hypocritical officeholders issuing hollow plaudits with one hand while slapping teachers with the other. Not all politicians fall into that category, but those that do – people like Gov. Greg Abbott and his legislative allies — really stink.

I haven’t seen a Teacher Appreciation Week message from Abbott yet this year. Maybe I missed it, or maybe he figured out it was pointless, but here is last year’s message:

“Texas teachers play a vital role in shaping the Texas of tomorrow. We thank them for all they do as they educate the future of our state – our students.”

That message was issued in May of 2023, in the middle of a year in which the Legislature – in one regular session and four special sessions – failed to use one penny of a record, $33 billion budget surplus to increase funding for teacher pay or public school classrooms.

Why? If you must be reminded, it was because the Legislature also failed to enact Abbott’s real education priority, a voucher plan that soon would have diverted billions of tax dollars from underfunded public schools to private schools. So, Abbott, in a snit fit, kept his vow not to increase public school funding, creating serious budgetary problems for many districts and, in some cases, putting educator jobs in jeopardy.

The real purpose of Teacher Appreciation Week is to recognize and thank teachers for their dedication and hard work in educating all students who come their way and, to the best of their ability and resources, preparing those students for successful futures. All students means all students, including those with gender identities whom Abbott has chosen to harass and bully.

Appreciation means more than free donuts, two-for-one chicken wings or half-price hamburger combos, for which many teachers doubtlessly are grateful. Appreciation also means higher pay for teachers and school support staff and more resources for their classrooms, all of which has eroded under Abbott’s watch, while political attacks on educators have grown.

According to the National Education Association’s latest national survey of financial support of public schools and educators, the average teacher pay in Texas is now more than $9,000 less than the national average, and Texas spending per student in average daily attendance is more than $5,000 less.

The teacher pay deficit has increased by about $3,000 since Abbott became governor, and the per-student funding gap by more than $2,000.

Does Abbott appreciate teachers – or public education? What do you think?

Clay Robison

State Education Commissioner Mike Morath was flippant to the point of being disrespectful when, in an appearance before the State Board of Education, he blamed school districts for the rising number of uncertified teachers entering the profession.

Morath claimed that districts had given up on hiring certified teachers and had moved to “hiring people off the street…It’s as if district leaders say, ‘You have a heartbeat. Come o in.’”

Not only is Morath a bad comedian, if that is what he was trying to be, he also is a bad education commissioner. To him, student scores on STAAR tests are the essence of public education, and charter school regulation means giving charter chains as many campuses as they want. And he consults with teachers about as often as a total solar eclipse visits Austin.

According to the Texas Education Agency’s latest report, dated last month, only 34 percent of the latest batch of new Texas teachers are certified. That is not the fault of school districts.

Partly this is the fault of state government – and that includes Commissioner Morath – creating additional, alternative pathways by which would-be teachers can enter the classroom without credentials and little preparation.

A huge share of the blame though belongs to the guy who hired Morath. That would be Gov. Greg Abbott, who probably has driven off more teachers than the pandemic with his political attacks on educators, his endorsement of book bans, his support for private school vouchers and his refusal to increase public school funding, including for higher teacher pay.

Even with a record $33 billion budget surplus, Abbott slammed the door on public schools last year in an effort to win a voucher plan that would have diverted billions of tax dollars to private schools within a few years. Failing that, he then spent millions of dollars spreading lies against pro-public education Texas House members in the recent Republican primary and succeeded in replacing six of them, so far, with pro-voucher candidates with little interest in public education.

Meanwhile, budget-strapped school districts have been left doing their best to replace and retain thousands of good, experienced teachers for what many educators have come to view as a thankless job.

And Morath, the education commissioner, pooh-poohs their efforts.

Texas needs a better education commissioner, a real education commissioner. But we are not going to get one until we get a better governor. Right now, we’re scraping the bottom of the barrel in both positions.

Clay Robison

School voucher advocates are already proclaiming victory when the new Texas Legislature meets next year, and with six anti-voucher Republican House members unseated in last week’s primary and four others headed to a runoff, it is clear the fight against vouchers – although not over — has become more difficult.

What is not so clear is whether vouchers had much to do with the election results. It seems more likely many anti-voucher voters were misled by millions of dollars’ worth of lies.

Gov. Greg Abbott and his school privatization allies mounted aggressive campaigns against the Republicans who helped kill last year’s voucher plan, but they didn’t openly make vouchers an issue. Instead, they used attack ads to spread falsehoods accusing targeted lawmakers of being soft on border security and killing a bill that would have increased funding for public schools and raised teacher pay.

The lies worked, even though the targeted Republicans voted for all the border security initiatives that Abbott demanded and would have voted for more funding for public education if Abbott had given them the chance. Instead, the funding bill was lost because the governor made clear he would veto it if he didn’t win a voucher plan for spending millions of dollars on private schools.

Abbott let the budget bill die during last year’s critical final special session after the legislators he attacked had removed vouchers from the measure. As a result of Abbott’s pique, many school districts are cutting budgets and operating with deficits, even though the state had a $33 billion budget surplus.

Abbott vowed to unseat the lawmakers because they voted against vouchers, but he and his allies dared not attack them head-on over vouchers because of long-standing opposition to vouchers among the legislators’ mostly rural constituents.

Voucher advocates claim that the large margin with which a non-binding referendum backing vouchers was approved in last week’s Republican primary is further proof voucher opposition is dwindling among rural Republicans, but it’s all in the wording.

The ballot proposition read: “Texas parents and guardians should have the right to select schools, whether public or private, for their children, and the funding should follow the student.”

Something more to the point, such as “Do you support taking hundreds of millions of your tax dollars from your public schools and sending them to unregulated private schools?”, would have had a much different response.

Some of Abbott’s voucher targets also were targeted by Attorney General Ken Paxton and his right-wing billionaire supporters for voting for Paxton’s impeachment.

It will be a while before we find out if the pro-voucher celebration is premature. Four of the anti-voucher legislators will be in a runoff in May, and many of the GOP primary victors will face Democratic opposition in November. If the anti-voucher Republicans who voted against their like-minded state representatives in the primary figure out the governor’s game, and if the anti-voucher Republicans who stayed home last week vote against vouchers in November, anti-voucher Democrats may be able to pick off a few pro-voucher Republicans, although Texas’ political maps make that a difficult proposition.

The public school district is at the heart – and is often the biggest employer – in many rural communities, and vouchers could eventually destroy some of the smaller school districts – which are already underfunded — or force consolidation among districts.

Voters in most of those communities are overwhelmingly Republican. But if last week’s results in their party primary aren’t a wake-up call for voters who truly value their public schools, I don’t know what is.

Clay Robison