Michigan’s Republican gubernatorial candidate Tudor Dixon blasted Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) Tuesday for policies that caused Michigan’s students to lag behind academically during the coronavirus pandemic.
Recent test scores showed fourth and eighth graders are doing “horribly in reading and math,” so she wants to revive education, get parents involved, and “make sure our kids are back on track from the pandemic,” Dixon told voters during the final debate before the midterm elections:
Most states that had schools out as long as Michigan, which there are very few. So, close to as long as the state of Michigan had students out of school, have had comprehensive tutoring programs go into their schools. The governor has talked about literacy, coaches going into our schools… I haven’t found any schools that have literacy coaches yet. But I want to have a comprehensive 25 hour tutoring program for every student across the state to make sure that they get back on track from the years of online learning that they endured under this governor’s policies.
A Michigan Republican Party ad slammed Whitmer for failing students and working to keep schools closed down, Breitbart News reported in February.
“While the Michigan Democrat promised in her 2021 State of the State address that schools would be open to in-person learning by March of that year — claiming that the coronavirus pandemic ‘stole’ precious schooling time from children — many of the Great Lakes State’s largest school districts remained shuttered,” the outlet noted.
During their first debate, Dixon said Michigan students have “incredibly low reading scores” and also emphasized that Whitmer’s school lockdowns hurt young students across the state.
“Michigan is one of the only states where the governor didn’t immediately implement a tutoring plan for our students,” Dixon said and also called out the sex and gender theories seeping into the state’s public schools.
“Right now in Michigan schools, as you’re seeing on the news, parents are really concerned about what their kids are being taught with the sex and gender theory and not teaching them to read, write, and do math,” Dixon said, adding that she wants parents involved in education.