Whoever becomes Education Secretary has to have a love and

“Whoever becomes Education Secretary has to have a love and passion for public schools. Not charter schools, not vouchers, but public schools.” Thus spoke Jamaal Bowman, a teacher turned statesman, whose words rise not as a mere political declaration, but as a cry of the heart — a defense of the sacred covenant between a nation and its children. In these few lines lies both wisdom and warning: that the guardians of education must love not power, not prestige, not policy, but the people — the ordinary children who sit in crowded classrooms, whose futures depend upon the strength and equity of public education.

When Bowman calls for love and passion for public schools, he speaks as one who has lived among them — who has seen their cracked walls and crowded halls, but also their fierce hope and hidden brilliance. He reminds us that public schools are not mere institutions; they are the living heart of democracy, the temples where the sons and daughters of every background come together to learn what it means to be free and equal. The Education Secretary, in his vision, must be not a manager of systems but a shepherd of souls — one who sees each child as a promise, not a statistic, and who believes that justice begins not in courts or congresses, but in classrooms.

The ancients would have understood such devotion. In Athens, the birthplace of democracy, education was regarded as the foundation of the state itself. The philosopher Aristotle declared that the fate of empires depended upon the education of their youth. The Greeks knew that no republic could endure if its citizens were ignorant or divided. Thus, they taught all, not merely the privileged few, for they believed that wisdom was the common inheritance of humankind. Bowman’s words, though modern, echo this ancient ideal — that education must serve the public good, not private gain; that knowledge, like sunlight, must fall upon every child, not merely those born under a fortunate star.

Yet in our age, the purity of this vision has grown clouded. Charter schools and vouchers, though often built with noble intent, have in many places become the tools of division — siphoning resources from the common well and feeding inequality beneath the guise of choice. Bowman’s warning is not against innovation, but against abandonment. When the powerful withdraw their faith from the public school, they withdraw their faith from the people themselves. For what is a public school but the embodiment of a nation’s belief that every child, regardless of wealth or circumstance, deserves the chance to learn, to dream, and to rise?

Consider the story of Horace Mann, the great reformer of American education in the nineteenth century. He walked the dusty roads of rural towns, seeing children laboring in fields instead of reading in classrooms. It was he who proclaimed that “education is the great equalizer of the conditions of men.” Mann fought for public schools not because they were perfect, but because they were just — because they offered every child, rich or poor, a doorway to possibility. His work gave birth to the modern school system, and through it, the promise that democracy could educate itself anew with each generation. Bowman’s words carry that same flame, reminding us that the purpose of education is not to sort or separate, but to unite and uplift.

But, my children, love is not a policy — it is a practice. To have a passion for public schools means to see their struggles as our own, their triumphs as our shared victory. It means defending teachers when they are scorned, supporting students when they falter, and demanding that resources flow not to the few, but to the many. It means believing that the poorest classroom can still be a palace of learning if filled with care and courage. And above all, it means recognizing that a nation’s greatness will never outshine the light it gives to its children.

Thus, the lesson of Bowman’s words is both moral and urgent. If you would lead, first learn to love. If you would govern education, first serve those who learn within it. Let no reform or ambition make you forget the faces of the young — the ones who walk through school doors with dreams yet unformed and hearts yet fragile. The measure of an Education Secretary, of a teacher, of a society itself, lies not in wealth or innovation, but in how faithfully it protects the right of every child to be taught with dignity, fairness, and hope.

So remember this: public schools are the forge where the future is shaped. To strengthen them is to strengthen the republic; to neglect them is to weaken the very soul of the nation. Whoever stands guard over education must do so not with policy alone, but with love and passion — for where there is love, there will be justice; and where there is justice, there will be learning that lights the way for generations to come.