What happened in the Seattle Public Schools — just as much as the higher profile pandemic-era meltdown in the San Francisco Unified School District — stands as a cautionary tale of how good progressive intentions can go terribly wrong, and as a microcosm of how the national turn in some of the country’s most educated and economically successful blue jurisdictions over the last decade away from a focus on accountability and academic achievement in schools has turned into an extended exercise in self-sabotage.

What happened in the Seattle Public Schools — just as much as the higher profile pandemic-era meltdown in the San Francisco Unified School District — stands as a cautionary tale of how good progressive intentions can go terribly wrong, and as a microcosm of how the national turn in some of the country’s most educated and economically successful blue jurisdictions over the last decade away from a focus on accountability and academic achievement in schools has turned into an extended exercise in self-sabotage.

What happened in the Seattle Public Schools — just as much as the higher profile pandemic-era meltdown in the San Francisco Unified School District — stands as a cautionary tale of how good progressive intentions can go terribly wrong, and as a microcosm of how the national turn in some of the country’s most educated and economically successful blue jurisdictions over the last decade away from a focus on accountability and academic achievement in schools has turned into an extended exercise in self-sabotage.