The former chancellor of Washington, D.C., public schools is scheduled to meet with President-elect Donald Trump for a potential cabinet seat.
A Trump administration official said Michelle Rhee will be meeting with Trump in New Jersey on Saturday to discuss the secretary of education position. She is currently Sacramento, California’s, first lady, but she was the chancellor of D.C. schools from 2007 to 2010.
Her tenure in Washington courted controversy almost immediately after she took the position, closing 23 schools and firing 36 principals in her first year. In 2010, she fired 241 teachers under the terms of a new contract.
Rhee's aggressive style drew massive public attention. Rhee made the cover of Time magazine in 2008, and made an appearance in the 2010 documentary film “Waiting for Superman.”
“Michelle Rhee was a disaster in Washington D.C. She supported independent, privately-run charters -- sometimes for-profit,” Sacramento City Teachers Association Vice President Davis Fisher told KCRA. “Pretty much used private school rules and public money to continue the have and have-nots.”
Rhee was not active in education in Sacramento or in California.
