🌈 Cultural Wars in Education: Tom Horne's Stand on Ethnic Studies, Vouchers, and Title XI
🚓 More Police in Schools: A Solution or Overkill? 🤖 AI in Schools: A Silver Bullet or Just Hype?
Based on the 1/17/24 Buckmaster show on KVOI-1030AM.
🙊 Notable quotes from the show
On Voucher Program:
"Rich people have always been able to choose education. Now people of all income levels can do that." - Tom Horne
"It's mostly Scottsdale rich families using vouchers. Poor families still can't afford private tuition, even with the vouchers." - Facebook commenter
On Artificial Intelligence in Education:
"We now have the possibility that all kids go on to the next grade with 90% or more of the knowledge they need. This is the future, and I'm making the tools available right now." - Tom Horne
"Don't get scared. It's not going to replace teachers. It's there to help teachers." - Tom Horne on AI in education
On School Resource Officers:
"My nightmare is that some maniac is going to invade a school... and kill 20 kids and the parents will never get over it." - Tom Horne
"Having a gun-free school is like telling the world, come get me, I'm an easy victim." - Tom Horne
On Ethnic Studies and Race:
"We're all individuals and we deserve to be judged by individuals. We need to adhere to the traditional American value of individual merit." - Tom Horne
"If that philosophy wins out, we are going to become a mediocre country and a third world country. And China will be the predominant power." - Tom Horne
On Title IX and Transgender Rights:
"We have no business putting biological boys in girls' bathrooms or showers or locker rooms." - Tom Horne
"Men have bigger musculature, they have more circulation, they have tremendous advantages over girls." - Tom Horne on transgender athletes
😽 Keepin’ It Simple Summary for Younger Readers
👧🏾✊🏾👦🏾
📻 In a recent radio show, Arizona's education leader, Tom Horne, talked about giving parents more choices for schools, but many believe it's only helping rich families. 💰 He thinks using computers 💻 to help kids learn is a great idea and is putting a lot of money into it. Horne also wants more police 🚓 in schools to keep them safe, but some worry that might make schools feel more like prisons. 🏫 He has strong opinions against classes that teach about different cultures 🌍 and stands against rules for helping transgender students feel comfortable in schools. 🏳️🌈
🗝️ Takeaways
🏫 Voucher Spending: Arizona's voucher program has skyrocketed to $750 million, perceived by some as benefiting mainly affluent families.
🤖 AI Advances: Horne promotes AI as a solution for educational shortcomings, partnering with Khan Academy to provide tutoring for hundreds of thousands.
🚓 Increased Security: The number of school resource officers has doubled, raising questions about the militarization of educational spaces.
🌈 Cultural Conflict: Horne aggressively opposes programs that center ethnic studies, framing them as challenges to "traditional values."
🏳️ Controversial Policies: Horne's comments on Title IX illustrate a transphobic stance, with proposals that would marginalize transgender students.
School, Surveillance, and Sarcasm: Unpacking the Buckmaster Show's Educational Exposé
On a crisp January Friday morning in 2025, the Buckmaster Show transformed its airwaves into a battleground of educational politics. The show featured the ever-controversial Tom Horne, Arizona's Superintendent of Public Instruction, and Caitlin Schmidt, the sharp-minded journalist from Tucson Spotlight.
Nestled in the Zocalo Village Studios, Bill Buckmaster orchestrated a no-holds-barred conversation that peeled back the layers of Arizona's educational landscape like an investigative onion—guaranteed to make even the most stoic listener's eyes water.
🏫 Education in the Crosshairs: Horne's Voucher Vendetta
Tom Horne strutted into the studio with the confidence of a politician who believes he's got all the answers—spoiler alert: he doesn't. The voucher program, his legislative love child, has ballooned to a whopping $750 million, a fiscal feast that would make capitalist vultures salivate.
Horne's defense?
"Rich people have always been able to choose education, and now everyone can!" Because nothing says educational equity-like throwing money at a system that fundamentally reproduces existing inequalities.
"I had no vision of it at all. All I felt was that parents should be able to choose the best education for their children."
The irony drips thicker than Arizona's summer humidity. Horne claims the program isn't just for wealthy Scottsdale families, arguing that now "at least half of our students were in public schools" before switching to Educational Savings Accounts (ESAs).
One listener pointed out that Facebook's comment cut through the political rhetoric: "It's mostly Scottsdale rich families using vouchers. Poor families still can't afford private tuition, even with the vouchers."
🤖 AI to the Rescue: Education's Technological Savior?
Enter Horne's newest educational silver bullet: Artificial Intelligence.
With the zeal of a tech evangelist, he's partnered with Khan Academy, investing $1.5 million to bring AI tutoring to 100,000 students.
His pitch?
AI will be the educational equivalent of a Swiss Army knife—fixing everything from learning loss to potential dropout rates.
"We have the possibility that all kids go on to the next grade with 90% or more of the knowledge they need. This is the future, and I'm making the tools available right now."
🚪 School Safety: Resource Officers and Paranoid Protectionism
Horne's solution to school safety?
More police.
He's doubled school resource officers from 190 to 357, framing it as a protective measure against potential school shootings. The narrative reads like a militaristic fever dream, where educational spaces become mini-police states.
"My nightmare is that some maniac is going to invade a school... and kill 20 kids and the parents will never get over it."
🌈 Language, Identity, and the Colonial Classroom: Horne's Cultural Crusade
Tom Horne emerged as a one-man cultural demolition crew, wielding policy like a sledgehammer against what he perceives as threats to "traditional American values"—a phrase that should make any critical thinker's spine tingle with historical warning bells.
His most vitriolic attacks targeted Ethnic Studies and Mexican American Studies (MAS) at Tucson Unified School District (TUSD), a program that dared to center the narratives of marginalized communities. Horne's rhetoric revealed a worldview so profoundly rooted in colonial thinking that it could make settler colonialism blush.
"My philosophy is that we're all individuals and we deserve to be judged by individuals. And we need to adhere to the traditional American value of individual merit."
Translation? Ignore systemic racism. Pretend the playing field is level while standing on a mountain of historical oppression.
When discussing ethnic studies materials, Horne didn't mince words, claiming they were "openly racist." His evidence? A page allegedly divided into columns comparing "whiteness" and "qualities of people of color," which he said pushed stereotypes.
"They'd have a page with a line down the middle. On the left, it had the qualities of what they call whiteness, and on the right would have the qualities of people of color. And they would say negative things about white people, like white people interrupt too much and things like that."
His battle against bilingual education reads like a manifesto of cultural suppression. Horne proudly proclaims he increased English proficiency rates from a mere 4% to 31%, conveniently ignoring the cultural violence of linguistic erasure.
"When I took office the first time in 2023, the voters had passed the initiative in 2000, but my two predecessors hadn't enforced it. Bilingual education was everywhere."
The TUSD Desegregation Order became another battlefield. Horne denounced it as a legal manipulation, particularly in its application to ethnic studies and what he calls "political race theory."
"That deseg order was used as an excuse. You may remember I had a big fight with Tucson Unified about ethnic studies and political race theory."
His critique of Critical Race Theory and ethnic studies reveals a fundamental misunderstanding—or deliberate misrepresentation—of how systemic racism operates:
"If that philosophy wins out, we are going to become a mediocre country and a third world country. And China will be the predominant power."
When it comes to Title IX and transgender rights, Horne's rhetoric becomes even more explicitly discriminatory:
"We have no business putting biological boys in girls' bathrooms or showers or locker rooms. It will really hurt if that were done, it would terribly hurt public education, because if a father finds out that her girl has to go to a bathroom where there are biological males there, they'll take them out of public schools."
On sports participation, he doubles down:
"Men have bigger musculature, they have more circulation, they have tremendous advantages over girls. That's why we had Title IX in the first place, so girls could participate and excel."
Ironically, in his quest to "protect" women's sports, Horn perpetuates the very stereotypes and biological determinism that Title IX sought to dismantle.
His most chilling statement reveals the true stakes of his cultural warfare:
"If that philosophy wins out, we are going to become a mediocre country and a third world country. And China will be the predominant power."
It's a statement that speaks volumes—not about education but the deep-seated fears driving conservative educational policy. Horne isn't just fighting a culture war; he's attempting to erase the narratives that challenge American exceptionalism's comfortable mythologies.
In the end, Horne represents a dying gasp of a political paradigm desperately clinging to a whitewashed version of history—where "individual merit" is code for maintaining systemic inequalities, and "American values" are a euphemism for cultural suppression.
🏳️ Title IX and Transgender Rights: A Conservative Crusade
Horn's comments on Title IX reveal a deeply transphobic stance, railing against allowing transgender students to use bathrooms matching their gender identity. His solution?
A third bathroom that "preserves dignity" while fundamentally othering transgender students.
"We have no business putting biological boys in girls' bathrooms or showers or locker rooms."
🎤 Media Spotlight: Caitlin Schmidt's Journalistic Lens
Caitlin Schmidt brought a crucial journalistic perspective, probing Horne's claims with pointed questions about data tracking, voucher usage, and the broader implications of educational policies.
As an adjunct professor and founder of Tucson Spotlight, she represents a new generation of media practitioners committed to holding power accountable.
💡 The Bigger Picture
A portrait of an educational system caught between innovation and regression emerges, where technological solutions are bandied about like magical incantations and systemic inequalities are masked by rhetoric of "individual merit" and "choice."
The Buckmaster Show once again proves a critical platform for dissecting the complex machinery of Arizona's political landscape, one interview at a time.
Stay woke, stay informed, and never stop questioning.
👥 People Mentioned:
Bill Buckmaster
Role: Show host
Broadcasting from Zocalo Village Studios
37 years in Tucson radio and TV
Currently in 15th year of radio show
Tom Horne
Role: Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction
Republican politician
Former Arizona Attorney General (2011-2015)
Former state legislator (1997-2001)
Memorable quote about himself: "When I said I was going to run for office again, my friend said, 'Tommy, you're crazy. It's a huge cut in income from what you made as a lawyer,' and I said, 'There are huge problems in our schools, I absolutely have to work on it.'"
Caitlin Schmidt
Role: Co-media host
From Tucson Spotlight online news service
Adjunct journalism professor at University of Arizona
Former Arizona Daily Star reporter
Governor Katie Hobbs
Mentioned in context of voucher program criticism
Horn gave her an "F" for her state of the state speech
Kris Mayes
Current Arizona Attorney General
Horn describes having a poor working relationship with her
Dr. Trujillo
Superintendent of Tucson Unified School District (TUSD)
Mentioned as making significant improvements to district schools
Janet Napolitano
Former Democratic Governor of Arizona
Horn praised her as someone he worked well with bipartisanly
Terry Goddard
Former Democratic Attorney General
Another politician Horne claimed to have worked well with in the past
Tom Fairbanks
Appears to be a co-host or technical support for the show
Matt Gentry
Morning host on 101.7 The Drive
Discussed weekend events during a segment of the show
Peripheral quotes:
About Matt Gentry: Hosts a morning show playing 60s, 70s, and 80s music
About Tucson Spotlight: A new online news service with 14 staff members and 5 new interns
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China is already the predominant economic power in the world…