Evidence of Inconsistencies in Public Support for Educational Neutrality - Talk by Eric Torres
In this talk I present the results of a study of Americans’ attitudes about political socialization in public schools. Using data from a nationally representative survey conducted in March of 2025, I find that Americans across the political spectrum largely oppose schools attempting to steer students towards either liberal or conservative viewpoints, even if they align with respondents' own. However, a survey experiment reveals Americans are significantly more likely to rate as acceptable teachers’ political disclosures to students when those disclosures are aligned with respondents' own ideological leanings, suggesting that partisans may inconsistently apply their preferences for educational neutrality in forming judgements about individual cases in the classroom. These asymmetries in stakeholder oversight suggest a mechanism by which educational polarization between predominantly liberal and conservative educational settings might be exacerbated. I conclude by discussing implications for public trust in education and avenues for future research.