Independent Institute Senior Fellow Dr. Williamson M. Evers addresses the June 24, 2020, meeting of the Laguna Niguel Republican Women Federated of California.

Dr. Evers talks and answers questions about the serious problems in California's public schools in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis and shutdown of schools. He examines the serious gap in learning caused by the shutdown, problems during the shutdown (including grading, cheating, school accountability), and problems after re-opening—in terms of the interests of parents, students, and taxpayers.

Williamson M. Evers is Senior Fellow, Director of the Center on Educational Excellence and Assistant Editor for "The Independent Review: A Journal of Political Economy" at the Independent Institute. Dr. Evers was the U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education for Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development from 2007 to 2009; Senior Adviser to U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings during 2007; head of the Trump-Pence transition's agency review for the U.S. Department of Education; and Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution. In addition, he was a member of the Hoover Institution’s Koret Task Force on K-12 Education from its beginning in 1999 until it wrapped up in 2014.

Closing Schools Was a Grievous Error, by Williamson M. Evers