Bush Picks School Reformer Tennessean to Replace Cavazos

President Bush today chose former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander, who has been active in education reform, to fill the post of education secretary vacated last week when Lauro F. Cavazos was forced to resign.

Meanwhile, the Adminstration signaled it may be backing away from a controversial Education Department edict that race-based minority scholarships are illegal. White House Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater said Bush was “very disturbed” about the ruling.

“No governor in the country is so clearly identified with the movement to improve education,” Bush said in presenting Alexander. He described the nominee as being “at the forefront of the movement to restructure our nation’s schools.”

A Republican, Alexander has long been a national leader in education reform. He has been president of the University of Tennessee for the last three years. He was governor of Tennessee from 1978-86.

While governor, he pushed for education reform and instituted his “master teacher plan.” That plan gave teachers higher pay based on education levels and performance.

On the subject of race-based scholarships, Fitzwater said Bush has ordered the Education Department to conduct a quick review, with advice from the Justice Department and White House lawyers.

Bush “believes these scholarships are important to minorities and to ensuring opportunities for all Americans to get a good education,” the spokesman said.

Alexander said, “We have scholarships for minority students who are poor at the University of Tennessee” and they have proved useful in helping poor students get an education.

Robert Atwell, president of the American Council on Education, called the naming of Alexander “the most positive signal we could have gotten that the President really wants to be the education President.” The council is a Washington-based lobby representing about 1,800 institutions of higher learning.

Albert Shanker, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said he is optimistic that Alexander, as a former governor, can bring to the department some of the dynamism that critics said it lacked under Cavazos.

“I’m hopeful,” he said in a telephone interview. “I doubt very much he’d take the position unless there was that kind of expectation.”

Bush made the Alexander announcement at a morning meeting with reporters at which he also introduced his new labor secretary, outgoing Rep. Lynn Martin (R-Ill.). Bush announced the Martin choice Friday, while she was home in Illinois.

Bush said: “Working Americans have a friend in Lynn Martin. She understands the challenges facing our work force.”

The Martin and Alexander appointments are all but certain to win confirmation. Both will have to go before the Senate Labor and Human Resources Committee, probably in January.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), the committee chairman, said Alexander “has a distinguished record in education and earned bipartisan respect for his role in stimulating education reform in the states.”