Fourth Estate/Andani Munkaila
Mason Adjunct Faculty runs for Congress with a focus on education reform
BY ANDANI MUNKAILA, SOCIAL MEDIA AND GRAPHICS EDITOR
Mason Adjunct Faculty and former high school teacher Atif Qarni is a Pakistani-American politician and war veteran. Gaining recognition for his work in education and public service, he served as the Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth of Virginia.
According to his campaign, Qarni is now running for Congress in Virginia’s 10th district with a focus on education reform and improved access to quality education for all students. Qarni additionally shares plans to make advances in topics such as women’s rights, gun safety legislation and educational funding.
Editor’s Note: This interview was edited for length and clarity.
What is your political party?
There’s no party registration in Virginia, but I’m a Democrat.
When I was deciding to get involved politically, I looked at my values to see which party aligned closely. Most of the alignment was with the Democratic Party. [I] feel that it was a bigger tent that made at least somewhat of an attempt to embrace marginalized groups. I didn’t feel that that was the case with the Republican Party.
What was it like teaching eighth graders?
Fun. There’s no boring day. There’s always good and challenging drama. It was the most meaningful because you’re becoming a teenager.
I really enjoyed my eighth grade year specifically. There was something really excited in me when I did my student teaching. I tried high school as well, but for some reason, eighth grade really resonated with me.
How did your time in the military affect your teaching?
The military has a lot of discipline and structure, which can be good for the classroom. Sometimes too much structure can also be suffocating, so you have to kind of let go and be nimble and agile as you work with human beings in any kind of setting.
The military really focuses on integrity and building relationships. I’m a combat veteran, and I was in Iraq. What folks don’t realize is that nine out of 10 times, a lot of issues get resolved and temperatures come down [when] we have conversations with people.
I don’t speak Arabic, but because of my background as a Muslim, I understood the cultural norms of Iraqis so many times [that] I was able to defuse situations.
So… same thing in teaching eighth grade. Children are human beings. Just like adults, they have feelings. There’s a lot going on in their lives. It’s not just about figuring out a two step equation.
When there’s tension between two students, I say, “Okay, let’s take a deep breath…Let’s try to understand what’s going on.”
Can you tell me more about when you won Teacher of The Year during your time teaching high school?
It’s an award that students and teachers have to nominate you for. After I won, I got a binder. And it was dozens of students who wrote letters.
I read them and they emphasized that, “He’s very good at building relationships [and] really caring for students or teachers.”
It’s funny because when you think of academics, you think of hey, content, right? They didn’t talk about the facts that they learned in history class. They talked about those relationships, that they felt welcome, had a lot of fun and enjoyed learning.
What is the IDEA act?
IDEA stands for Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. There are a lot of vulnerable students that are neglected in our systems. Activists passed [it] several decades ago, but it’s never been fully funded. I really want to fund education. You know, we’ve spent a lot of taxpayer dollars funding war machines… and there’s too much global chaos which is not even keeping America safe. Only 10% of our federal budget is made up of education, while other countries are spending much more per capita. So it’s a significant issue and IDEA funding is one example of that, but there’s a lack of funding.
Why do you care about people?
It’s life experiences. You know, coming here as an immigrant, I faced a lot of challenges learning a new language [and] learning about a new culture… it’s an experience that a lot of us go through and then it changes you or gives you perspective.
What are your main goals if elected into Congress?
I really want to economically uplift families. I want to focus on the “Child Care Stabilization Act” [and] I want to focus on IDEA. We have the inflation reduction… and then with healthcare, making sure that we’re regulating the prices of prescription drugs and making use of the very expanding Medicare [and] Medicaid reimbursement rates.
There are other things that I want to do with gun safety legislation, pass a Women’s Health Protection Act which will protect women’s reproductive rights and [to] expand the Supreme Court.
Not only do we have to get a Democrat elected as president, but we have to get the House back. When you have a political trifecta, that’s when you can really advance those things.
Can you tell us more about the Women’s Health Protection Act?
The Women’s Health Protection Act has been pending in Congress for a while. That’s really, really robust. It codifies that women’s reproductive care is safely available everywhere in the United States.
What are your thoughts on the Supreme Court?
The Supreme Court is very antiquated. They’re not representative of the American people. The diversity is still lacking [and] the perspectives are still lacking. I think they’re really out of touch [and] I think term limits would be good. I think they need to just go through a better accountability test. I know that they go to congressional hearings and so forth, but the current representation is definitely not representative of the majority of Americans right now.
The way it’s functioning right now is not an elected representative body and has way too much intervention in our lives. We need to rein that in and bring a big balance. I think one of the ways to do that is to expand the Supreme Court to 13 justices. Nobody should be able to serve on the Supreme Court for more than 20 years. That’s my policy position.
What are your thoughts on gun safety legislation?
What I believe is that military grade weapons do not belong in homes [or] schools. I’m talking about assault rifles [and] high capacity magazines. The vast majority of Americans want comprehensive gun safety legislation reform.
Because of special interest groups like the NRA, they keep locking it [and] they keep spreading misinformation.
I think also part of that [gun violence] is mental health. One, we have too easy of an access to assault rifles in America. Second, we still feel we have a stigma with mental health. We’re not doing a good job in addressing mental health. The “Mental Health Act” is one act that I also want to fully fund because we’re lacking social services [for] PTSD.
What is the biggest issue facing our country?
There’s a lot, but I think polarization. Politicians like Donald Trump are exploiting the minds of human beings and they’re taking advantage of them. People care about the same things. They care about their children… they care about the children’s future. But, politicians are exploiting people’s economic fragility and saying, “You are struggling because of this distant person that you don’t know.”
There’s a divide and conquer approach between racial groups [and] between classes based on different identities and that’s the biggest problem: Political exploitation by politicians. We need more integrity in our politics.
Why should people vote for you?
I think they should vote for someone that cares for them [and] about their values, which I represent. I think they should vote for someone who’s going to go bat for them [and] is going to have their back, always.
I think they should vote for someone that they can be proud of. My track record is that I’ve really led from the front. I want to make people proud of being Virginian and to be a voter of this district.
