Opinion

KAROL MARKOWICZ: 1619 Project founder Nikole Hannah-Jones learned the hard truth about schools

The journalist wanted to live out her values, especially the belief that children should go to their local school and that school choice is unacceptable. But those ideas failed when they hit reality

By Karol Markowicz Fox News

Published September 24, 2026 5:00am EDT

Comments Facebook Twitter Threads Flipboard Print Email Add Fox News on Google

close

Video

1619 Project founder expresses regret over education choices for daughter

Manhattan Institute senior fellow Chris Rufo reacts to 1619 Project founder Nikole Hannah-Jones admitting she regrets her public education choices. Writing in an essay, Hannah-Jones states she feels she failed her child by enrolling her in a high-poverty Brooklyn school. Rufo argues progressive ideals created a gap between political rhetoric and practical realities for families.

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!

Nikole Hannah-Jones, founder of the 1619 Project and winner of the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for commentary, has written a blockbuster piece, "In Fighting for Every Black Child, Did I Betray My Own?" on the reality of sending her daughter Najya to failing schools in New York City. 

Hannah-Jones, a domestic correspondent for The New York Times Magazine covering racial injustice and civil rights, had tried to live out her progressive values and sent her child to the local, deficient public school. Writing in 2016 for the magazine, she noted that her neighbors in the quickly gentrifying neighborhood of Bedford-Stuyvesant were opting out of the local school. "I didn’t know any of our middle-class neighbors, Black or White, who sent their children to one of these schools," Hannah-Jones shared.

Hannah-Jones did. Now, 10 years later, Hannah-Jones’ latest piece shows that her project had been a failure, at the cost of her child’s education.

It’s a difficult read. Hannah-Jones wanted to live out her values, especially the belief that children should go to their local school and that school choice is unacceptable. But those ideas failed when they hit reality, and Hannah-Jones spent nearly a decade coming to accept that.

1619 PROJECT FOUNDER REGRETS SCHOOL CHOICE FOR HER DAUGHTER, ADMITS PUTTING IDEALS AHEAD OF HER EDUCATION

The column illustrates the struggles her daughter had at her elementary school, where teachers were disinterested and bad behavior went unpunished, and then in middle school, where homework went unchecked and standards were........

© Fox News