President-elect Donald Trump has chosen prominent charter school advocate Betsy DeVos as his secretary of education, one of the first women selected for top-level administration posts in his new administration.
The Cabinet-level position requires Senate confirmation.
The DeVos choice faced criticism even before it was formally announced Wednesday.
Conservatives warned that DeVos, a longtime Republican donor, previously supported the Common Core education standards that Trump railed against during the campaign.
Trump, who was at his Palm Beach estate Wednesday for the Thanksgiving holiday, called DeVos "a brilliant and passionate education advocate."
DeVos, from Michigan, is a longtime advocate for charter schools and school vouchers. She currently leads the advocacy group, American Federation for Children, and sits on the board of the Jeb Bush-led Foundation for Excellence in Education.
DeVos said in her own statement, "The status quo in education is not acceptable."
DeVos was slow to warm to Trump.
She told The Associated Press in July, "A lot of the things he has said are very off-putting and concerning."
On Saturday, she met with the president-elect at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey.
