Only a tiny fraction of the many billions spent on public education is invested at the early end of the spectrum. We are missing a prime opportunity, one that we cannot afford to waste.
Summer seems fleeting; think summer love and melting ice cream cones. But in fact, the learning losses it creates for children are permanent.
There is an education crisis facing young men of color. It's not on the front page of the newspaper, but it's out there, and if we fail to address this crisis together, the education level of the entire American workforce will decline for the first time in our history.
Community schools bring additional human and financial resources into schools and align these resources with the schools' goals for student learning and developmental. They are producing powerful results.
What really infuriates me is that many of the decision-makers in education never taught. Some make claims that they've been in many classrooms -- in the back and taking notes.
Summer can then be an essential time of relational repair, bonding and trust-building between parent and child alike that may well determine a child's success come fall and beyond.
I now know that I have spent too much time with "reformers" who are just waltzing it. They want to micromanage educators, but without bothering to learn how the game is played.
"Our problems right now in India are different to those of more developed nations. India has a poor education system. However, our society values education more than anything."
What can we do to get the people in charge to wake up to the importance of art, music, drama, journalism and even recess? They're all being cut in the name of 'academic rigor.' And that insane policy is hurting children and youth everywhere.
Millions of high school students who should be acquiring the education and skills that will enable them to lead the 21st century global economy are being shortchanged by America's public school system.
At the end of a school year of staffing cuts that put a lot of us on edge, it was a much needed boost for me to attend the Christopher Scholarship awards ceremony and see one of our students being honored.
When I got Andrew, he was addicted to fast food, exhibited signs of ADHD, and possible spectrum disorder. He didn't know how to use a fork or a knife, barely read, and couldn't be left alone. Most importantly, he had been through hell.
Paraphrasing the last line of the Declaration of Independence, Shriver said all of us need to "pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor" that the cuts to art education cannot be tolerated.
Even in a difficult financial situation, we can't afford to slide backwards when it comes to providing a strong early education for young children.
The science on early childhood education is unequivocal. If the U.S. were to make a deep investment in this overlooked part of the education spectrum, we'd diminish many social ills, and increase graduation rates and family incomes.
We need the regulatory relief this summer before school starts, instead of a new bureaucratic process that the Department of Education is purposing that could take many months to create.
From the way Illinois politicians have been preening the past couple of days, you'd think they had cured cancer. Nope, it's what they and the media have been relentlessly calling a "historic" new education reform law.
Indeed, Duncan's saber-rattling seems to have done little more than piss off the Hill.
If we are truly going to do something to help children and families rise above the circumstance of poverty, it is critical that we help kids succeed in the classroom.
