Transcripts For CSPAN3 Former Education Secretaries On 2020 Election Education Policy 20240713

John violent at the Ground Center on education policy and were here today to talk about education policy and the 2020 election and as you all know education doesnt always grab headlines and that is certainly the case this time around two and that being said, there are consequential issues and big policy ideas that are being talked about as part of this campaign and to help us make sense of whats going on we have a group of panelist with us today already, done can served as secretary of education from 2009 to 2015. I believe he was the ninth secretary and the department history. Hes a managing partner and a nonresidency and dr. John king was the secretary of education from 2016 till 2017. And doctor king is the president and ceo of the education funds. To help guide our discussion we have alison klein, the assisting editor for education. Her current b is the workforce issues and for many years shes covered education, paul six and policies in washington and beyond. With that i will welcome the three of you to our stage and headed over to allison. Up applause thanks for joining us im happy to introduce this gentleman here because they need no introduction to know them well. We are going to dive right into questions. I know you both been following the campaign and senator sanders called from a moratorium on Charter Schools. I know you both been supportive of charter in, fact secretary was principle before your time at the education. Do you worry that the Current Trump Administration Choice has put charters on Democratic Institutions in parents and teachers . Well, its not their current policy around choice but its also secretary and history around choice. The reality is that there are really high profile charters that are contributing very positively to the public educational landscape and we think about charter sector in boston and new york and on the other hand there was a charter sector that was terrible like the sector in michigan. And secretary has a history of being a champion of a low regulation and low oversight and low accountability for charters and. Michigan you had a very affiliation in turners and 80 and schools that exist and take advantage of community. It was so hostile and low incoming students frequent and people are right to be skeptical of the administration. We as democrats there with our policy choices and shouldnt be swayed by that and there are amazing Charter Schools and were very low performing charts. The democrats as citizens and want more good schools for mitt and it is the wrong frame. Youve said one of your biggest regrets was not getting a big new reconverted investment of the finish line during your tenure. In that youve had something much more ambitious in mind. Has there been enough discussion on that issue in the democratic primary . Should the next president whether its in four years or eight years take up the administrations law on this . Why were new able to get it done . I was put both in my successes category and my failures. We got additional billion dollars to provide access to the hundreds and thousands of three and fouryearolds across the country and its not in the space or proud about that. We would love to have had ten or 20 billion dollars and race at the top competition to come in and we had 36 states what we only funded half of the first 18. One of the states that we couldnt wait to extend prek was the mississippi and that governor was governor bryant who is hard and conservative and 10 on issues who was broken hearted and couldnt stand prek in mississippi. I remember that phone call like it was yesterday. The fact that theyre usually 49 or 50 on the indicator and some huge desire but man was there from the republicans and democrats across the country they couldnt get congress to step more. I am biased, i think if i wanted additional tax dollar and education that i wouldve had high quality prek. I think its absolutely important for kids. It applies to an economist in chicago and on every dollar we give back seven dollars and less dropouts and more High School Graduates and all of our scarce tactics i dont know how often we can back seven dollars that we put in so that would be the top but its the United States which ranks 28 or 29th relative to other countries and providing access to prek and we should be absolutely ashamed as a country that we send so many five or olds to kindergarten a year to 18 months behind and this education often dont catch those kids up because people are dropouts but yes we should debate it and put it out there and its not a democratic principle but is off to a good start and theres nothing on that. I would just add, we have proposed in the Obama Administration the 75 Million Dollar cost over ten years to access to prek for low income fouryearold and Congress Said that was too expensive. The very same members of Congress Went on to vote for tax cuts for the top 1 . This is a question of what we care about and willing to invest in. Were in universal prek for three and four year olds and we also need a Huge Investment and zero to three. We need a much better access to Quality Childcare with low income families and communities of color. That is all doable in this effort an existing on the face of it. Speaking of money weve seen a number of proposals that can ramp up the federal share of education. Do you think that is the right way to go . Or is it more money from additional accountability . laughs we always do this both of us. I think there is an opportunity to blend or connect a significant new investment with smart policies around strengthening schools we, need both. The history is at states that have done both together see the benefits and i think about massachusetts in 1993. They passed the education reform act and had a huge infusion with these communities along with raising standards for teaching and for learning and investing in professional development and appropriation and they also included significant Accountability Measures where the state was able to take action on schools and the result is that it went from somewhere in the middle of the pack two on the performing state my hope would be that the administration would put in a very significant dollars around the title run but also pair that with efforts to increase School Integration and efforts to make sure that kids have access to diverse, quality teachers. Efforts to make sure that all kids have access to a well rounded curriculum that includes our, music and social studies. We have to think about the more dollars and conjunction with the things that now make a difference for kids. Education we have these either or debates but we need and. We need gore traditional schools and more people in college and prepared for careers its always both. You cannot be pro teacher and want more money for teachers and not quality. New cabbie pro for poor kids and not explicitly be saying we need more poor children to graduate from high school and going to college and new york. You have to as john said prepare these things and these values are not in conflict, in fact they complement each other. On a related note, another number of candidates said they want to have funding to increase teacher salaries. Its a big proposal that senator harris perot. They both championed when you are in office which was teacher evaluation based on student progress and test scores. Should the government be boosting teacher salaries . Should they be on the hook for Something Like that . Again, she different kinds of evaluations play into that . Do you feel like the teacher pay crisis has gotten so bad in places that its kind of bad no matter what . Ill try to come out is a couple of different ways. Its a number of states in North Carolina and arizona and you go down the list where weve had republican administrations have star education. Teacher pay as not kept up with the inflation of the average. There was a teacher in d. C. , from North Carolina who is actually selling blood and looking to make ends meet. That is unconscionable we, absolutely need more to pay are living away. Teachers are going into education to not become millionaires but you want to sustain that. Yes, you need that and can the teacher not talk about quality or how important and i met yesterday what someone from a Tennessee Team and saw huge growth and making improvements. Their analysis of a lot of different things. But their thing that drove to recoup the most was taking teacher a valuation seriously. I think we have to try and help these things, pay teachers the right wage. A little bit off topic but one thing i thought about would be. A little bit of a political compromise. Its not just how much you pay teachers, its their ability to make more money earlier in their career. Every teacher contract is a very slow step and have to stay in the system for 30 or 40 years. Millennials dont want that. Id love to see districts think about two tracks about being more traditional in but you want and also a highrisk, high reward where a teacher could make 100,000 dollars in a place like d. C. Or denver to play with that. The union could negotiate both of those and youre not negotiating anyones power. Teachers, young, old veteran or whatever. Have choices for you to make any figure out whats best for you in your family in your current situation. Thats not even more money but a different way of thinking about it. Its about attaining much more young talent. The only thing i would add is the absolute should be paying teachers more and should have a federal state that eases federal dollars and pushes states to invest more as well. But as we do that, two things would have to go alongside. One, we have to diversify the teaching profession. Majority of our kids in Public Schools are kids of color and 80 of our teachers are teachers of color and 2 are African American. We know that matters for kids of color to have access to teachers of color and the evidence is as american teachers are well likely to graduate from high school and go to college. Its important for white kids to see teachers and leaders of color in their schools and communities. A smart comprehensive strategy would diversify the profession. The other piece is making sure we have the strongest teachers for the kids and give their greatest needs. We want to have incentives that attract people to work in a high needs Rural Communities and attract people to pursue fields of study where we have huge shortages. Secondary staff, bilingual teachers, teachers with disabilities that you get at the secondary level and imagine structuring a package that accomplishes the goal of reasons and who all boats and also trying to get at some of these challenges. Thats a huge point i want to emphasize. If we think of the Great Teachers that matter and most in this room do. If you think great principles matter. I get the principle of local control and understand thats based on that but we have 15,000 School District in our country. I dont know if any single district in america with systemically find and identify the best principles and teachers and play somewhat kids in the community with the most health. We really do think that teachers and principals matter that teachers change kids lives, its a little stunning to me that not one teacher is taken a step that john is talking about. Speaking of my next question very well its obviously an issue that is in the democratic debates in something that both you value and what we are talking about right before we came in here. How much power to do both feel you had a secretary to influence that discussion . Beyond i know youre drawing attention but what do you think a new administration could do to help go through that problem . We both tried to talk about the importance of the thing that communities have and to have socioeconomic integration and proposed congress under 20 Million Dollar fine to support local efforts to integrate schools. Again, we heard from members of congress that its too expensive but then they put all their money to poured the top 1 . Problem is a missed opportunity that is still out there. Senator murphy are the champions of that effort in the strength and diversity act and that is an opportunity that this administration would have. There are ways to think about how you link other programs and other federal funding trips to the goal of diversity. Whether its diversity in charters and things as an area and emphasis for the Charter School program. We think of an area as emphasis on how they might use title one dollars. Expanding the Magnets School program. Theres a lot of that federal funding thats available but hasnt been used since the early to mid 1980s. Theres also a need for real enforceable Rights Enforcement from the department of education and the justice system. Were doing things intentionally and exacerbate segregation and got to take action on that for civil rights law. I think john did a much better job than i did of talking about this at the forefront and getting into the nuances of the federal incentives that could be put in place. We were talking backstage, not all of this takes any money. Sometimes its as simple as redrawing School Boundaries around schools that dont cost a penny. Now its politically very difficult to challenge and we live in a country where People Choose to self segregate and places to be and have less diversity. Federal incentives help but trying to get parents and students to understand and benefit not for black its or latino kids but for the benefits of having drivers for all kids. There is a larger thing beyond money that gets to some of the challenges in our country that we struggle with around race and diversity and that are hard to talk about that you cant dealing that in this conversation were having. Other proposals weve seen a lot including from senator sanders on free college for everybody. Other candidates like former Vice President biden are mentioning something in Free Community college which is something that the Obama Administration during your tenure secretary duncan mention an office. What do you think the strategy should be . Should the government be on the hook for all college for all kids . Just a portion of . It shouldnt be for everyone or just low income kids . I did free college i would do free prek. I would prioritize just to start but secondly, free college again is not even a democratic idea and the best is tennessee. And government haslam and they are a hallmark there and investment in the greatest resources in the human capital. I do think the k to 12 model in education in america is obsolete. I think we should move to a prek to 14 model. There are comport Surrey High School reports and middle class for the past hundred years that are insufficient from the next ten or at least 50 and have to get off to a good start. You get a good job with a High School Diploma is pretty rare these days. You have Community College strange and and some form of Higher Education which has that goal. The thing that troubles me in this debate is actually a teacher pay debate which is that we talk about the results come with the higher sign a possibility. Theres a whole bunch of colleges i would send students to but a whole bunch of colleges i dont want anyone to go to our shouldnt go for free. They are not learning anything. Those colleges are getting rich and people are unaware situation and we started. For me, thinking about Community College and not just for the teens for but for the 50 year olds that are coming back and you have to talk about results. People just being admitted to college or actually walking at the back end with skills. Lasting all say on this is that we try and totally failed on this. All of our funding for Higher Education was 100 percent which went to enrollment. We dont do a penny of grants for those that are increasing their education rates and its a first generation. Not even more money but changing how you Fund Education just a little bit of money around outcomes was a huge change of that zero. I agree completely with the completion agenda and the reality is we have the College Dropout crisis. Every ten white students who start a bachelor degree program, six will graduate and every ten latino students at start a program five people have graduated six years later. Every ten African American students that start to program for will graduate and we have college and Community Colleges around the country in the teens and if that is a problem there are on schedule so its actually to finish and requires investment and policy change. That authorization observation out make is in details and as you know looking across the states. There are states that say they are free college but what they mean by that is that its a tiny little bit of money for middle and upper income students to get subsidies for tuition. They have done nothing for the low income students. Because the last Dollar Program and their structure doesnt match the tuition which has further investment in the kinds of support that low income students need. We have students in colleges that are hungry and that are homeless and we should be talking about the total cost of college and not just tuition. So that details matter and those states that have all kinds of attaches in the Free College Program. If you move to another state or Free College Tuition converts and to a loan, lots of fine print and that is a problem. Im glad were having this conversation about investing in public high or already act. Probably nine out of ten states they are higher today than they were in 2008. We should talk about invest in public hiring and talk about making everything accessible for everyone. The details of the policy matters and we have to find a way that is focused on low income students and students of color who are most vulnerable in our current Higher Education system. Two quick acts i love hanging out with him. If you look at the trends and if you look at any state over the past ten or 20 years. Look at the percent increase or decrease going to hire ed or look at the increase for consultation. Every single state across the country and the rate of increase on the consultation is going much faster and any education. We accept that and dont debate that and its just like a given. We will lock someone up at 60,000 dollars but debate forever on a little bit more teacher pay. I want to challenge us as voters with the spectrum to think about the larger challenge i have on so much of this is take free college as an example. Free colleges a strategy and we dont have to talk about goals. For me, what is the eagle . It is not free college, the goal i think is to lead the world in college completion. Where we let the world and we need to keep high school jobs we should try to leave the world. We were first generation ago with the flatlined that would stagnate that would pass a spot. We never step back and say to an end . A moratorium on charters to what end and what academic the evidence come with those charters. I would propose a couple of goals for the country and a nation building goals and not the public or democrat. We should lead the world in high quality prek. We have some rates of the alltime highs of 84 but, that is still hundreds of thousands of kids dropping out each year. I wish the Current Administration would have their goals lower about their education outcomes. It causes completion and if we started every conversation with here are the goals we have a lots of responsive debate to achieve those goals. Weve never come up for air and we played a small ball and we dont talk about where we need to go as a country to have a thriving middle class and to keep good jobs in america. We need to elevate the conversation. Were not seeing a ton of talk yet about the things that the Obama Administration pushed especially in its first term. There are rigorous standards of teacher evaluation and robust state systems and have a very ambitious plan for that. Is there enough progress that was made during your tenure . And i think thats why people are talking about them. Do you think the candidates are avoiding them . Because you both faced a state chief and the secretary of education of serious political backlash for these issues. Why do you think were not hearing about them right now . Go ahead. Theres a couple of adverse observations. One is in part why or in 40 plus states and are still doing the College Standards and how that works and the challenge state by state is at the level of do they have the right curriculum available to teachers and the right work on teacher development. As a country, we have to do that as control issues. There are some states that are doing smart things like about louisiana which tied access to funding for curriculum and districts choosing curriculum that are highly rated as well aligned in their way for sanders and will reap the benefits of that. Its investments and teacher training because standards in math for example is a much more understanding about the math concepts and how to teach them and having that profession and i think thats a good thing. That issue i think is underway. But could use more resources. On the data systems piece im optimistic that if theres a Higher Education in this congress that it will include the Transparency Act and we will see better post secondary data. That could be connected to k12 data. Thats a place where there is Good Progress and momentum. On the low performing schools, with this goes to your point earlier about we talk about money and political will and courage and i think there is a reluctance to talk about schools and what it would take to improve performance on the struggle of those schools. I hope we hear more about that because reality is, in state after state we still see very large low income students and students of color. Majority of our kids are color and mulch are eligible for free christ lunch and have our economy that has no future if we dont get better at educating low income students and students of color. There are many more conversation about that and more conversation about the federal role in leading on this. Because of things that are not early in the administration we, had a National Attention on Graduation Rates and dropout factories and a lot of them are high schools that are described as dropout factories and have over the course of the administration thousands upon thousands of questions and is powerfully in freeport and of. With all talk about goals and not strategies any talk about why is it important with those standards. Talk about College Costs and house too expensive and we talk about the cost and as a country we spend 70 dine billion dollars this year to have College Students have College Tuition to take high school classes. That is all of our grants and all of our tax money in about 79 billion dollars every single year. That means that young people are prepared to take College Level classes. I learned this recently that stunned me. The average high school gba for a College Student taking those classes. Guess what that is . In high school . That is 3. 2. These werent 1. 3, this wasnt 1. 7 they, had better than a be average in high school and in college and dont have the skills necessary to take credit bearing classes in college. Thats not the students fault. We failed to repeat them and thats the need for high standards so the common core sounds like a good name but we did not anticipate obamacare we, didnt anticipate the pushback as strong as it was to the first black president. We didnt anticipate the first pushback from obamacare to obama core. In hindsight we, should have called it highly uncommon core. laughs its very unique to every single state and the husky core. At the end of the day, that is the branding issue. What we need to make sure that we are raising High School Graduation rage which is important and make sure those i School Graduates can go to college and take a College Level class, thats the gold our trying to accomplish. On another topic. Youve spoken passionately about safety and as we are working on in the department. Do you see that as an education issue . Do you think it will motivate young people and parents to win this campaign which is motivated folks who dont want to see gun control to get out about. Do you see that starting to change . One ill say one second and say that i left the Chicago Public school for seven and a half years before i went to d. C. And talked about lots of things. Im proud of the terms and i could talk about all day. The case where i dont think i failed when i know i failed is we as leaders and myself failed to keep our students alive. During my seven and a half years in chicago we had a student killings in gun violence. Never once in the school but in the neighborhood, around the block and going home and they were shot by an ak47 from moderate yards away. I thought things couldnt get worse from my family and i thought chicago was the rockbottom pretty sense in the couldve gotten a lot worse. We are motivated by her success and haunted by our failures. This is why this is my lifes work for now. To try and removed from my fear and trauma and violence that is absolutely overwhelming for kids. President obama dealt with the hardest issues on the planet. He said publicly that is hard to stay was sandy hook massacre. He went down the next day and i went down a couple of days later and youll never forget, youll never forget. Im not proud to say this but i will say that when i was in chicago, i thought no one cared that black and brown kids were being killed and it was taking white kids of being killed to change and no one ever in the Worst Nightmare can imagine 20 names and five teachers being slaughtered. The fact that as a country we got nothing done, zero done in terms of public legislation. Taught me a pretty painful lesson that we dont care about black and brown kids we dont care enough about why kids. We value our guns too much. Im deeply pessimistic on this, parkland massacre change some things. Those young people kids from chicago were down and had our kids speak at the rally. Our adults have failed on this. Young people are leading us to a very different place. After sandy hook, i was extraordinarily pessimistic about more optimistic now than ive ever been. Its not any of us in this room are doing but as weve had with the Civil Rights Movement and having more protests and more change. We need to get to a better place. Ill say in chicago, im in schools all the time on the south and west side. 100 of young people know someone has been killed and i say how many of you know five, ten, 15 people are being killed. A third of the hands are still up. Ive never been to an actual war zone in iraq or afghanistan, but our kids in places like chicago are living in war zones and its entirely unacceptable. Were making progress and making better but we have a lot of work to do here. Im so grateful for the work that he is doing. The work that you are doing points out that we have to have a strategy of having fewer guns and having fewer guns can conflict mass casualties. Thats about changing laws and i feel like we have this moment where their voices are trying to change those laws. We have a violence taking place that was about all these intersecting issues in the lack of access and lack of access to substance edition and history of racism and policies of mass incarceration. All of that intercepts into this perfect mix that resolves between communities that are a wash in violence. We have to do work on that to so that education dimension is both about changing gun policy but is changing our social policy and how we think about communities. Quickly for this audience because its important. School shootings are horrific but the nuclear 90 of People Killed are killed in schools, its not a School Safety issue it is a societal issue. Its a vast majority of People Killed are killed in the park, mall, movie theater, walking out the street. Its related to schools but just a little bit. To echo johns point, im working with a young man who can shoot and be shot and as lived with trauma or their life. Many had been shot multiple times and many had had their fair share of shooting. I dont say this lightly, we dont have one bad man that were working with. Were giving an opportunity to move out of that life into the economy and give some Economic Opportunities and have black coaches and a bunch of care and lots of guys get their High School Diplomas and go to college. I want this audience to understand, this situation and getting caught in that life is the solution not the problem. We have to walk with them and theyre going to leave chicago and other places. Were winding down on our time and we have a few more questions and i will move quickly. The Trump Administration has talked a lot about locations in education. You pointed out in another recent forum that provided not in the funding in this area. Im wondering, do you think for your call it is a must for all students . What would you want to see this administration or another due to strengthen drab job training . I want to be clear, the trump ministration does not want to educate inaudible that is not in their interest. If youre an authoritarian leader and you want to have a source of truth and that the media is enemy of the people, you do not want people to be able to think for themselves. All the things that we talked about and jon talked about how to think critically and weigh arguments. The administration has zero interest in doing that. But they are not going to do anything and less educated we are, the more we will follow in the authoritarian process in this election we can debate the intricacies but this election is really a fight to preserve our democracy. We will have a criminal enterprise but this is much bigger than the education policy. Does everyone have to go to a four Year University . I do think everyone has to graduate from high school. I dont know any good jobs out there for a high school dropouts. Everyone has to have some form of education beyond high school. For university, to your community collards, trades or any kind of training. Last thing ill say is that other countries track 13 or 14 that are going this way but you cant go this way. I reject that 100 percent. I want to give kids options and let them figure out whats their path and what do they want to do. My final point is that none of us ive ever stopped going to school and many of us of stopped learning but how do we teach lifelong learners. And whatever were doing is glad to be the end of it. We will invest in that as our future depends on it. We need more young people who leave high school with a plan and a path to the economic armature opportunity. Both on it i had visited between ibm and the university of the department of event and kids graduate with a High School Diploma and associates to agree with a job at ibm. Our main effort was to replicate this across the state level which is a demand for employers and the partners and we as a federal support that effort and folks in the Health Care Industry and the manufacturing and i. T. We are eager to partner with school so that young people would leave ready for what is next. The accounts in marilyn visited in through tech centers that could be developed there and are struck by how motivated the kids are. The kids in the Biomedical Program are learning and have huge potential in smart in tech ed and have to acknowledge the risk that some places that they are pointing out our decades worth are tracking kids to less opportunity to jobs that existed 20 years ago and dont exist anymore. That is a problem. We need to invest in career tech but go around the goal. It is the readiness for postsecondary success and successful careers. One more question from me before we move to cue a name. Neither one of you hasnt forced a candidate in the democratic primary. laughs do you want to make some news today and tell us who you are supporting . Or at least two you find intriguing laughs im not going to endorse a candidate but i will say that in 2016, there was a very little discussion about education. I have been more candidates talking up more about schools and education so far. I think that is a good sign about how our direction is going. Humans were not going to make huge news, sorry. You have to try. All repeat what ive said, this election or not and and should not turn on anyone educational policy. I think this is the most consequential induction of our lifetime. I hope we are never in this position again as a country. Im not a scared guy and im scared for a country and scared for a democracy. This is not a time for him to support and not support any given candidate based on something you disagree on. We are fighting for our country. In stuff to say for myself i took for granted. My entire life i was just given truths and that has been rocked to its foundation. That is what is at stake and its not left or right or put republican or democrat, it is democracy versus not a democracy. It is that real. Having said that, in a normal election i would wish that left, right and education prompt beat it most non partisan issue and i just desperately wish that more people go with mayors governors and around education and the fact is almost none of us do and i think i saw in 2018 midterm toys that people voted based on education. Ive never been a candidate that was anti education and we have photo office with people ahead. laughs i know very few candidates that say i want to be reelected with the High School Education rates. I want to be reelected because of the gaps. I want to fight for more prek. Let me be clear, i dont blame any of the politicians but we floated based on these issues with more candidates across the spectrum who had been in office based on their ability to increase achievement and close those gaps and have young people prepare for work. That is my hope. Thank you. Im sure you all have some Great Questions and if you could tell us your name and the organization that you work for. Thank you im liam, im working with an organization with the parents counsel. My concern is that not every student comes into the classroom with the need to learn. What suggestion would you have in terms of Going Forward as to how to assist the School System and the teacher in working with the parent that they know students that do not fall within the need to learn every day category . By this going the secretary devos has in legislation in congress right now with Charter Schools and we could have the scholarship act that could give some support to those students . A couple of thought. One, i think that the agenda and the voucher agenda in the administration is not intended to address those goals. It is intended to undermine Public Schools. Unfortunately, i dont think theres a lot of room for a conversation around that proposal but i do think that there is much more we can be doing to connect school with other support to address kids needs. One of the things that we did in the Obama Administration is we had the Neighborhoods Initiative and that there was consistent with what jeffrey did in the zone in trying to match schools with other supports with Mental Health services, parent education, starting with new parents and with new babies and helping them support their kids academically and with social involvement and mentioning schools with programs after school and in the summer. Access to health care, access to gentle care, access to vision care. We should remove barriers that get in the way of kids success. All too often, arne made this point earlier and people say that there is nothing we can do in school because kids are having these challenges outside of school. That can possibly be true. School saves lives every day and both my parents passed away when as a kid and my dominoes eight and data when i was 12, school save my life. At the same time, when people say school is all that matters, why cant be right either because people are homeless and hungry. If people dont have a glasses it will hurt their education. We have to not get into that falls to vague and how we connect and how do we invest in those things . If we invest in School Counselors and Mental Health services, we will more than saved the cost later and most kids are successful in prison or addicted to substance or reliant on social services. If you are smart about our investment we would provide those supports to our kids. Ill tell you one quick story that after the riots we visited one school in baltimore that beat all the odds and results were way better in other communities. I said i want to go see this and it was a liberty elementary. I think he still is the principle and they were crushing it outside and i just want to hear what were you were doing. And they had amazing teachers and storing the principal. They turned itself into a food bank. That school was given out i think it was 16 tons of food. I cant draw a direct line from six tons of food from better results but i know there is a direct line there. Thats not in the principles job description. Our education and teaching principles google figure stuff out but what he identified was a real little chat real challenge. They say its hard to learn when your stomach is growling. If you start to me kids and families and what they really are, its like food, its like glasses and then we can talk about that but thats a ticket to entry and thats the foundational were talking about. Its the physical and social wellbeing and Mental Health of our kids. Schools have to do that. They have to work with the community and not in isolation and that these things are not in conflict. Thats the kind of leadership kids in our communities need. Any other questions . Why dont we take a few at a time. Did you have one two and then one in the back im frank palmer im part of the secretary duncan mentioned the Higher Education and the parts in the states which has a free college in indiana was the first precut Free College Program and in texas was the first state with dreamers and some states have performance pending. My question to the secretaries would be, as we try to reauthorize Higher Education act. What could we see i should be the federal state partnership and how you have those accountabilitys in the efforts. Will pass it to the back and you can decide but to address someone order. Im lisa, im a Software Engineer that a former schoolteacher and special education teacher. I was in a Charter School and some of the first charter parts last year. I wanted to hear from you guys if there are any particular initiatives coming out to address specifically the special education shortage and the funding shortages that we face every day on our classroom. Thank you. Another one in the back. Im a student from the Teachers College at columbia university. I have a question regarding the quality that has dropped for continuously eight years in the United States. Can you make some more comments regarding that, thank you. Keep those three enlightening round . Sure. On i know there is a great opportunity in Higher Education and authorization conversation to increase investment, i see it doubling or even tripling in a massive investment for low income students to start and id love to see an investment in evidence based reports so there is a program at the university which is based and shown to double completion rates and college to wrap rounds and better advising and that program is replicated in ohio. It looks like the results should be similarly positive. We have evidence based reparation and we have and accounts a system that looks at our students finishing, how much are they able to pay off and are they able to get good jobs. We worked very hard on this in the administration and the Current Administration has rolled back a lot of the work that we try to do for non profit colleges and for students and taxpayers. We dont have the accountability ships them and we ought to have a system that includes additional investment in the school that served the highest needs of students and focus is everyone on outcome. The last point ill make its id love to see us with a very serious investment in those issues and theres just no question that each bc in ms i are driving access in economic mobility and access in the class for low income students all over the country and how long they have been doing that and we were just on the Eastern Shore last week and my grandmother graduated there in 1994. That is many generations of folks all across america are in those institutions and our under investing as a country. There are lots of opportunities and not act and as the population of students who are High School Graduates, the population rate of 18 year old schools down. Its differently about what College Needs and what College Students are. They have a lot more to support College Students who are parents today and a quarter of our students are parents. Its rare to have good childcare programs and our campuses. There are a lot more of those and a lot more working adults in college. We have to have a lot more support for them around things like transportation and housing and food. As we change how we think about what those College Students are, we can help to soon so we have and attract other folks back in. One of the things about the tennessee effort that they have expanded their College Programs beyond just High School Graduates and the tennessee reconnect and how working adults come back to school to finish and we should see a lot more states doing things like that. Two things on teacher hiring shortages and i will restate what john and i both talked about of having some sense of being a peace and other things to have teachers and great principles to go down to those communities. They are so unwilling in those districts to step into that space. She did a little bit awhile back with those five principles of the school and talking to one principal lead a very High Performance school and a really struggling school and youre going to retire, why are you going to do this. Its a privilege of a lifetime to have this opportunity and that is the mentality that we have to have in education that is a privilege of a lifetime to work on the america and new city baltimore d. C. And chicago. Hes on teachers shortages, they repay everyone later in the state and with special ed with math and science and the errors of critical need and a piece of attracting teachers to just get a piece which should be additional compensation. Those are the two fundamental changes i would make to identify excellence and award excellence and courage to work with kids that need the most help. When we have errors which we know we have with the math and science, and sometimes in physical education we should not be based upon that in our lack of creativity in the School District side is pretty stunning. Part of the problem that feeds this engine is that you dont hear any schools of education steering kids in one direction and there may be lots of jobs for that or very few jobs that are not helping to push students in the right direction. That is morally pity pretty bankrupt. On that note, on that happy note i think laughs we will wrap up and thank you for sharing their experiences. Thank you very much. applause , thank you kelly, acting director of citizenship and Immigration Services talks about criminal deportation of undocumented immigrants. This is hosted by the Christian Science monitor