The nation’s government, education, business and philanthropic leaders gathered in Washington on Sunday to lend their political–and in some cases financial–muscle to the burgeoning high school reform movement.
Calling the country’s high school education system “obsolete,” “flawed” and “broken,” the diverse group vowed to change secondary education by ratcheting up standards, providing more opportunities to poor children, pumping millions into school redesign and launching a full-scale public relations campaign to move high school reform to the forefront of the national debate about education.
“This is a defining moment for America,” Ohio Gov. Bob Taft said during a weekend education summit sponsored by the National Governors Association. “We need a sustained, systematic national effort to reform our high schools. We owe it to the nation and to our children to act now.”
That effort began in earnest Sunday when six philanthropic organizations announced they had joined together and donated $23 million to help states launch high school reform efforts.
Moments later, 13 states, including Indiana and Michigan, announced they were signing on to a national high school project that will boost standards, require students to take rigorous college and “work-ready” courses, and hold colleges accountable for the students they admit.
The conference, jointly sponsored by the governors group and Achieve Inc., a non-profit group that works to raise academic standards, attracted governors and education leaders from 45 states.
The conference comes on the heels of President Bush’s efforts to expand the “No Child Left Behind” law requirements to high schools.
Chicago Public Schools chief Arne Duncan, who attended the conference, said he was pleased the governors are focusing on high schools.
“I think it’s time to admit we need to make major changes to our high schools,” Duncan said. “The traditional large modern American high school is broken, and we need to find innovative ways to fix it.”
