Year after year we approach, celebrate, and then pass by the anniversary of the US Supreme Court landmark decision of Brown v. Board of Education, which purported to end decades of educational inequality and downright injustice in America's schools. And, 55 years later, as we approach yet another anniversary, the...

Like the shy smart kid in school who knows the answers but keeps quiet for fear of being taunted, Candidate Obama instinctively knew the best answers to improving our nation's broken school system, but avoided calling them out for fear of antagonizing the powerful education establishment, especially the unions. Yesterday,...

With the elections behind us and the transition moving forward, the most important decision affecting the future of our public schools is President-Elect Obama's selection to succeed Margaret Spellings as Secretary of Education.

Speculation over the post - and attention to the issue of education - has only increased in...

Nicholas Kristof writes an alarming piece in today's New York Times, claiming that President-elect Barack Obama may be putting education on the "backburner."

That would be a mistake.

The need for improving our education system has never been greater. The rest of the world is catching up with...

The recent controversy over whether public school teachers can wear political buttons in the classroom highlights a significant obstacle to improving our schools: teachers' unions would rather dig in their heels in a fight over something trivial than actively work to improve learning in the classroom.

Should a school district...

This past week Strong American Schools launched a five million dollar ad campaign in crucial general election states across the country. The radio, television, and print ads depict the current education crisis that our students are now facing -- namely that they are slipping to the middle of the...

This Wednesday, millions of viewers will tune into ABC to watch what could be the last presidential primary debate of the season. While some will surely express relief that the primary season is one step closer to the end -- others will closely watch the candidates' proposed solutions to fix...

The twentieth century is often times referred to as the "Great American Century" -- the period of time when America was the world leader on a number of fronts. During this century, the world looked to America as the international problem solver and as the leader in the global economy....

In his Washington Post column this week, Jay Matthews wrote that he just doesn't buy that students in China and India, who routinely outscore their American peers, are a threat to our economic competitiveness. "The more prosperous they are, the more prosperous we are," he writes, "since they will...

If you listened to CNN self-promote the YouTube debate on Wednesday night, it was going to be another "monumental" or "historic" moment where the voice of the people would be heard loud and clear on the campaign trail. Anderson Cooper and his team would push the candidates to answer...

What I'm about to say may not make me popular with my kids, or those jokers who produce after-school cartoons, but I'm going to say it anyway -- America needs to rethink the amount of time our students spend in school.

More than half of the freshmen admitted to the...

Take a look at these quotes from the presidential candidates in recent debates:

It's important to state that improving our schools, improving education, access to education for all Americans, should be America's foremost priority.

I have fought to make sure that schools are fair to all children, and I...

This week, The Huffington Post, Yahoo!, and Slate are co-sponsoring the first-ever online "candidate mashup," another way in which technology is helping us to access and judge the presidential candidates. Those Web sites asked users to submit questions for the Democratic candidates on any issue and then ranked the top...

Last weekend I had the surreal experience of sitting next to mega-rapper Kanye West at a press conference and realizing that we were pretty alike: we both feel strongly about George W. Bush, we both look good in Polo shirts, and most importantly, we're both concerned black men who...

I thought America was all about encouraging vigorous debate on important issues, but I guess not everyone agrees.

At the ABC News presidential debate in Iowa on Sunday morning, we finally began to see what a real debate on education might look like, the kind of debate...

The recent Republican debate in Iowa showed once again the media's failure to hold the candidates accountable to answer questions about America's K-12 education crisis. Instead we got more of the same: chatter about Iraq, finger pointing on abortion, and tummy tickles about Jane Fonda and Dr. Strangelove. If we...

At 6:59 pm last night, I was in Charleston, SC waiting for the CNN/You Tube Democratic debate to begin, and I was pretty damn excited.

All week, CNN had been reporting that education topped the list at 16% as the issue getting the most questions submitted to You Tube, a...

The report card is in. All of the major Democrats and one Republican presidential candidate auditioned in front of the National Education Association (NEA) at their annual conference in Philadelphia last week. While there, both the candidates and educators were given a spotlight to draw attention and focus to the...

If there is any advantage to our nation's prolonged presidential campaign season, it is the increased number of opportunities to hear detailed, issue-focused answers from the candidates. However, of the 440 questions asked during the first four Democratic and Republican debates, only one has touched on education.

This election...

There was an article in the Washington Post last Sunday that infuriated me. It wasn't the article so much as the headline: "Schools Pinched in Hiring: Teacher Shortage Looms as Law Raises Bar and Boomer Women Retire."

From this, one might infer that the growing teacher shortage and our...