Sharon Meigh-Chang

Director of the Portland Council PTA Clothing Center

My involvement with PTA began when my daughter entered school. I found there were many volunteer projects that I could be a part of to enhance the educational experience for every child.

John M. Eger

Van Deerlin Endowed Chair of Communications and Public Policy and Director of the Creative Economy Initiative, San Diego State University

Art integration or teaching all disciplines through the arts, is gaining credibility in San Diego, and the Young Audiences effort here portends yet another victory for those advocating more art integration in the schools.

Joel Shatzky

English Professor

A report on the effectiveness of a "virtual school" company, K12, Inc., was released recently. It provides a serious warning to educational "innovators" who are moving in the direction of relying on technology as a substitute for teachers.

Derrick Kitts

Senior Director of Partnership Marketing, MSNBC

Believe it or not, 2012 is shaping up to be all about the Beaver State. With innocuous races for the Oregon legislature and an under the radar non-partisan race for statewide office, Oregon is the sleeper state up for grabs in 2012.

Sam Sommers

Professor, Tufts University; Author

For many people the debate comes down to one question: tribute or stereotype? But there's also another, arguably more compelling way to answer this question: look to the data.

Richard Lee Colvin

Visiting Fellow, Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation

"Let's take the politics out of education." In my many years observing and writing about American education I've probably heard variants of that phrase hundreds of times. It's naïve, of course.

Martin J. Blank

President of the Institute for Educational Leadership

Let's modify top-down educational mandates such as No Child Left Behind to unleash the power of communities to adapt school models to neighborhood needs.

Ed Madison

Founding producer at CNN

As an academic and media professional, I am troubled by educational policies that result in removing face-to-face teacher-student interaction from the learning equation.