Arne Duncan's Call With Business Leaders

It is truly appalling to read the transcript and see the close knit entanglement of business in education. Many education activists knew this a long time ago, but have a hard time convincing the public. Susan Ohanian has a book on the subject: Why Is Corporate America Bashing Our Public Schools?

Here some insightful parts of U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan's telephone conference call on January 24th, with representatives from major players (IBM, Ford Foundation, GlaxoSmithKline, Panasonic etc.)

"Listen" in!

Suzanne Immerman (Director of Philanthropic Engagement at the US Department of Education):

"..We recognize that the philanthropic sector is a core constituency in education reform in our country and as a result want to make sure that all of you have a chance to hear directly from the Secretary about issues that are most relevant to all of us in our work."

Arne Duncan:

"..my goal is to make every single governor in this country the best education governor their states have ever seen..we’re going to do hopefully a really innovative thing in the middle of February in Denver. We invited about 150 districts to come, do a conference around labor management issues.

..We would only bring in districts where the superintendent, the school board chair and the union leader would all come together. We were worried we’d have very few takers. We have slots for about 150 districts and we had almost 250 districts want to come in.

..What we think is - there’s a relatively small handful - 10 to 12 districts around the country that have come up with much more thoughtful contracts that really support student achievement. We don’t see why that can’t go to scale just like common standards went to scale.

..We obviously want to reauthorize NCLB this year, do it in a bipartisan way. I think we have a real opportunity to do it. I spent Friday in ..Minnesota with [House Education and Labor Committee] Chairman Klein.

..I think he can be a real partner in this. .. we’re not necessarily going to grant every single issue but I think there’s a lot of common [ground] there.

...  I think there’s actually a very good chance it can happen. And having you guys continue to push off and be a partner in this work I think we can do it.

Last week.., we had this great forum.. with the folks who came as part of the I3 competition who didn’t quite get funding from us.

We had about 700 leaders attend the forum from around the country.

[Participants included executives from Goldman Sachs, AT&T, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt]

We want to continue to partner great ideas whether it’s through I3 or Promised Neighborhoods, with potential funders and lots of information obviously on our Web site for you to look at there.

..the forum..was a real chance to continue to build a community of learners together to have folks collaborate and to provide exposure to potential funders for the good work that’s going on out there.

.. to continue to drive change at the state level is hugely important...getting folks to continue to change policies, getting folks to redesign what the state departments do to support the good work in classrooms, getting states to think through legislation that’s either helpful or not helping, having you guys play at that state level, I can’t emphasize how critically important that is going forward.

..with 40 states..having raised standards, 44 states working the common assessments together, lots of movement there. And my goal is to make every single governor in this country the best education governor their states have ever seen.

..And I’ve met with virtually every single one of the new governors. I’ll be going to speak with the NGA [National Association for Governors] in February and want to continue to keep all of them moving. So your support at those local levels is critical.

I think, you know, part of the challenge always is with us, and are we doing a good enough job to reach out to the business community and to reach out to CEOs and ask their thoughts about ways we can do that better and to be a better partner. We more than welcome those ideas as well."

Bill Shore of  GlaxoSmithKline shared:

"..we have our own business advisory council. And the superintendent set it up. And there are about 50 companies here - we meet every three months, it’s a religion almost, we meet every three months with the superintendent and the senior staff, and go over all the goals and objectives that the school system has and what it’s going to take to make him and the students successful.

And helps identify the role that each of us in the business community can play. IBM’s at the table, GlaxoSmithKline, Cisco. He’s got access to every business here. And it has been so refreshing for us because it’s always been us going to the school system trying to help.

..no superintendent ever invited us to the table. So now there’s this incredible dialogue that has not existed before. And we’re literally working in the trenches with him to help make him successful."

Arne Ducan:

"Yes, and I love that and those kinds of models. Unfortunately they are more the exception than norm. And if we had those set up for every single school district that would be fantastic."

Read it all. Click here.