From my op-ed on the Educational Opportunity and Equity Commission Actin The Hill:

We are losing our economic edge because the brightest and best are emerging overseas and we are losing our streets to violence as dropouts increase. President Obama notes the “relative decline of American education” is “untenable for our economy, unsustainable for our democracy and unacceptable for our children.”

To stem this decline, I reintroduced legislation, the Educational Opportunity and Equity Commission Act, H.R. 1758 — supported by the National Education Association, American Federation of Teachers and Parent Teacher Association, among others — to create a national commission that gathers public insights about how government can improve education and eliminate disparities in the education system.

As a former teacher, principal and board member in economically and racially mixed neighborhoods, I know well how a comprehensive rethinking and retooling of our educational system can rectify what went wrong. So too, does Secretary Arne Duncan. Meeting with the secretary, I was heartened to hear that the largest one-time federal investment in education, enacted by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, will address the needs of individual students and move away from a one-size-fits-all approach......