 First of all, let me thank Harriet for, she's the type of person regardless of what you're going through. Her smile and her thought leadership has a way of bringing the best out of you. And I thank her for both because she always provides a certain energy in the room. And I can always tell when she's in the room. So thank you for being in the room. And I hope to see you in many more rooms over the years as we work together to find a way to provide all students an opportunity to learn. I was telling Gloria that I understand that you all had a conversation with Gloria and Gary Orfield earlier with that level of discourse. Why am I here? You know, you've heard from some of the greatest minds and thought leaders on many of these topics. But I want to thank you and I do understand that this says the closing keynote. So I'm the last person that stands between you and you doing whatever you want to do after this. But I appreciate you taking the time and the investment that you're making to focus on solutions. Not just problems. I think sometimes we get stuck in the mud and focusing on the problem that we never get to the solution. But it seems to me that you all are a group of individuals who decided to make the solution more important than a problem. And I think that there's some power in that. So I want to thank you for the investment that you are making. You know, it reminds me of the story of an old man that decided to marry a very young woman. And as the story is told, he was an old jealous man. And he became ill and he pulled his young wife by his bedside and said, promise me that when I die you're going to bury me with all of my money. Because I don't want you spending my money on any other man. Please make the promise. She made the promise. And it came to pass that the old man passed away. And at the funeral, the young widow approached the casket with her girlfriend by her side. And she put an envelope out of her purse and she placed it in the casket. And as she began to walk away, her girlfriend just shook her head and said, tell me girl, you didn't keep that promise. She said, I did, but I wrote him a check. So it's very important, it's very important that we make the investments that we can make today. Because there will come a point when we can no longer make these investments. And I think we know that there is no more important investment than the investment in providing all students an opportunity to learn. We know that there is a correlation between educational attainment and a community's economic base. A correlation between educational attainment and access to healthcare. A correlation between educational attainment and civic participation, voting, volunteerism, pillars of our democracy. That's why we believe that education is the vehicle to opportunity. But we also know that there is a correlation between educational attainment and incarceration. So much so that our country leads all other nations in the number of citizens incarcerated. So much so that it is bankrupting many of our state budgets. So this issue of education is not just an issue that we want to address as educators, but it's an issue that's connected to the very progress of our country as many of us know. And let's be clear, as we begin to talk about the issue, it's not just an issue that only impacts one racial or ethnic or social economic class, the challenges within education. We know there's clear evidence that regardless of race or ethnicity, there were 99.6% the same. 99.6% the same biological evidence. In fact, there are more genes to explain the variance in our eye color than our racial or ethnic differences. So to the degree that we're 99.6% the same, any variance that we see in educational outcomes that's identifiable by race or gender are not caused by the racial or ethnic differences, but the social policies and social practices which lead to those differences. So our challenge becomes identifying what are those social policies and practices that allow us to identify by race, ethnicity and gender. Who's more likely to graduate? Who's less likely to be in gifted and talented courses? Who's more likely to be in special education? Who's more likely to be suspended in expel? Identify those social policies and practices and remove them. And again, this is a challenge that impacts us all. You know, the president talked several state of the unions ago about the need for the country to be a global leader, to be globally competitive, to be a global leader in post-secondary education by 2020. Well, we won't achieve that goal unless we're somewhere around 60%. Right now we're at 38%, and we've been between 38 and 39% for several decades. We don't get to 60% unless we do a better job of providing opportunities to learn to those that have been historically disadvantaged, African-American, Latino, Hmong, those in rural communities across our country. We don't do a better job unless we put together a system that provides them a fair and substantive opportunity to learn. And if you say, well, you know, I don't live around any of those communities, so it won't impact me. Well, we're living through the first generation whose wealth outcomes are projected lower than to be lower than their parents. The first generation whose health outcomes are projected to be lower than their parent. We're also the only industrialized country whose skill, the skill level of those leaving the labor force, are more highly skilled than those entering the labor force. You may say, well, I don't care about any of those things. How does that impact me? Well, social security may impact some of you pretty soon. In order to support one person on social security, we need three workers. We're now under that number. So this, indeed, is a calling for all of us to be on board with where you are focused on the solutions. And I know it's tough work. I know after a long conference, many of you have been doing this work for several years and you feel like, well, can I just pass it on to someone else? You know, there's a scripture in the Bible in Jeremiah that speaks to that the harvest has passed. The summer has ended and we're still not safe. And I know that some of you may feel that way. You know, I thought we fought this battle in Brown versus the Board of Education. I thought we fought this battle in 1965 with the Elementary Secondary Education Act. I thought we fought this battle with no child left behind. I thought we fought this battle with Common Core, but we still have this challenge. If I can just leave three things with you before we move on and continue the work, because right now we've sort of set down, we came to plan out the collaboration. Now we've got to go out and really collaborate. If I can leave you with three things. The first thing that I really want us to focus on that I think is, you know, very important is that we have to, you know, understand the, we have to speak the same language in many respects. Understand what's actually being said. You know, there was a little boy sitting on a porch and a man was walking past the little boy. A little boy was sitting next to a dog. The man asked him, does your dog bite? He said, no, my dog doesn't bite. The man reached over to pat the dog. The dog bit him. He said, hey, I thought you said your dog didn't bite. The little boy said, that's not my dog. So it's very important that we be very clear and specific about the challenge that we have. For many years, we've been talking about the achievement gap. And we've said we've got to take steps to address the achievement gap. Well, essentially what we have is an opportunity gap. An opportunity gap which is a much larger, much robust set of challenges. For many of us to address the opportunity gap means addressing some things that happened even before the students stepped into the classroom. It's about providing students the opportunity to learn. At the Shaw Foundation, every couple years, we will publish a report on the outcomes for black males as it relates to graduation results. Why black males? Because we believe in measuring the opportunity to learn not by those who are often at the top, but as we ran the numbers and looked at four-year graduation rates, what it indicated was in 36 of the 50 states as it relates to four-year graduation rates, black males were at the bottom. And on other 12 states, Latino males were at the bottom. And many of the 36 were black males were at the bottom. Latino males were second from the bottom. So we wanted to understand, go beyond, and say, well, where are the places where black males are performing well? What states? What states do you think black males are performing well? Come on, use your words. Jersey? Massachusetts? It was places like North Dakota. Vermont. Some places where they were so small in population that they could not be relegated or isolated to under-resourced spaces. And when they were in those same spaces, they performed on par or even better than their white male peers. So likewise, we wanted to go to an under-resourced space to look and see what were the experiences for white males. So unfortunately, we went to Detroit. Where the black male graduation rate was 21% a four-year period. We're talking high school, 21%. But the white male graduation rate was 19%. So this issue around outcomes is not a race or ethnicity issue. It's about providing opportunity to learn. What makes it a race or ethnicity issue is that we're more often to relegate black and Latino students to under-resourced spaces. Then what are without the necessary supports necessary to overcome the opportunity challenges which serves as barriers to their opportunity to learn? So let's begin to speak the same language. This challenge that we are taking on, that we are seeking to address, is not a simple achievement gap that's measured as we look at test scores, but it's a larger opportunity gap. Once we admit and we agree that we are all addressing an opportunity gap, then we have to begin to say, what's going to be necessary? What type of agenda is going to be necessary to address that? Because there is going to be a need to go beyond just framing and messaging the challenge. There was a pastor who was in a Baptist church who was giving a sermon one Sunday. Harriet, you may remember the sermon, and he was talking about whiskey. And he said, we're going to go through all of the town and we're going to grab all of the whiskey and pour it in the river. And the congregation got a little roused up. They clapped a little bit and he liked it. He said, then we're going to go through all of the state, grab all of the whiskey and dump it in the river. The congregation got roused up a little more. He said, then we're going through all of the country, grab all of the whiskey and pour it in the river. And they gave him a standing ovation. He thought it was a good time to sit down. So he took his seat, turned the service over into the hands of the minister of music. The minister of music said, let us stand and sing him 357. Let us drink from the river. So it is important that we have some level of alignment. So we can't meet an opportunity gap challenge with a reform agenda that is not based on opportunity but only based on standards. So for years, since 1983, we have been focused, since the nation of risk, focused on a standards-based reform agenda. Asking, what are the right standards? How do we deliver these standards? How do we measure the standards? We've concretized the standards. In many respects through Common Core, we've concretized the standards. I submit that it is time for us to transition from a standards-based reform agenda to a supports-based reform agenda. Supports-based. Where we ask the question, what are the supports necessary for all students to achieve standards? How do we align those supports and how do we deliver those supports within a system? These are some pretty tough questions. What are the right supports? How do we align the supports and how do we deliver the supports in the right system? And I don't want us to be afraid of those questions because if you think back on 1983, when we put together this standards-based reform agenda, we didn't have all of the answers. We didn't know what were the right standards. We didn't know how would we deliver them. States had to take on many of these challenges but many of those questions were asked and answered and we didn't get all of the answers right. We're still working to try to perfect the standards side. So this shift to a supports-based reform agenda doesn't say standards are no longer relevant. Yes, we need standards. We need to improve upon our standards. We need better standards. But only to say that until we begin to address the supports that are necessary, we can't begin to address the opportunity gaps that exist so that all students can achieve those standards. You know, a group of funders, an international trip to some of the countries that right now are out competing us. We went to Singapore. We went to the province of Ontario, Finland. We went to Finland and we began to ask them, you know, what did you do? How did you turn things around? We began to talk to them about, you know, what we do in the U.S. and all of the rest. And they asked us one question and said, you know, why do you all focus so much on structure? Essentially what they were saying is if someone in here said that it was cold in the room, they would bring in blankets and we would bring in another thermometer. But they asked us, why do you all focus so much on structure? And we pushed even, what did you do? Because they turned things around in a relatively short period of time, 10-year period. And this is a true story. One of them finally said, we came. We looked at the research in the U.S. and we went back and implemented it. True story. We came, we looked at your research and we went back and implemented it. So we don't have an innovations challenge. We have an execution challenge. So our challenge is how do we, once we identify these supports, align them? Because it is questionable even if we were given everything that we were asking for in our states and our locality. Do we know how to deliver them in such a way that it would be impactful and effective to all students? One case in point and no child left behind, there is a provision in there for supplemental service providers. Now, why? It's called that. I don't know. It's Washington talk. But it sort of makes sense if there's a student who is academically behind, we give the student supplemental supports or academic supports. If we were to go back and review the success of that, we would find that number one, there were tremendous challenges in the delivery of those supports to students. So when people step back and they analyze, well, did it make sense? Was it productive? There were some questions. It doesn't mean it was a bad idea. It means that we have to think through how do we line and deliver these supports in a system. So I don't want us to just begin to continue to identify the supports that we need without also hoping without also holding ourselves accountable for taking some ownership in the ability to operationalize those supports. Because for many years, we've talked about the need for resources. And yes, we need resources. But at the same time, we've got to show that we know how to align and operationalize those resources so that every student can have an opportunity to learn. How do we create the policy drivers that align existing supports? And I'm owning this too because in philanthropy, we don't do a good job of this. Even if we support education or health within our foundations, we still work in silos. We've got to find a way to break down the silos to align the supports so that the delivery systems are better. One of the things that we've talked about is, you know, we can identify students who are a grade level or more behind in reading or math. And if we were to ask, well, what is the plan for them? We've been asking, what can you do for my child right now? I understand we've got to change the system, but what can you do for my child right now? But what we've been saying is, for every child that's a grade level or more behind, let's give that student a personal opportunity plan. A plan that would give them access to additional academic supports, whether that's tutoring, extended day, or ELL supports. A plan that would give the student additional social-emotional supports. A mentor. It's clear data and evidence that having a mentor actually helps. And I'm not talking about a mentor from a volunteer-based organization. I think it's great. I think it's a worthy cause that people do it. But I'm saying a mentor that's paid for out of the coffers of state and local budgets who could stay with the student over a several-year period. And some of you all say, well, how do we do this? We're in the middle of a recession, everything else. But if you think about it, we pay for probationary officers and state and local budgets, right? And often our students end up in a pipeline where we don't want them to end and where it costs us more to keep them there. So it seems to me that we would budget in a way where we make the investment on the front end, project a lower number of individuals in prison on the back end, take the cost savings, and invest more. It's called opportunity budgeting rather than budgeting in a level of oppression. So let's give them additional academic, social, and health supports. We can identify the health challenges which serve as barriers to a student's opportunity to learn. Asthma, eyesight, mental health. Many of the students are going through emotional trauma that, I'm sorry, our schools don't have the capacity to address. You've been saying it, but have you created the policy driver that would align those supports, where the district has to identify, who's my academic social provider, my academic provider? Who's my social provider? Who are my health providers? So that systems begin to align because ultimately no, it's not the job of the teacher or just the school to provide all of those slow supports. But we've got to provide some insight on how do we create the policy drivers to align them so that we can give every student a fair and substantive opportunity to learn. And as we have those supports, let's hold ourselves accountable. If our ultimate job is to provide all students an opportunity to learn, that means there are some things that we can't do. One of the things that we can no longer do is this issue of out of school suspension. If our job is to educate students, it doesn't serve well to put them out. One of the leading reasons that students are put out is truancy. You don't show up, so I'm going to put you out. Doesn't make sense to the students of talk with them. I don't think anybody signs up to be in the education profession to get rid of students, right? I don't think the majority of students show up to school to say, okay, I'm not going to school today. So we have a policy structure that doesn't work. And of course I'm not talking about those cases that are covered by federal law, where there are guns or drugs for distribution. I'm talking about those cases where students are not living up to a discipline standard. Instead of just saying, you didn't meet the standard, we have to ask, what are the supports necessary so that we can wrap those supports around the student to help them achieve that high standard? And quite frankly, as we kick them out, it minimizes the argument for the need of the supports because the students are not there. So if the alternative, get rid of them, but we know that we want these supports, I think that there's a better, and we think that there's a better way to address this with the school climate. We're happy that both the NEA and AFT have been working with a number of community-based organizations across the country to ask for the supports necessary to provide all students an opportunity to learn. To be clear, our goal is to address the opportunity gap. A reform frame that we would like to promote is a supports-based reform agenda, asking what are the supports necessary so that all students can have an opportunity to learn. But at the more basic level, what we also need to recognize is we're being held accountable for a larger cultural shift. Yes, we are talking about the issues in education. We're talking about issues of providing students an opportunity to learn. But the larger context is that our country, it's going through a level of classism, a level of racism, and a level of anti-government that we haven't seen. And quite frankly, we have not put together the messages and the frames to discuss two important pieces in America, race and government. There's no message. There's clear data and evidence. There are a number of communications organizations that have studied this, that when you begin to talk about issues of race, there's a population that sort of shuts it down. When you begin to talk about government, there's a population that sort of closes their ears. This is why something like Sandy Hook could happen. We can't even get to a conversation on gun control and addressing mental health issues. Because when we step into the space of government, there's no frame. I was in Ontario and I got in a taxi, and I was talking with the taxi driver about, I said, you all have very high taxes here. I knew the answer. He said, yes. He said, but, you know, we also have health care. We have the other services that we have to pay for so the government can provide it. Totally different frame on government. Now, I mentioned these two because our public education system today is right at the intersection of that conversation on race and the role of government. So to think that we can move our agenda without stepping into the space and pushing, you know, these conversations, I think would be a little naive. I think if we start at the very basic level, at the very basic level, we believe that all students should have an opportunity to learn. If we believe that 99.6% we're 99.6% the same. If we believe that not only all, but each child should have an opportunity to learn, racism is nothing but institutionalized lovelessness. The very basic level. We've got to check ourselves. Do we love the ones that we're losing? Or do we count them off as something that we can afford to lose? We love and we care. We believe that they have an opportunity to learn. Then we will take that next step to say, well, what do we have to do and put in place so that they do? Often when we have these conversations, the other piece that the messaging research indicated, the first, the second thing that people switch to, well, it's their parents. Their parents should, their parents did better. They would receive an opportunity to learn. But if we believe that education is a civil right and a human right, we have to develop a system for those students that don't have parents. Those millions of students who are homeless across the country. Our system has to be that strong. I know some of you, when I was coming up, we didn't have to do that. When I was coming up, the parents did their job. Let me be clear on something. Some of us grew up when there were 32 channels, right? Some of you all remember when there were fewer than 32 channels. I won't point you out. Some of you all remember when at 12 midnight, the Star Spangled Banner would play and the television would go off. I'm not pointing to anybody. This generation has over 800 stations. If they're not getting it there, they're getting it from the internet. If they're not getting it there, they're getting it from their cell phones. They're processing more information in a day, prepackaged information than many of us have been challenged to package in a month during our time. And then we say, well, during my time, if it was just no, we're worlds apart from there. But think about, we've got to create solutions that work for the generation of the day. Otherwise, it's not a substantive solution. What is the solution that works for the generation today? And that's why I believe that we've got to step into this space. And it is going to mean not always, you know, being nice. We're not going to always agree. It's going to mean working with someone for every nature of working with them. It will take a couple of years off of your life. And if you don't know anyone like that, you're probably that person. Because at the very core of this, what we are committed to is an assignment. It's not a task. You know, a task is something that you can make your list. I did it. You can predict the cost, how long it will take. An assignment you can't predict. You don't know how long it will take. I see some of you still looking at me like, what is it? Let me put it this way. Dating is a task. Marriage is an assignment. We're on the same page. This is an assignment. And in assignment, there will be moments that are very difficult and tough. And one of the things that we have to embrace and begin to love it's going to sound sort of strange is conflict. Conflict is a part of progress. We can't be conflict averse. We should be drama averse. But we can't be conflict averse. You know, many of us, we have drama because we don't manage conflict. You know, conflict if you're married, conflict is Friday night. Baby, you have a child. Baby, I want to do this Friday night. Can you watch the child? No, honey, I wanted to do this Friday night. Can you watch the child? That's conflict. Drama is honey, where's a child? Right? So many of us we've got to begin to learn to manage our conflict in this space. And it's something that we're not I think about even the violence in Chicago. And as I begin to talk with the young people and look at some of the cases a lot of what is happening there has to do with conflict resolution. And even at the highest level of our countries, we're not role modeling for our young people conflict resolution. So I say this to say let's stay at the table. Let's stay focused on the solution. I say that to say that there's a role for each and every person. You may not be the leader. You may not always be the president. Your name may not always be in lights, but there's a role for each and every person. I'm often reminded this when I look at the stock footage of the March on Washington and there was a man who few people know about and I hope you all know about in the labor community, Bayard Rustin. If you ever look at the stock footage of the March on Washington, you look beyond Dr. King's speech, there's an unassuming African American gentleman, Bayard Rustin who actually organized the March on Washington. And I remember looking at this stock footage where the journalist was asking him what was the most important part of the March thinking he would say it was Dr. King's speech, Mahalia Jackson's song, Roy Wilkins' speech. He said those were important but equally important with those individuals who said that they would stay after the street so we wouldn't get fined. Those individuals who said that they would make a thousand signs and they showed up with a thousand signs. Those individuals who said that they would make 500 sandwiches and showed up with 500 sandwiches. Those individuals who said that they would be on the corner of third and effort four o'clock and were actually on the corner of third and effort four o'clock and this was long before you could text. Are you there yet? They had a level of execution. They had to sweep the streets so we wouldn't get fined. I can't tell you what your role is but it is a very important role. And no matter what it is, even if you, I think Dr. King said it best when he said if it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, sweep streets like Michelangelo painted. Like Shakespeare wrote poetry, like Raphael carved marble. Do it so well that the hosts of Heaven and Earth will say there lived a great street sweeper who swept his or her job well. That's our challenge. So let's commit that we're going to address this opportunity gap. We're going to push for a supports based reform agenda. We're going to move policy proposals so that we provide each child an opportunity to learn. Finally, let's commit that and recognize that it's going to take something that a little boy had to teach his father. Father was reading a little boy a bedtime story, finished the story, kissed his son on the head and said good night. As he began to walk away, his son said daddy can you bring me a glass of water? Father said son, I'm sorry it's bedtime. You had all day to get water. I'm not giving you water before you go to bed. Good night. Father gets back up, begins to walk away. Here's his son again. He said daddy can you bring me a glass of water? Father a little more upset. His son I'm a little upset, a little perturbed with you because I just explained to you. I'm not giving you water before you go to bed. If I have to come back in here, I'm going to have to come back in here to spank you. Good night. Father gets up, walks out, close the door. Here's his son. Daddy, when you come back in here to spank me can you bring me a glass of water? It's going to take a level of persistence if we are going to do this. I know we have the right people. I know we have everything that we need. The question is whether we have the persistence. We have the right people. We have everything that we need, the thought leaders. So the only question that remains is the rhetorical question that Shakespeare spoke through the mouth of Hamlet. To be or not to be, that is a question whether it's nobler for our children to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous misfortunes or for us to pick up arms against the sea of troubles and through direct opposition in them. To be or not to be, that is our question and the answer is in your hands. God bless you all.