 So, it's my pleasure to introduce David Kass. Somebody wondered, Kass, four letters, begins with K, David, went to the same college as me. Is there some conspiracy going on here? But I assure you not. David is the president of the Council for Strong America. The Council for Strong America does what's been needed for a long time, that takes all these groups that we've been hearing about. The business groups, the scientists and also the sort of leaders in athletics and in religion and the military, the sort of people across the country who care about, for complementary reasons, who care about, you know, stewardship in the country and about early education. So it's an organization that includes fight, crime, invest in kids, which you've heard about in several of the states, ready nation, mission readiness, shepherding the next generation and champions for America's future. And you can tell from those names which groups they represent. And there he is the director of that overall operation. He was deputy secretary for legislation at the Department of Housing, where he managed the Congressional Affairs Office, worked on children's issues as a staff person on Capitol Hill and for several non-profits. So David, it's a pleasure to have you here. You're welcome you to the stage. I would be lucky if I was separated at birth from David Kerb, so thank you. Good morning. Come on, I know I'm the last speaker, but really, good morning. Thank you, much better. This is just a terrific report and I am so pleased to be here. And the panelists, I think, really gave us a sense of how challenging this is, but how incredibly important it is to our kids. You know, I have the privilege of working on early education with some fantastic leaders. And it's sort of obvious, well, why would educators care about this issue? But so why would a general care? Why would your local sheriff care? Why does a Fortune 500 CEO care? Well, a general cares about early education because, consider this, according to the Department of Defense, more than 70% of all young Americans between the ages of 17 and 24 can't qualify for the military. Now, I know when I heard that statistic for the first time, I thought, well, there's a typo there, right? Because it's 7%, that can't possibly be true. But more than 70% of young American Americans can't even get into the military. So why is that? Well, three reasons primarily because young people lack the education, they didn't graduate high school, they are not physically fit, or got in trouble with the law. It's actually hard to get into the military if you didn't graduate high school. And among young adults who don't finish high school, more than 20% who seek to enlist can't score highly enough on the military's entrance exam. Retired Rear Admiral Bob Beasel is one of our members, he's from South Carolina. And he was the commanding officer of the Navy's attack squadron, 75. And during his tour, he led the squadron in Operation Desert Storm, he flew combat missions from the USS John Kennedy. He's received all these awards, the Navy's Distinguished Service Medal for awards of legions of merit, many others. The guy's like an American hero, true American hero. And here's what I've heard him say about early education. He says, quality early education is the bedrock for preparing children to be citizen ready with options in life. I love that phrase citizen ready. To him that's what this is about. So quality early education can deal with these disqualifiers for military service for those young people who choose it. We've heard about how it boosts graduation rates and deters young people from crime, even reduces obesity rates by instilling healthy eating and exercise habits that contribute to a lifelong culture of health. So I talked about deterring kids from crime. We know the indisputable link between educational success and public safety. Right now, seven in ten inmates in state prisons don't have a high school diploma. We know the intense problems and we know how preschool can make such a difference. And so for too many kids without access to high quality early learning, they start too far behind and too many of them are getting in trouble with the law. So early education is vital to our national security. It's vital to save communities. But we know it's also critically important to business leaders as we've heard in the states and how it was important to Governor Hunt and working with the business community. So what we hear from our business leaders is that by 2020, 65% of jobs were required formal education beyond high school. But yet as a nation, we continue to struggle with so much low student achievement. If we don't lay the bedrock in the earliest years, the critical thinking skills that businesses need, the team building skills, that's never going to happen. It affects our international standing as a country. It affects consumers buying power, the ability to purchase products. It has an impact on business. It matters. It's in business' own self-interest to make sure that all kids get high quality preschool. So these are the challenges if we don't fully support preschool. So mission readiness has more than 600 retired animals and generals who talk about why these smart investments will help children to be able to enter military service or whatever career. So that you can't have a strong country when you have more than 70% of the young people without those basic skills. What's interesting is actually the military is competing against all other businesses for the same group of about 25% of the population. So I've seen it over and over again. You have a four star general stand up and say preschool is important and it's a matter of national security and policymakers listen in just a different way. So our organization of 5,000 police chief sheriffs and prosecutors called Fight Crime Invest in Kids, it's just really exciting to see how that local sheriff can talk to policymakers and frame the argument in a different way and how our business leaders can do the same thing. And our athletes and coaches who can have that kind of access to have someone like Coach K the winningest men's basketball coach talking about why he did this great op-ed talking about in a game against Notre Dame they got behind in the first quarter and they could never catch up. Well the same thing is true for so many young kids that they start behind and if we don't make those investments those kids are never going to be able to catch up. Our evangelical pastors we have more than 700 of those and you know when a policymaker knows that pastor has the ear of hundreds or some of the thousands of people every Sunday that's going to be a voice that can often be very helpful. So we were very pleased to work in Washington State just to give an example this year of working with allies and so we had our police chiefs and business leaders and retired admals and generals met with 38 policymakers testified did nine letters to the editor and op-eds. So trying to really raise the awareness that look it cuts crime it increases national security and another critical messages. So I just want to say David thank you so much for doing this report for you and your team for bringing everyone together I think this is very important and I know our unexpected messengers are ready to work with everybody in this audience and with you and your team so thank you so much.