Forum on Youth, Education, and American Competitiveness

Greetings Friends & Colleagues:

I would like to invite you to join Secretary of Education ARNE DUNCAN, PBS NewsHour’s JUDY WOODRUFF, Senator LAMAR ALEXANDER & DC Schools Chancellor KAYA HENDERSON (among others) for a discussion on youth, education, and America’s competition and skills deficit as compared to the rest of the world.  

We talk a lot about the need to train youth to compete in a global economy — but the bottom line is that American schools, families, firms, school boards, states and the general matrix of stakeholders in education aren’t really cutting it when it comes to kicking out deliverables on a highly skilled, flexible, thinking workforce that can compete with the rest of the world.  These are ‘my views’ here — not necessarily those of our speakers.

I would like to invite you to be my guest at this event and participate in the discussion.  I will be there the entire time and will be moderating a couple of the morning sessions.  I myself am frustrated with the fuzziness of the education policy arena — but I feel that this event, underwritten by Microsoft, will be a cut above the norm.  I’d very much like you to be part of the meeting.

The Forum takes place at The Newseum (enter on 6th Street) -- on Tuesday, 27 March 2012, from 8:15 am – 11:30 am.   Please feel free to RSVP directly to me at this email or to Eliza French at efrench@theatlantic.com (phone 202-266-7678)

The agenda follows below.  Please let me know if you can join and thanks so much for considering this.

All best,

Steve Clemons

Washington Editor at Large, The Atlantic

@SCClemons

Agenda Below

Jobs & the Economy: Educating a Next Generation to Compete

The Newseum, 555 Pennsylvania Avenue NW   Washington, DC

Tuesday, 27 March 27 2012

8:15 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.

RSVP to STEVE CLEMONS directly at sclemons@theatlantic.com

8:15 a.m.                         

Guest Arrival

8:45 a.m.                         

Welcome Remarks by Steve Clemons, Editor-in-Chief, AtlanticLIVE

8:50 a.m.                         

Remarks by Brad Smith, General Counsel and Executive Vice President, Microsoft

8:55 a.m.                         

International Youth Foundation Report Unveiling

9:00 a.m.                         

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan

Interviewed by Judy Woodruff, Senior Correspondent, PBS NewsHour

9:45 a.m.                

Panel Discussion: Re-Thinking Higher Education in America

Moderator: Steve Clemons

Confirmed Panelists:

• Michael Greenstone, Director of The Hamilton Project

• Kaya Henderson, Chancellor, DC Public Schools

• Robert Mendenhall, President of the Western Governors University

• Amy Rosen, President & CEO, Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship

10:45 a.m.

Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN)

Interviewed by Amanda Ripley, Contributor, TIME Magazine

11:30  a.m.                      

Closing Remarks