Center for American Progress Report

The Center for American Progress has analyzed President Obama’s education budget for 2011 in great detail. The center’s analysts had this to say about the budget’s community initiatives:

The president also proposes to support community schools under a reformed CCLC program. The Center for American Progress discussed the benefits of school-based services offered by community schools in a recent report. In addition, the proposed $210 million in funding for Promise Neighborhoods will allow for the replication of the highly successful Harlem’s Children’s Zone in communities across the country. The president is right to prioritize funding for school-level reforms that facilitate access to important social and health services for students and families.

$210 Million

The federal education department issued a press release yesterday explaining President Obama’s 2011 budget request. Here’s the budget proposal for the Promise Neighborhoods program, which received $10 million in the 2010 budget:

$210 million for Promise Neighborhoods, a new competitive grant program modeled on the Harlem Children’s Zone that combines comprehensive social services with school improvements in order to transform whole neighborhoods.

National League of Cities

In Nation Cities Weekly, the magazine of the National League of Cities, Michael Karpman writes about the November conference on replicating the Harlem Children’s Zone model:

HCZ’s results are the reason why more than 1,400 local leaders from more than 100 communities gathered in New York at a recent conference co-sponsored with PolicyLink, a national research and action institute seeking to advance social and economic equity.  Speakers included New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg; Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker; Savannah, Ga., Mayor Otis Johnson; Secretary of Education Arne Duncan; White House Domestic Policy Council Director Melody Barnes; White House Office of Urban Affairs Director Adolfo Carrión; Children’s Defense Fund President Marian Wright Edelman; American Express Chairman and CEO Kenneth Chenault; HCZ President and CEO Geoffrey Canada and PolicyLink CEO Angela Glover Blackwell.

Most communities represented hope to receive federal planning grants under an Obama Administration proposal to create up to 20 Promise Neighborhoods modeled on HCZ. However, cities that do not receive federal support still plan to forge ahead. As one school district leader stated, “this is our mission — we’re going to do this whether we get the money or not.”

WNYC report

Beth Fertig at WNYC reports on this week’s conference on replicating the Harlem Children’s Zone model. In an accompanying blog post, she quotes Arne Duncan, the secretary of education, on whether communities applying for Promise Neighborhood grants need to be “shovel-ready” to have a shot at federal support:

These are scarce resources and there’s tremendous interest out there. And I think this work has to continue whether schools and neighborhoods and communities get funded or not. But we want to invest in those places that have the capacity to deliver dramatically better results for children. So this is not just about a good idea, it’s not just about good will or good intentions. We want to put lots of dollars, millions and millions of dollars behind those places that have the capacity, the political will, the courage and the plan to dramatically improve student outcomes.

Blog Roundup

On the Flypaper blog, Mike Petrilli comments on Arne Duncan’s recent statements on school vouchers:

“We need to be more ambitious,” Duncan explained. “The goal shouldn’t be to save a handful of children. The goal should be to dramatically change the opportunity structure for entire neighborhoods of kids.”

Wow. On the one hand, that rhetoric is straight out of the Great Society, and in line with the Obama team’s audacious attempt to redefine what’s possible in domestic policymaking. But it’s also a clear reference to Geoffrey Canada’s Harlem Children’s Zone, which is trying to remake an “entire neighborhood” of kids.

And on The Plank, a  New Republic blog, Seyward Darby adds, “It does appear that Harlem Children’s Zone and similar pioneering programs are informing Duncan’s approach to policy.” Darby quotes from the recent Chicago magazine interview with Duncan, in which Duncan promised to undertake and fund a 20-city Harlem Children’s Zone replication project, and concludes:

That’s pretty bold (and encouraging!) talk, particularly in the face of congressional and union opposition to broadening reform efforts that have only been tested on a small scale–like the Harlem Children’s Zone.

Arne Duncan

In a new interview in Chicago magazine, Arne Duncan, Barack Obama’s secretary of education, takes a stand for replicating the Harlem Children’s Zone:

Q: Have you read Whatever It Takes, the new book about Geoffrey Canada’s Harlem Children’s Zone? I bring it up because that project, which tries to catch kids from birth and guide them all the way to college, suggests that it may be necessary in certain communities for the neighborhood school to take on functions that lie traditionally in the realm of social services.
A: Geoff Canada’s a good, good friend of mine. I’m actually meeting with him Monday.

Q: Obviously you’re familiar with what he’s doing.
A: Yes. I’m going to create 20 Harlem Children’s Zones around the country. I am.

Q: Really? Do you think you’ll face opposition to the federal role expanding in that way?
A: I don’t care. I’m going to fund it.

To the Point

On Friday I’ll be on To the Point, a news talk program broadcast nationally on public radio, discussing education politics and the choice of Arne Duncan as education secretary. My fellow guests are Randi Weingarten, Rick Hess and Joe Williams. As the show’s website explains:

Barack Obama has picked a secretary of education who’s endorsed both sides of the raging debate over how to improve American schools. Will he become an agent of change or will splitting the difference reinforce the status quo?  Why is Obama so focused on early childhood education?

Check here for stations and times.