At the Teach For America 20th- anniversary summit in Washington, some of the most recognizable names in the education reform movement discussed the need for a “revolution” to close the nation’s achievement gap.
The summit this month served as a call to action for the 11,000 attendees, many of them trained by TFA, a nonprofit organization that places high-achieving college graduates in underresourced public schools around the country.
Speakers, including Harlem Children’s Zone founder Geoffrey Canada and former New York City Schools Chancellor Joel I. Klein, were asked to compare the fight for educational equity to the uprising in Egypt that forced President Hosni Mubarak to step down.
“Forget incremental change—we need radical change,” Mr. Klein told the crowd. Mr. Canada said that the last time he saw people assemble so passionately around an issue in the United States was during the civil rights era.
U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan praised TFA for changing the face of public education in this nation.
