Let's talk about education: Voices in Action 2011

Lauren Scherr co-authored this post.

This past Saturday, February 26, 2011, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) hosted "Voices in Action: National Youth Summit" in Washington, DC. The event culminated ED’s National Youth Listening Tour, which engaged more than 1,800 students in a conversation on President Obama's 2020 goal—for the U.S. to have the highest proportion of students graduating from college in the world by 2020. The purpose of the summit was to continue the dialogue on education reform in America.

More than 400 high school and middle school students from around the country as well as educators and policy officials met at the Summit to share their views on some of today’s most pressing educational issues. Top priorities for the day included:  effective teaching; college information gaps; parental involvement; community mentors; and school climate and discipline. Attendees spent the day participating in workshops and breakout sessions to identify what schools and communities need to best prepare students for college and career.

To encourage and ensure participation among the younger audiences, ED created a live  stream and Facebook page so anyone who was interested could follow the proceedings. In addition, Spark Action hosted a Twitter Q&A with U.S. Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, opening a direct channel to the administration. This was a novel approach to reaching and engaging the “Digital Native” population that may prove to be an innovative model for future campaigns.

Secretary Duncan also spoke at the conference about the importance of making higher education an aspiration for America’s youth. He noted that in today’s economy Americans aren’t just competing for jobs with peers in their neighborhood, but rather with many others from around the world. Duncan went on to emphasize the importance of education for America’s growth and economy by citing a previous statement from President Obama, “other countries are out-educating us today… and countries that out-educate us today will out-compete us tomorrow.”

During the conference ED released results from the listening tour, which highlighted challenges students face and possible solutions that they believe may help communities, families and schools to reach the president’s 2020 goal.

Several of the most pressing challenges reported by students included:

• More challenging curriculum and engaging classes needed in schools.
• More counselors are needed in schools.
• Information on the college applications process, financial aid, and the SAT/ACT process are too hard to come by.
• There is a lack of resources in schools.
• There is too great of a focus on security and discipline issues in schools.
• Quality of teachers could be improved (e.g., specialize in subject matter)
• The teacher to student ratio is too low—making for over-crowded and inefficient classrooms and too few teachers.
• Family instability (e.g., divorce, incarceration) is a serious concern for many.

Attendees left feeling that this was a positive step towards empowering youth. While no definitive conclusions were reached by the participants regarding next steps and policy actions, the conference reaffirmed the importance of the issue overall and raised awareness about what students consider to be the most challenging barriers to success.

How do you think ED and others in this space can continue the conversation and ensure that the voices of those who will be affected are heard? From a communications perspective, do you think social media tools are the most effective in rallying America’s youth to action?