Volume 13 / Number 1 Spring 2021 FUTURE OF CARNEGIE LEARNING & DEMOCRACY REPORTER Volume 12 / Number 2 Summer 2020 Sonia Sotomayor1 | SPRING What 2021 We Owe Our Children | Vartan Gregorian On Teachers | John B. King, Jr., Margaret Spellings, John C. White American Education | LaVerne Evans Srinivasan Achieving Equity, Rigor, and Relevance | Plus: Immigration, Scholarship and Public Policy, Higher Education in Africa WELCOME TO THE SPRING 2021 ISSUE OF THE CARNEGIE REPORTER We Must Keep at It t is hard to see the true impact of a crisis when Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor argues that a you are still in it. I have nodded my head each time I healthy civil society is built on a foundation of knowledge have heard this observation in the last year — in words and understanding, and that the obligations that come coming from media columnists, ICU nurses, researchers, with citizenship are learned, not inherited. Corporation and historians. Despite the one-year milestone of the Trustee Martha Minow reminds us of Justice Ruth Bader Ipandemic, and despite the rising hope that vaccines will Ginsburg’s work to help all citizens “repair tears in their local provide a path to a new normal, we all share a deep sense communities, the nation, and the world, so that the long arc that the new normal in America will not be the old normal. of the moral universe will continue to bend toward justice.” It may be decades before we truly understand what is happening now. And we recognize the role that education plays in international affairs, including in the halls of Congress, There are clear and obvious signs that our current crisis is where democracy is served when those creating foreign also shaped by the unresolved issues and lingering inequities policy can benefit from scholarly expertise and opportunities that we brought with us to this moment. The pandemic has to build bipartisan relationships that survive crises. served as a tsunami that has laid bare underlying systemic gaps in education, work, and our democracy, and we Indeed, we in America may be more unified than we think recognize that we did not see everything clearly before the we are. In a recent survey by Gallup and the Corporation, pandemic either. we found a surprising bipartisan consensus that the nation should help those in need and without work with a national Yet in some unexpected ways, the pandemic has brought plan that provides jobs, education, and training. a new lens that may help us see and address some things better. Geri Mannion, leader of the Corporation’s grantmaking in democracy, notes that there are real opportunities for Welcome to the Spring 2021 issue of the Carnegie Reporter, bipartisan progress on issues like immigration. “This is about where we look at the future of learning and the inextricable reaching across the aisle and across the street and across ties between education, democracy, and peace, and their industries … because that’s how people see what they have in implications for the era in which we are living. common and what they share,” she says. We talk to Margaret Spellings and John B. King, Jr., past Across the country, in this unexpected moment, the history secretaries of education, and consider what is changing — of this new normal is playing itself out at our home tables as and what must change — in order to educate all Americans we wrestle with the world at the same time we isolate from on a pathway to meaningful work. As LaVerne Evans it. We cannot yet grasp the enormity of the change we are Srinivasan, leader of the Corporation’s grantmaking in living. But we must keep at it, identifying new knowledge and education, says in her essay on how we can enact meaningful understanding, and working toward a future shaped by the change, “Practically everyone who plays a part in education best of what we know. must learn to act in new ways.” And while we all agree that education is imperative to the future of our nation and necessary for the strength of our democracy, we often don’t mention the central role of teachers, writes Corporation Julia Weede President Vartan Gregorian, in his letter calling for more Chief Communications and Digital Strategies Officer material and moral support for educators in America. Carnegie Corporation of New York 2 | SPRING 2021 Volume 13 / Number 1 Spring 2021 TABLE OF CONTENTS FROM THE PRESIDENT Teachers Create the Future of America | Vartan Gregorian 02 CARNEGIE CONVERSATION Chief Communications and American Education: What We Absolutely Can and Should Be Doing | 10 Digital Strategies Officer John B. King, Jr., Margaret Spellings, and John C. White Julia Weede Director of Content and Publications SPOTLIGHT Kelly Devine Transforming Education for a Rapidly Changing World | 18 Editor/Writer LaVerne Evans Srinivasan Kenneth Benson Principal Design Director CENTER POINT 26 Daniel Kitae Um All in the Family Making education work better for everyone is a team effort. Families — and the Editorial Assistant Corporation grantees who work with them — can help point the way Jessica DiGiacinto Researcher FEATURES Ronald Sexton What We Owe Our Children | Sonia Sotomayor 40 Carnegie Corporation of New York is a grant- The Supreme Court justice argues that a healthy civil society is built on a foundation making foundation, investing in knowledge that of knowledge and understanding inspires informed action in democracy, education, and international peace since 1911. Visit carnegie.org to learn more about our work and Course Correction | Andrew Geraghty and Geri Mannion to sign up for our newsletters. Civic education is imperative to the civic and civil health of the nation 44 To subscribe to the Carnegie Reporter magazine — it’s free! — go to: carnegie.org/reporter. RBG: What Ruth Bader Ginsburg Means to Me — And to Democracy | To update your mailing address or to submit a Martha Minow 46 question or comment, please email [email protected]. Continuing Education for Congress: Building Trust and Expertise — To Get Things Done | Menachem Wecker 54 BOARD OF TRUSTEES Thomas H. Kean, Chair Janet L. Robinson, Vice Chair Meet Naazneen Barma — Bringing Scholarly Insights to Real-World 61 Vartan Gregorian, Ex Officio Problems in International Relations | Ellen T. White Pedro Aspe Caroline Kennedy Lionel Barber Maria Elena Lagomasino CARNEGIE ON THE GROUND Jared L. Cohon Marcia McNutt The Elements: Transforming Teaching through Curriculum-Based 66 Kevin J. Conway Martha Minow Professional Learning | Jim Short and Stephanie Hirsh John J. DeGioia Louise Richardson Leymah Gbowee Anne Tatlock The Real Value of the Nuclear Ban Treaty | Carl Robichaud and Karim Kamel Jean-Marie Guéhenno Judy Woodruff 70 Helene L. Kaplan, Honorary Trustee Newton N. Minow, Honorary Trustee Building Bridges on Immigration | William H. Woodwell, Jr. 72 Africa Emergent | Wachira Kigotho e/merge Africa unleashes the power of digital learning, digital networks, and 75 networking in Africa NOTABLE EVENTS Listening to Americans: The Gallup/Carnegie Back to Work Survey | CEIP President William 78 437 Madison Avenue J. Burns Confirmed for CIA Director | General Lloyd J. Austin III Becomes First Black Secretary New York, New York 10022 of Defense | Vartan Gregorian Honored by 9/11 Memorial & Museum | Andrew Carnegie Phone: 212.371.3200 Fax: 212.753.0584 carnegie.org Fellow on the Mythology of Linear Economic Progress On the Cover CARNEGIE BOOKSHELF Woman of Words New Orleans’ Rameisha “Ramie” Transforming African Higher Education | Claudia Frittelli 82 Johnson spent about three days manually adding the words to the wall behind her, creating a virtual learning Energy, Climate Change, and the Emerging Global Order | Thomas C. Hayes space for her daughter with a series of inspirational 85 quotes suggested by her colleagues at EdNavigator. A 1962 quote by James Baldwin (1924–1987) appears CARNEGIE CORNER partially above Ramie: “Not everything that is faced 88 can be changed; but nothing can be changed until it is Our Future Rests with the Children of Immigrants | Marcelo Suárez-Orozco faced.” For more on Ramie and some of her own words, check out the Center Point section of the magazine CARNEGIE REPORTER | 1 beginning on p. 26. FROM THE PRESIDENT A Noble Profession A teacher from Yung Wing Elementary P.S. 124 in New York City’s Chinatown remote teaches from her rooftop on March 24, 2020. Due to the spread of COVID-19, the city’s vast system of 1,800 schools had entirely shut down the week before. CREDIT: MICHAEL LOCCISANO/GETTY IMAGES 2 | SPRING 2021 TEACHERS CREATE THE FUTURE OF AMERICA While we all agree that education is imperative to the future of our nation and necessary for the strength of our democracy, we often don’t mention the central role of teachers, writes Vartan Gregorian. They deserve both material and moral support as well as our respect By Vartan Gregorian Editor’s Note: Vartan Gregorian, the 12th president of Carnegie Corporation of New York, died unexpectedly on April 15, 2021, as this issue was on press. Gregorian founded the Carnegie Reporter magazine in 2000 and was deeply involved in the development of this issue dedicated to education and democracy. Among Gregorian’s many writings as an educator and a historian, this final essay focuses on subjects that he held dear — teaching and learning. To learn more about his extraordinary life and legacy, please visit carnegie.org/gregorian. ndrew Carnegie, our founder, had an extraor- guardian of our democracy, because they had learned that dinary vision for our society. He believed along with all of the rights bestowed upon them came an in the necessity and the transformational obligation to become engaged citizens. power of education. He also believed that the success of our democracy depends on the After more than two centuries of independence, we in Aquality of our education and of our teachers.