In farewell, Duncan chides 'collective failure' to protect kids
In his final speech as U. S. Education Secretary , Duncan on Wednesday delivered a blunt, sometimes unsparing address that challenged adults to help restore safety and a basic sense of hope to millions of young people — many of whom, he said, don't expect to make it to adulthood.
Speaking from the basement of a church onChicago's South Side , Duncan directly linked the U.S. high school dropout rate with its youth homicide rate, saying both problems spring from the same "collective failure as adults" to nurture and protect children.
"Dropping out is one level of hopelessness," he said. "And picking up a gun and shooting someone is just that in the extreme."
Moments into the speech, Duncan's voice shook as he recounted one grim statistic: About 16,000 young people had been killed, he said, in his first six years in Washington.
The total after seven years was likely "north of 18,000," or an average of seven children killed every day, he said. "It's a crisis that we have to come together to work on."
The idea of making a church basement the location of his 257th and final speech as secretary was no accident. Duncan, 51, said his "life's work" began in a similar basement with his mother's after-school program. And he noted, "Movements have started in church basements. We could have been in a fancy hotel downtown, we could have done something else, but that didn't feel right. This feels like home."
More than any other education secretary in recent memory, Duncan has pushed to give the federal government a larger role in schools' day-to-day workings, using much-needed federal funding during the recession to entice states to turn around struggling schools and to pay more attention to teacher ratings, among other measures.
He noted a few key accomplishments as a result, including an all-time high 82% high school graduation rate, as well as large reductions in African-American and Latino students' dropout rates — 1.1 million more students of color are now graduating from high school and going on to college, he said, "so the progress is real."
But he warned that his departure on Wednesday "is not some 'Mission Accomplished ' moment. Not by any stretch."
Schools still suspend too many minority students, putting them on a path to run-ins with police and perpetuating the so-called school-to-prison pipeline. "We are part of the problem," he said.
Most pointedly, Duncan recounted several conversations he'd had recently with young people who told him that gangs and gun violence in their communities meant they simply didn't expect to live very long. He said a young woman in Ferguson, Mo. , told him, "I'd consider it a blessing if I live to be 16."
A few weeks ago, Duncan said, he met a young woman in Baltimore who estimated In farewell, Duncan chides 'collective failure' to protect kids:
