John Bridgeland was recently appointed to the White House Council for Community Solutions by President Barack Obama. Mr. Bridgeland previously served under President George W. Bush as Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council. As Assistant to the President of the United States and the first Director of the USA Freedom Corps, Mr. Bridgeland coordinated policy on international, national, community and faith-based service in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Mr. Bridgeland co-leads Opportunity Nation to increase economic mobility and help restore access to the American Dream for low-income Americans. His report on the high school dropout crisis – The Silent Epidemic – helped bring national attention to the issue, and his leadership of the National Summit on America’s Silent Epidemic (with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the National Governors Association, TIME Magazine and MTV) prompted federal, state and local action around a 10-point plan to boost high school graduation rates, and college and workforce readiness.

Mr. Bridgeland’s non-profit board service includes City Year, Earth Conservation Corps, EARTH University in Costa Rica, Malaria No More, the New Hampshire Institute of Politics, and the National Conference on Citizenship. He is the author or co-author of a dozen reports related to the dropout epidemic, and of the forthcoming book Heart of a Nation: Volunteering and America’s Civic Sprit.

Mr. Bridgeland holds an A.B. (honors) in government from Harvard University, studied at the College of Europe and Universite Libre de Bruxelles as a Rotary International Fellow, and received his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law.

Dr. Carnevale’s career in academia, workforce research and public service includes appointments to the White House Commission on Technology and Adult Education by President George W. Bush, and to the chairmanship of the National Commission on Employment Policy by President Bill Clinton. Prior to his presidential appointments, Dr. Carnevale served as Vice President for Public Leadership at the Educational Testing Service, and as Director of Human Resource and Employment Studies at the Committee for Economic Development – the nation’s oldest business-sponsored policy research organization.

Dr. Carnevale founded and was president of the Institute for Workplace Learning; served as Director of Political and Government Affairs for the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (the largest union in the AFL-CIO); and served as a senior staff member in both houses of the U.S. Congress, where he was appointed Majority Staff Director on the Public Financing Subcommittee of the House Committee on Government Operations.

Dr. Carnevale received his B.A from Colby College, and his Ph.D. in public finance economics from the Maxwell School at Syracuse University.

Appointed the ninth U.S. Secretary of Education by President Barack Obama, Mr. Duncan’s tenure has been marked by a number of significant accomplishments on behalf of American students and teachers. He helped to secure congressional support for President Obama’s investments in education – including the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act’s $100 billion to fund 325,000 teaching jobs, increases in Pell grants, reform efforts such as Race to the Top and Investing in Innovation, and interventions in low-performing schools. Additionally, Secretary Duncan has helped secure an additional $10 billion to avoid teacher layoffs, the elimination of student loan subsidies to banks, and a $500 million national competition for early learning programs.

Under Secretary Duncan’s leadership, the Race to the Top program has the incentives, guidance, and flexibility it needs to support reforms in states. The Department also has focused billions of dollars to transform struggling schools, prompting more than 1,000 low-performing schools nationwide to recruit new staff, adopt new teaching methods, and add learning time. Secretary Duncan also has led new efforts to encourage labor and management to work together as never before, and their new collaboration is helping to drive reform, strengthen teaching, create better educational options, and improve learning. During Secretary Duncan’s tenure, the Department has launched a comprehensive effort to transform the teaching profession.

Secretary Duncan holds an A.B., magna cum laude, in sociology from Harvard University, where he was co-captain of Harvard’s basketball team and was named a first team Academic All-American.

Jonathan Fanton is Interim Director and Franklin D. Roosevelt Visiting Fellow at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College. He was President of The MacArthur Foundation from 1999-2009. Mr. Fanton holds a Ph.D in American History from Yale University where he taught and was Chief of Staff to President Kingman Brewster. He was Vice President of Planning at The University of Chicago and for 17 years was President of The New School for Social Research.

He is past Chair of Human Rights Watch, Security Council Report, The Union Square Development Corporation, The Association of Independent Colleges and Universities in New York, and was also an Advisory Trustee at the Rockefeller Brothers Foundation. He is currently Chair of the Africa Advisory Committee for Human Rights Watch, Chair of Scholars At Risk, and on the Boards of Research Alliance, Common Cause, and the Asian Cultural Council.

As President of Bunker Hill Community College, and formerly as President of the multi-campus Harrisburg Area Community College, Mary Fifield has led two institutions that received the Charles Kennedy Equity Award from the Association of Community College Trustees for achievement of equity and opportunity for women and persons of color. A strong advocate for workforce development, Dr. Fifield has held a gubernatorial appointment to the Workforce Investment Board for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and is a gubernatorial appointee to the Special Commission on Educational Scholarships. She also currently serves on the Educational Testing Service (ETS) College Advisory Committee and is a former Commissioner for the New England Association of Schools and Colleges – the accrediting agency for higher education institutions.

Dr. Fifield is a former member of the Board and Executive Committee of the American Association of Community Colleges, which represents more than 1,100 two-year institutions nationwide. She is a member of The Boston Foundation Indicators Project Leadership Group, The Boston Foundation Workforce Development Advisory Committee, and is Chair Emerita of the Boston Higher Education Partnership – a coalition of 30 Greater Boston Colleges, Universities and the Boston Public Schools. Dr. Fifield also serves on the Boston Private Industry Council’s Workforce Investment Board.

The co-author of several publications and articles about community colleges, global workforce needs, and the value of diversity, Dr. Fifield holds a B.A. from Clarke College, an M.F.A. from Pratt Institute, and a Ph.D. from St. Louis University.

Matthew Goldstein is the first CUNY graduate to lead the nation’s most prominent urban public university, which comprises 24 colleges and professional schools throughout the five boroughs of New York City. Under Dr. Goldstein’s leadership, CUNY is experiencing a widely lauded transformation. The University has raised academic standards, improved student performance, increased enrollment, built its faculty corps, created new colleges and schools, and expanded its research capacity.

Dr. Goldstein is a member of the Business-Higher Education Forum, as well as a director of the Lincoln Center Institute for the Arts in Education, ex officio. By appointment of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo, he is co-chair of the New York City Regional Economic Development Council and a member of the New NY Education Reform Commission. He previously served as chair of the 2010 New York City Charter Revision Commission at the appointment of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.

A fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and of the New York Academy of Sciences, Dr. Goldstein earned his B.S. (high honors) in statistics and mathematics from The City College of The City University of New York, and his Ph.D. in mathematical statistics from the University of Connecticut.

As New York State Education Commissioner, Dr. King oversees more than 7,000 public and independent elementary and secondary schools (serving 3.1 million students), and hundreds of other educational institutions across New York State – including higher education, libraries, and museums. A former high school teacher and middle school principal, Dr. King has been a strong voice for education reform and a driving force in New York’s successful Race to the Top application.

Dr. King holds an A.B. from Harvard University, a J.D. from Yale Law School, and an M.A. and Ed.D. from Teachers College, Columbia University.

A former Deputy Chancellor of the New York City Public Schools, Mr. Litow helped devise the Pathways in Technology Early College High School (P-TECH) – a grades 9 through 14 school engaging companies, colleges, communities and schools to strengthen U.S economic competitiveness. Mr. Litow also developed IBM’s Smarter Cities Challenge to help 100 cities worldwide become more effective, and IBM’s Corporate Service Corps, a corporate version of the Peace Corps, to train and deploy thousands of IBM’s future leaders. Under Mr. Litow’s leadership, IBM led three national education summits and has become widely regarded as the global leader in Corporate Citizenship, and praised for societal and environmental leadership, labor practices, and civic leadership. Previously he worked for both the Mayor of New York City and the Governor of New York State.

He has served on the President’s Welfare to Work Commission, and currently serves on the board of the Harvard Business School Social Enterprise Initiative, The Citizens Budget Commission, The After-School Corporation and the Albert Shanker Institute.

Mr. Litow’s articles and commentary have appeared in publications including: Education Week, The New York Times, U.S. News & World Report, and The Yale Law Journal. He is the recipient of the Council on Foundation’s prestigious Scrivner Award for creative philanthropy, and was recognized by the Anne Frank Center, the Coro Foundation, and the Martin Luther King, Jr. Commission for his commitment to education, service and leadership. He has twice been voted CEO of the Year by Corporate Responsibility magazine, and IBM’s efforts to improve American education have won the company two Ron Brown Presidential Awards for Corporate Leadership, presented by the President of the United States.

Cynthia Marshall oversees AT&T North Carolina’s public policy activities and operations of 7,000 employees statewide. Nationally, she chairs the Board of Governors of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. Within North Carolina, Cynthia is a member of the Executive Committee and a past Chair of the North Carolina Chamber, the first African American to hold the position. She also serves on the Board of Directors for numerous organizations, including the Foundation for the Carolinas and the Kenan Institute for Engineering, Technology and Science at North Carolina State University.

Among Ms. Marshall’s numerous awards and honors are the “Friend of Education Award” from the North Carolina State Board of Education, the Award of Excellence from the Thurgood Marshall Fund, and the Woman of Substance Award from Bennett College. In 2010, she received the Maya Angelou Women Who Lead Award from the United Negro College Fund for her contributions to North Carolina and to the business community.

Ms. Marshall is a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley.

Jennifer J. Raab is the 13th President of Hunter College, the largest college of the City University of New York.
Since assuming the presidency in 2001, she has led a successful effort to enlarge the faculty and recruit distinguished professors and artists. Standards throughout the college have been raised, and fiscal management has been modernized and strengthened, as reflected in Hunter’s rising national standing as one of the Top 10 “Best Value” public colleges in the nation for three consecutive years, according to The Princeton Review.
Major changes include the renovation and reopening of the historic Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt House, now the Public Policy Institute at Hunter College, and the construction of a Hunter’s renowned School of Social Work housing the new CUNY School of Public Health at Hunter College in East Harlem.
Before coming to Hunter, Raab was Chairman of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, and served as a political campaign advisor, the Director of Public Affairs for the New York City Planning Commission, and a litigator at two of the nation’s top law firms.

A graduate of Hunter College High School, President Raab is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Cornell University, holds a Master in Public Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton and received her law degree cum laude from Harvard Law School.

Robert Schwartz is Francis Keppel Professor of Practice in Educational Policy and Administration at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Prior to joining the Harvard faculty in 1996, Schwartz served in a variety of roles in education: high school teacher and principal; education advisor to the Mayor of Boston and the Governor of Massachusetts; director of The Boston Compact, a public/private partnership; and Education Program director at The Pew Charitable Trusts, one of the country’s largest private philanthropies. From 1997-2002 Schwartz served as founding President of Achieve, Inc, a non-profit organization created by governors and corporate leaders to help raise academic standards and improve performance in US schools. More recently Schwartz has contributed to two major OECD studies, Learning for Jobs and Strong Performers and Successful Reformers; co-authored a widely influential report calling for more attention to career and technical education, Pathways to Prosperity; and co-edited The Futures of School Reform.

Chancellor Tisch brings to her appointment many years of experience in the fields of education, community service, and philanthropy. She is chairperson of the $100 million Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty, which has gained national recognition for its work in the areas of youth and family services, housing, poverty programs, and neighborhood preservation. Previously, she served as chairperson of the Mt. Sinai Children’s Center Foundation.

Chancellor Tisch also serves on the executive committees of The Washington Institute for Near East Policy and the Citizens Budget Commission. Additionally, she serves on the board of The Trust for Cultural Resources of the City of New York, the Graduate School of Education’s Board of Overseers at the University of Pennsylvania, Learning Leaders, and the Sesame Workshop.

Chancellor Tisch formerly taught first-graders at New York City’s Ramaz School and the B’nai Jeshurun School. She holds a B.A. from Barnard College, an M.A. in Education from New York University, and an Ed.D. from Teacher’s College, Columbia University.

As the New York City Department of Education’s second-in-command, Mr. Polakow-Suransky oversees all of the Department’s instructional work – including implementation of the Common Core standards, design and administration of summative and formative assessments, school accountability initiatives, leadership development, and direct operational and instructional support to schools. In this capacity, Mr. Polakow-Suransky has focused on building instructional capacity, using data to evaluate school quality and improve student performance, developing school leaders, and opening new schools.
Mr. Polakow-Suransky has worked in the New York City Public Schools since 1994. He started his career as a middle school mathematics and social studies teacher before becoming assistant principal at Bread and Roses Integrated Arts High School in Harlem. In 2001, Mr. Polakow-Suransky became the founding principal of Bronx International High School, which primarily served English language learners. Under Mr. Polakow-Suransky’s leadership, the school achieved some of the best scores among its peer institutions in the city.

Mr. Polakow-Suransky was born in South Africa, from which his parents – who were anti-apartheid activists – fled in 1973. He holds a B.A. in education and urban studies from Brown University, and an M.A. in educational leadership from Bank Street College of Education. Mr. Polakow-Suransky also was a 2008 Fellow at the Broad Superintendents Academy.

Ms. Wylde joined the nonprofit Partnership for New York City – the city’s leading business organization – in 1982 and took over as President & CEO after serving as founding president of two Partnership subsidiaries, the Housing Partnership Development Corporation and the Partnership Fund. Under her leadership, the Partnership has played a major role in the revitalization of the city and its neighborhoods, and has contributed to the city’s emergence as a premiere global center of commerce, culture and innovation.

An internationally-known expert in housing, economic development and urban policy, Ms. Wylde is the Deputy Chair of the Board of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and serves on a number of boards and advisory groups, including the Mayor’s Sustainability Advisory Board, NYC Economic Development Corporation, NYC & Company, NYC Leadership Academy, the Research Alliance for NYC Schools, the Manhattan Institute, the Governor’s Regional Economic Development Council and the Lutheran Medical Center. She was a member of the NYS legislative commission that recommended mayoral control of the NYC school system and the Mayor’s task force on career & technical education reform.

Ms. Wylde is a graduate of St. Olaf College.