A letter to the president.

Dear Mr. Bush or Mr. Kerry: I write this letter in October, long before the votes have been cast and tallied so I don't know which of you will be inaugurated this month. But whoever it might be, I would ask you to step back and reflect on the perils and possibilities of your job and in particular how they will affect the future of our country by the children's policies that you choose to pursue.

Now you may find it strange that as an educator I choose to use the words "children's policies" and not education, but that is the point. To borrow a phrase from an earlier election, "it's about the whole child, stupid."

During the campaign you talked about education as if it was an isolated activity that could be improved with more accountability or a new program here or there. Much of the emphasis on education (when there was an emphasis at all) was on college and competition. You talked about accountability and standards. That is all interesting but let me assure you that until we get serious in this country about our children and the totality of their lives, we will never get serious about education. No standards in the world are high enough to elevate those in need. Perhaps we could start by asking our country to take a global test by adopting the greeting that the Masai in Africa use: "How are the children?"

Lacking Bootstraps

We have a national program, No Child Left Behind, that one of you proposed and the other of you voted for so I suspect we will continue to live under its shadow these coming years. We can all hope that in the coming months you will find the insight and flexibility required to make its best intentions more possible. However, until we recognize that when about 20 to 30 percent of our children come to school already left behind, it will remain a tough lift for schools alone to close the gap between our best intentions and our sad realities.

You can't ask people to lift themselves up by their own bootstraps if they aren't wearing boots and you can't ask a boot maker to make boots without giving him leather. It was once said that it is easier to build children than to repair men. We must accept it is also easier to build children if their health, safety and nutrition are sound and if their developmental needs are addressed. So educational idea No. 1 is to start your education policy by asking, "How are the children?"

The next idea is to make sure every classroom in America has a world map. Now you are going to say that most of them do--even if they are woefully outdated. But you should vary these new maps by supplying maps created for other countries. I have been struck when visiting other countries to find that their world maps had them in the center of the map instead of the United States. You see, everyone is the center of his or her own universe and every country is the center of its world. That is a quaint notion the most powerful nation in that world can no longer afford to hold for itself.

Like most Americans I love my country very much and I am very proud of its heritage and the possibilities it holds out. But we have to understand that we are only one of hundreds of countries and they all love themselves too. And being powerful, what we do affects them. If we want our children to play well with others, it must start with us.

Our children are inheriting a world that is much smaller and much more interdependent than the one in which we grew up. When one country pollutes, another coughs. When one is caught in the undertow of poverty, another pays the price. The economy is global and so must be our thinking. Our children must begin learning the interwoven nature of the world and that America is but one patch in the quilt of humanity.

Yes, our children need the highest levels of skill to compete in the global marketplace, but they also need the skills of collaboration and the practice of humility to survive in a smaller world. And it wouldn't be a bad thing if we made sure they knew another language. While English is the international language, the acquisition of another language opens a new window of perspective and a little more perspective is exactly what the world needs right now.

Mutual Interests

I would hope that whoever is sworn in on Jan. 20, 2005, also will swear an oath of allegiance to making America a good society by reinvigorating public education. The economist John Kenneth Galbraith suggested that a good society is one where every citizen regardless of background can have access to a rewarding life. And that must start with education. Virtually every social thinker worth his or her salt has recognized that a healthy public education system is the cornerstone of democracy. Even the 9/11 Commission recommended that America concentrate on building strong public education systems in the Middle East so that democracy could flourish there. Does our own country deserve any less?

Isn't it time we stop trying to find simple solutions to complex problems and recognize that for our nation to advance we need a public education system that is equipped to raise the skills and strengthen the values of all our citizens? Wouldn't that imply creating a system that personalizes children's strengths and provides an education that is meaningful and engaging? Isn't that the foundation for creating proficiency?

Perhaps you could start your term off by quoting in your inaugural address the words of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. that "we are all caught up in a network of mutuality, tied into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly."

How are the children, Mr. President?

Paul Houston is AASA executive director. E-mail: [e-mail]