jesus christ preached in the gospel. that is the fundamental reality of our schools. but what but what we believe is that the individual, the human person with that our school is of inevitable dignity and because of that dignity we held them within our environment and asked what education that we will help them flourish as an individual person and human being. and therefore all the things that make up a good a good education are part of the conversation for our schools and good teachers, community excellent governance, good use of resources all of that is part of the larger question because it matters to who the the children are. we believe that education

has two ends and the church's teachings on this and clear for many years. but the flourishing of the person here and now as a citizen of this world and their eternal and as a citizen of the world to come and so the mission and the vision of our schools we try to keep that very much within our minds because it matters to the children in front of us. that is what makes our schools different. [applause] >> i'm going to assume that is the same mission as the charter schools. what makes the charter schools unique and different? >> again, it is a diverse committee. depending on the state law that allows for the creation of charter schools you we will have different types. one of the things we do is grade charter school law based upon strength and last

year we produced a document that looked at the movement and the quality how innovative. and the thing we base it on is whether as an entrepreneur or you are able to open a school and come up with different types of curricula, different modes of delivering and different ways of attracting families and running schools. the more the more freedom you have to do that the stronger your law is. here again in washington dc some of the strongest charter school movement's because you are able to create online charter schools charter schools focused on math and science bilingual education character building and whatnot. depending again on the strength of the law you have different types of schools. we are as in the teeth of agnostic as agnostic as to what type of education is provided as long as they make sure all of the students regardless of race background are

achieving graduating command going on to college. >> that's great. [applause] >> i will just add, i think you asked earlier like what is happening. in happening. in many schools particularly urban and working-class communities kids are dying without hope teachers and believe in them. they don't see going to and through college as something that is real to them. this problem is urgent, real, and we have to have a three sector approach. sometimes i here it is all about having great charter schools or traditional public schools. the reality is we need a three sector approach great charter schools, traditional public schools, private schools, independent schools., independent schools. if they are not quality than they need to close. we need a no excuses no time no patients for schools and organizations or people were people who don't put children and student interest 1st. >> that is a great question.

the last couple of months or last six months to schools in indianapolis of closed. parents did not want it. is there a distinction between the idea that we want accountability based upon test score and performance and it parents still don't want the school to close? >> you know i think it is on us as reformers to think thoughtfully. if the if the students are going to go to a worse off school that is actually not a better choice. we have to engage the community in the process and be more transparent about what is a quality school. it is not just test scores family engagement, teacher satisfaction, accountability are multiple measures. i would argue that there is

not great transparency around what is a quality school. the more we can engage in the discussion about quality some more thoughtful we can be about closing schools and providing students and families better options. >> when she looks at me i have to say yes. >> and i would agree from the vantage.that we use the phrase principal subsidiary. the local level level in the catholic school, the community should be vested in that environment which means parents administrators the pastor, the bishop, a vested miss. the other.is that in doing so that relationship is a partnership. it is not just a consumer experience but an actual partnership with the school takes on the obligation to educate that child on behalf of the parent.

i think that element of relationship related to education is extremely important and maybe sometimes missing in this conversation. the parent has an obligation to communicate well with the school and the school vice versa. when we talk about accountability it is a relationship not necessarily just a gavel. i think that is an important part. >> can i take that? if the charter school movement were to operate the same way as a traditional system operates it would be no different from the other system that we are trying to save students from. it is important that we are firm on accountability and advocate for closure when a school is continuously failing. having said that, the reason why families are not

reacting could be that the schools are not as safe or as high-quality as high quality as the school that they are currently sending her children to. as reformers it is important for us to come up with sensible options whether through giving the governance of that charter to another charter school in explaining the families why it is they would be better off in another school making sure that other options are available is important. one last thing that we often think of this is something that only impacts low income families, but as a parent who is exercising choice right now it is extremely confusing to understand if a school is a high quality school and whether it is actually expending taxpayer dollars effectively. it is extremely opaque. the more information that is out in the public domain it would be better for our nation as a whole to understand what makes a quality school and what type

of schools are likely to put you on the path to success in college. >> agree. >> i am pro- vouchers 100 percent pro- vouchers. [applause] and most people are pro-vouchers. they just get caught up in the politics of what the words have come to mean in the political theater that is education. if you are pro- section eight and some of you might be using it, if you are pro- food stamps or the most recent iteration thereof pro- student financial aid pro- medicaid pro-medicare you are pro-vouchers, for public money being used for other public good or private goods or services. further, we don't don't have a problem with sending

brigham young university notre dame, boston boston college cooperating of the other jazz of the schools federal student financial aid. we see this as part of the thing that we do to educate at the next level. but then you here people saying they are against pre-k to 12 vouchers because they might go to a catholic school. isn't school. isn't notre dame the catholic school? why would you be okay with notre dame the university receiving a voucher but not notre dame high school or notre dame elementary school it is because the university doesn't have as good a lobbying group as the pre-k to 12 folks do. we need to do a better job of making it plain too much of the

education conversation is held in the minds and mouse of wonky politicos. love love you guys and your khaki pants and your blue blazers. love you but you don't make sense to the rest of the world. your echo chamber conversations don't mean anything to regular people. you wonder why people don't sign on to what you're talking about. it's because you're talking over people's heads. if you did you would take the time to make sure they understood what you said have them ask you questions, teach them. too too much of the conversation goes over the heads of our community and as a result they just sit they're. making it plain is this every child has a right to go to a good school.

and we have found the federal government through the courts have found every single time it has been brought before them if you put children from one community in it to disadvantage circumstance then that is inherently wrong. they need to be given choice. we need to fight to make sure our community understands if they got a scholarship if we can explain it a scholarship pre- k-12 grade they understand terms like a voucher. your people on both sides of the political conversation talking about how they want to save money in public education. you are you are paying for it twice not because there is a charter school or magnet school that because

it's a school a school that you paid into that the children did not attend. all these children who are hear attending charter schools, if there school the neighborhood school receives one dime you are paying twice. i'll say it again. connecticut, if the child is slated to go -- well, every child is slated to go to a neighborhood school. snow school elementary school of the street the one that kept me back in the 3rd grade. my sons don't attend. they attend my school. it gives $13,000 per pupil. capitol prep gives 12,000. we're paying $15,000 to thought that's why that they're are great and

workout, 25,000 for for my sons to go to one school, a school that they have never set foot in for any reason at all. if they were voucher they would only be paid once. the reason why we are in the situation we are in is because we're trying to keep the other school open so that they grown people can keep their jobs. what even they neglect to understand is the number of students does not change. it is static. if there are 1000 students that need teachers, there are a thousand students that need teachers no matter where they are. you will have a job as a teacher. we need to make it plain that our community that they are being played by the system so that the people who don't utilize these urban schools and send their kids to suburban, charter or catholic schools they send their own children the catholic school that don't support private schools.

we need to make it plain for our community so that our community can fight with us as opposed to a simply simply fighting and then not understand what we're fighting for. [applause] >> one of those packets suited grassroots politics. done some incredible work. grassroots activism. the big challenge is that you face and in particular dealing with people in khaki pants and blue blazers? ..

. >> what are some examples of grass roots activism.

>> and they rallied community leaders and parents to make sure that it would stay open. that is of greatest symbol of an effort that they insisted in an effort to to bring the leaders to the forefront. we have to leaders in the room today from the charter school association aunt mary carmichael these two individuals can probably teach tell you more in their respective communities but one of the things that you notice is the sense of learned helplessness. people have come to these communities to offer hope they and they have left. unfortunately that is what happens cop with the school district leaders. they may have support at the

time when office but unfortunately the average tenure is less than three years. then the next person comes with new ideas so understanding where they come from to make whenever infrastructure will stay there and one reason why a charter schools trumps any systemic reform because families are choosing them. because they are assigned to those schools. >> we obviously overlooked the most obvious grass-roots effort, in the waiting list. parents are voting with their feet. that i don't want the school that i am assigned. to the standard 20 or 30 or

40 or 50 percent of the entire student population. there is no other movement. a hour school has 4,200 children on the waiting list. one school. 70 seats but because of all week school board in the week mayor and the leaders have no vision in the community our school is not allowed to expand. with vouchers we don't have to go through this. each child would be then we would just open another school as many when the community says so resoundingly that they want something and the politicians stand in the way because literally a union person says something mean it to them or about them there is so weak in their conviction the same people

do not send their own children to the schools set the legislative over. we have micro activism. to look at the conversation new york of the grass-roots movement. they have found a way to understand which schools are the best performing. there may not understand the test data or with the theme is or what step means but if you look at the longest waiting was there also the best performing so the streets are talking the drums are playing and our community wants out. we, the powerful people are not letting them out. we need to make sure when they do our -- they do their

part we do our part and that allows them to have the choice. when you have cities with the school after school with the waiting list that is the clearest example of the grass roots then we blame the parents for not wanting to participate? are you kidding me? guess who they are mad at? us. they shouldn't me because we don't explain the reason why is not because the charter school association but it is because the weak school board and the overzealous union member have put a cap, a limit on how many of you can get out of this school. until we can make it abundantly clear who is to blame for this we keep getting the blame. i still m a principal.

mind your gm business. [laughter] i am working. it is a snow day today. [applause] [laughter] when i am doing bus to be and save my child has been on the waiting list six years i am not proud of that. there is nothing makes me feel i have done something right then i have wasted in the entire academic career on the school they know what to be in. i would open more schools if we could just get to the children. we have a grass-roots movement fight to make sure the with the parents have done that they could do to vote with their feet and move out of the failed school systems to major vouchers are real the choice is real so they can get the children out of the doldrums

of the very system that uneducated them. [applause] >> as the private catholic school parent for many years i don't know of a more grass roots based organization than the catholic church. so how have you been so successful? my school was filled with a wide diversity. lot of people were in poverty how have you created this success? >> the projects parents what an excellent education for their children and catholic schools have graduated students at 97% and 87 go on to the for your institution and do very well. so the reality within the

school itself is that parents want to that and will do what they can't do to be a part of that. we have 6500 schools approximately in the united states according to the most recent data 41% our urban or the inner-city setting. support of the challenge still although parents want our product is to help with those structures that give parents more voice and opportunity to say why it is important they are involved there in choosing the school that matters including the opportunity to have a full education for their child. so parents recognize a good

education when they see it and that has been helpful to attract people to the catholic school but we need to do more structurally to give them greater voice of parental choice. we use the term very specifically not school choice because we believe that is what this is about it is much more about having the right to choose the and supporting a particular institution in. [applause] >> one of the things that is important to do is point out the hypocrisy. we have a conversation around school choice that is not typically engaged by other people purport lofted disappointed by the latino in congressional black

caucus day as parents emphasize school choice but do not send their children to the neighborhood school in the good that they represent because some gatt very lucky into lotteries and get their children in or the magnet school. that is how lucky they are. [laughter] if we don't call out the hypocrisy of the individuals to benefit from choice but then pulled out bridge up behind them then we would not get to where we need to be. in america, in this country, your fate should not be decided by lottery. but in many cases there is because the law is written as such when there are more applicants than states there

needs to be a lottery. but if there were more seats or more options than there would be no more lotteries. then we all get to enjoy the same benefits of those that we elect to represent us. with all due respect he was not always the president. heated and send his children to public schools at any point. i want what he once for all kids. i say i respect and support him but i want him to respect the other children the same weight of his own children have been respected [applause] >> everybody ask last question. we have a lot of people in

the audience. you all have been involved with grass-roots schools what one piece of the price would you give to reformers and in particular the young ones about the grass roots activism to get involved? >> thanks again for having a but i want to impress with his intellectual debates is that i often hear care of -- parents of low income cannot make great choices and we have to go away with that idea to meet parents where they are. every parent wants what is best for their child and the tools to fight in did to the

children your voice matters perverse helping a child would be on the panel maybe we could hear from the children because they know what is happening in the schools. [applause] >> i completely agree but i would leave with one bit of a vice. the congress will mention to the reserve program that supports the growth of charter schools it has been around since the mid nineties with huge bipartisan support but it doesn't keep have enough funding. lot of families put their children on the wait list we have over 1 million names right now. but there is a way to a dress this to create more seats in congress could put more money into the programs

so to engage of the federal level tell them to put more funding in tears the charter school program. and to make more opportunities available for families. [applause] >> chavez and richard wright are here and if i've missed anyone i will meet you after words. you are here how to learn to make it possible for your brother's ancestors and cousins to get off waiting list to get into good schools. so many of you have watched your family and friends who didn't have access as you did with your educators you

see them fall down even worse and that is not cool. talking to you like my own that on the one hand you are special but don't thank you were so special that you were different. they deserve what you have and you do not have the rights to sit still or be silent as they suffer. you have to fight to expand school choice for you don't have an option. since it has been given to you and you partaking have a moral obligation to fight the for every seat every one of you is you get 10 more kids behind you. as far as i am concerned if you got into the party and you didn't pay you had to go hold the door for your brother's. [laughter] >> and shot up to the

archbishop and another catholic school? thanks for being here today. i don't have to lay down the moral got lit. [laughter] but dealing with advocacy respecting the of local community is fundamental in any reform. the parents do know what they want and they're looking to us to help give them a voice to be sure the legislature knows. so that partnership is critical to discuss in the reform also education education education. so many that don't understand what parental choice is all about. therefore we think they do so it is important to keep remembering a lot of people

who could be with us to help us but it may not fully comprehend what it is about. education advocacy and implementation. [applause] >> we're 38 minutes over. one more round of applause. [applause] >> and ray will come back. [inaudible conversations] >> let me start my introductory remarks about dr. rod paige. what an amazing life

listening carefully you will have a glimpse of why dash excited to have dr. rod paige present to you today. has a son of a librarian teeeight i thought this is the longest introductory in the history of man. a school principal, library and that produces a doctor. does that not speak to the power and necessity of education? he rose from segregated small-town mississippi all the way to the united states department of education. as secretary he championed student achievement and employed best of breed solutions to raise standards

of educational excellence. . . urged his reputation to seek out innovative approaches from when he was the dean at the college of education at texas southern university. there he established student for excellence in urban education it and also has a knack for inclusive leadership. as a school board trustee then superintendent of the houston independent school district that was the seventh largest in all of the united states. appointed superintendent 1994 and the first african american in the district's history to serve in that position. in 1989 dr. paige was named

of one of to educators in the country from the council of great city schools for '02 years later he was honored as the national superintendent of the year by the american association of schools administrators. following his time a secretary of education he served as a public policy fellow at the woodrow wilson international center for scholars. in 2006 he authored the war against hope in published the black-white achievement gap wide closing it is the greatest civil rights issue of our time. the oldest of five siblings and has a son and a daughter. he resigns in houston with

his wife please help me to welcome dr. rod paige. [applause] >> thank you for the warm welcome but he left out part of my history. i was also a football coach. at cincinnati and texas southern we were playing one game at the astrodome at that time was the largest crowd the third largest ever assembled i think the largest was sandy koufax pitching.

minute texas southern university football game. at the end that has our score on the wrong side of the scoreboard. you didn't get that. [laughter] they had the biggest gore and we had the smallest. i felt bad about that old lady dropped her purse on the floor and she said it excuse me know offensive she said i didn't care about your defense either. [laughter] i hope you got that one. i am not altogether certain i deserve that introduction

as was shared but i want to think him for that and begin and we owe him a round of applause for this event. [applause] thank you for your leadership of this event and although i am the system of the states of texas at watching the election results and was so happy when it was announced you were the winner. thank you for your compassion and powerful leadership. to borrow of phrase fly on. also the founders of the great organization. in the founder of the modern

movement of united states of america. always keep in mind. and also the alliance of school choice and the freedom foundation. i would like to think his leadership and the membership of the men and women who do the work with this great organization. fly on. 50 years ago thousands marched in selma alabama a. and in turn for freedom. two days ago to 200500 school choice supporters

walk through a recovery for another kind of freedom. the freedom of school choice. this was led by two american heroes the first great warrior for children dr. howard fuller. second the american federation for children mr. shaw vesper -- mr. chavez. [applause] in the book the al line of history h. g. wells author and historian and futurist and avid socialist advised

the world that even history is a race between education and catastrophe. we'll get the current situation to see how we're doing. almost 32 years have passed and that current generation for the call to action. even so the public school system debate is closed to insolvency. even with the well intended efforts especially with minorities they are falling short because of education inadequacies. although they were replaced -- replete of skilled and

well-meaning practitioners there's still with us unabated. the school opinion polls, newspaper editorials editorials, talk shows, with the very concept of public education evidence have found the public view or the attempt to prove that the public school system and public education of our children is the appeals told by in india. -- india. from the recent protest to emphasize this condition.

today's public schools are not equipped with the you today's problem of diversity in the schools. there is a reform effort from population. the bottom line is public-school thus far have failed and will continue if we don't find inappropriate way to manage the crisis the current reforms could not be attributed during the middle and late '80s and '90s of the first half of the decade school reform was dominated by education period. a long list of governors, a corporate america, the judicial branch the parade

to reform america's schools is long. despite that effort with the education system that some describe as increases even secretary duncan says education stagnation british is indisputable. our system is now working. and it seems clearly and why is. to be sure to have the glimmer of hope but it is indisputable america's children are still lagging behind. furthermore the gap still exist. these and members of pope can only be described as random pockets of improvement. so how do you explain the

lack of progress? everybody has opinion. so do i.. i'd like to share my with you. the opinion that is. [laughter] since the publication says it has been heavenly -- heavily influenced or has been sabotaged by of guardians of the status quo. the sources are well-financed, highly organized and extremely motivated. so far we have failed to meet pergola they have three very clear strategic goals, the more money less

accountability and more competition. phase three guiding principles are set forth the as members of a reform movement understand this to have any expectations of success. where do we go from your? here is where my opinion comes. were already to reform america's schools, but with the school operations my suggestion is to design operations around universal school choice. completely remove the cover of government to dictate where a child is in school and give that to parents and children. [applause]

now asking why i support universal school choice. last week a journalist from the dallas morning blues -- news ask why i supported universal choice. i just naturally support this banal i have to frame a statement it because education school choice now sits in this legislative session i needed to make sure i had this precise. so i figured out when did i come to this conclusion? where did i get these thoughts? i found out what it was. and i will share. i support universal choice for two reasons.

first, i believe chaining a child to a school that is not serving them well as in this marriage of justice. this is with that conclusion in the but trying to make schools work better in was all about making schools work better and it was from school choice there was a voice coming from the back of the room. the tall black gentleman stood up and said that is not the reason.

the reason is it ain't right. is not fair. and was almost intimidated. [laughter] but that's right. it is right. it is not right to change a child to a school that is not performing. is not right to have a child go to school that has crippled him. that reason was embedded in my mind in their work but i think it is also right to

hundred thousand student the third largest issues in texas. is a very complicated system i came to the conclusion within to be embedded in a monopolistic. i believe a school choice is a necessary condition while efficient school operations. talking about performing schools will go nowhere unless they are free from the grip of a monopoly.

our part as teachers students or parents or the public would benefit from the creativity inspired by universal school choice. but no. texas policy article entitled teachers women of a case for school choice pointed out the upper very effect but to increase their salary is the basic impact and we have the resources but with that average raise him in debate or the average teacher, think about them

but they would increase demand. it was an entrance for becoming a teacher for young people entered to direct more school funds into the classroom and a powerful force. it would help but it was due up to the changes all prices go down as the economy goes

down. at that time there was solid. but to have the big group of luxury apartments, this is for up-and-coming young people without children who are basically middle-class and above there were literacy good lives driving though lexis. windy economy was down, and stayed down for a long time, these jobs in there were no people to put into these apartments. but they had to sign a market. guess where government supported housing. so they've moved them into

the luxury apartments. thousands of them. splenectomy and -- and by the way they move before they have children. so doing their best with the fire department to issue tickets to the principle for over crowding schools. after liking vestar he came to a solution i have no idea would cause problems for gore for posted to the school board if we are a school certified by the texas education agency, in

this area what we are coming there are four schools that are also accredited. but they said those are private schools. here are our options. we can take the kids and bless them 70 miles across the city during drive time to put them in schools and adding 45 minutes for that time to get to school and 45 minutes to get back. or we could have them go to the private schools and when it comes to us we could paid a private school people.

i don't have to explain what the newspaper did. [laughter] but to lay did it anyway. so we selfhood a problem. it sold one for me he. those buses rolling every morning and leaving to deliver children to a school every day and every day somebody ran into somebody. so then this is to assist me to solve problems. so not only in a vintage for children but also makes available the school operations themselves that make them better.

hot -- i came directly from a professor of education in texas. i did not come up through the traditional routes so i had to make the schools. it is that could not deliver educational services to children. the reliable old director

and to guarantee results for children? so part of the study calls for taking class's at the center that teaches 500 ceos how to be the ceo. reading books. several made sense. we have a book called is there public in public schools? by the way we determine there is it because they did not create the public but that made a big difference.

bed as and i'll look around why do the charter schools work? why isn't the specialized schools work for the magnet schools? i concluded it is because the people who work in those schools are there because of their choice students who were there. the thing is they steadied is what they chose to use steady. the situation of choice that made perfect sense. looking around with the forces that are changing our society. oneness technology, the second is choice.

this is an idea whose time has come. we can continue to live alone to raise the power of technology and choice. in his book the author of the democratic platform is speechwriter for al gore said our current generation is a choice generation. he said we in the middle of a choice revolution. all americans should have the ability to make choices

for themselves because to save or how to prepare. choices of what school your child should attend that is now only reserved to wealth. the time for choice has come. today's technology provides people with more and more choice. war individual power, more personalization based on choice. as they expand these opportunities of choice by themselves, they were not long tolerate this situation where there is no choice of where their children attend school. my parents had a choice of

three tv networks when they wanted to watch television. childrens have hundreds. they to watch their favorite program when they want to. not to be waiting when it comes on or they can go to msnbc if they don't like fox news. and fast food. even services like the post office has now ups or fedex. this is a choice revolution. the notion is there told how to live their lives. and to become more and more repugnant.

>> in a fast-paced world. with the other party is that reform would not work. universal school choice of school reformers in choice pioneers to strategically

tie school choice to school reform. that for those people who want to reform should be a natural ally. there is any reasons not only that they are paid more but it would increase the environmental movement but now to make a better bet the candidate culminate must recruit them. because it ain't right is

only a matter of time. but they would have to embrace the choice revolution. they have no choice. but soon. is in the words.

so god bless the united states of america to five -- [applause] >> let's see if we can emulate the senators example of what it is useful. we have an outstanding panel for the third panel of the day you want to talk about the realities the school choice what are the obstacles? she is president of the louisiana federation of children rashid continues to

work but said the and the seven blood this state takeover of the rarity of schools that led to the rise it made that you see today. a and it is in the alliance but i recognize you as a reform leader and to usher in the nation's capital and chair of the education committee creating the most prolific six - - in the country. >> legal officer of successful academy charter schools operates 32 is in new york city.

she also put before adjourning and back with us they would recognize from the second panel, but this is school choice. kevin you have been doing this for a long time. but let's give him a hand to put this together. [applause] ion gesso impressed with him and his commitment to kids

the fact that young people can ask questions is important. to have innovative thank previous schools for those who wanted a residential school where kids could go and live and some came from homes that were not served well. i said that is the great idea but bin they said but my thinking was why don't we

>> but the politics of education has been the biggest barrier to what works for kids. i adopted a simple strategy that is will this help the child learn? if yes i am for it that is the yardstick we should discharge our responsibilities of adults as advocates for parents our policy makers we should embrace any and all ways to help a child learn and the politics of education is the biggest barrier. another that is equally as troubling is the fact when you hear all the talk or

even debates on standards or early childhood education they're not grounded in a practical reality of parents today. when i had said debate with reality, what do you say to the low income parents making less than $30,000 a year in harlem or bronx or los angeles? take a city. the parent knows going to the school or 90 -- or high-school that the present are failing. they know they have limited options. what about the parent that wants something different? the problem with our responsibility is there is

no sense of urgency. is numbers on the page. but all stories or individual challenges or frustrations matter. and for us to act like it is okay that does not work on a practical basis. in and. >> care and today, but that is not supposed to happen in. but the biggest obstacle is the policies of education and the fact everything we do is with a long-range plan and there is nothing with

the immediacy of these needs that is very get educational choice. >> if you work on these in the vienna -- louisiana louisiana, that's cool choice might have possibilities downstream but now you take dollars away from schools that are struggling, how do you justify that or make the numbers work? >> the queue to scott to put on this forum. it truly is very important for us to hear not only the issues but also solutions. at was funny when i became an elected official i didn't think it was my job to deal

with the public school system. . .

what i cared about was using the dollars we had in a more efficient and effective manner. >> as we think about efficient and effective schools where they are doing the most good for kids with the dollars they have do we no much about how traditional district schools compared to charter schools compared to private schools? >> i think we no a lot about traditional public schools or what i would call state-run schools. essentially the same thing

if you want to grocery shop. what we know when that happens? the costs are extremely high. the revenue sources for traditional public schools come from free areas, local dollars, state dollars, federal dollars on average of 13 to $14,000 a year. in some states like new jersey is up in the $20,000 range. so this is because there is a bureaucracy that has been built up around supporting a system, not students. the system has been made for the adults. the money has to flow that way. let me reflect on that, the

ability of parents to choose a charter school or prep school using the public money set aside has started to see that what does it cost to educate children? charter schools are typically doing it for 80% or 80 percent or less. private schools about your programs are doing it for much less than that. an elementary school student receiving a voucher was borgess $4,800 to go private school. what we do now, the current system is inefficient. we know the foundation just did a study, like that the ten voucher programs that have been enacted since 1996 to 2,000. $1.7 billion in savings to states. the sad thing is we can't tell you where that money went. the states of save that money because it cost less. >> when it cost 13, $14,000 to educate a kid made it

less than that. why is that? they have been charging tuition and subsidizing. the voucher you can your parents if they are able to a scholarship tax credit the schools themselves multiple sources of revenue. they are actually running cheaper but it is cheaper to the families. >> the cost the same to operate. >> economic terms, one of the suit pants where the

market is supposed to draw a line through supply and demand, basic economics. this is what every student will no. this for this to get this money. public schools have traditionally charged more. >> success academies is a growing organization of charter schools in new york city. could could you talk a little bit about how much it costs to run academy schools compared to new york schools >> the success academy charter schools as well 32 schools in new york city nearly 9500 scholars the

entire state of new york in the top 3 percent. [applause] very proud of the accomplishment of our scholars. what rob said, there is a tremendous funding disparity between what public charter school students receive an district school students. in new york it's about $6000 between $6,000 between what doe spends a much harder is a receiving by the time our scholars will have graduated from high school we we will have offered about four years of additional education compared to the traditional district counterparts. so their is a profound disparity. all we are doing differently is merely her on the

bureaucracy. the charter community in general, we have to be very cautious that we are not allowing bureaucracy to overtake what it is we're doing and it is harder as we go. the reports that our schools were required to prepare over the course of the year something like 60 major reports that request the man's reporting that we get. twenty-five. twenty-five of which from various sources, city, state, federal that require hundreds and hundreds of hours of personal time thousands time thousands and thousands of pieces of paper and that we would argue 1st of all i don't think anyone is looking at and more importantly it is not relevant to whether our schools are doing well. the authorizer should be the

one holding charters accountable at a very high level. charters are not are not performing their should be closed. the reporting requirements and bureaucracy that is slowly entering into what is charters do it is crippling the charter school movement. i believe that bureaucracy created actually take the charter movement down. if i may add a little bit tangentially i do think our opponents and the teachers union is very much aware of that. what we find is in the attacks that we are getting if along the lines of bureaucracy just as a quick a quick example: last year there was an arcane real estate law that we heard was sort of passing through the legislature more quickly than usual.

we could have tasked a notice. what it was was a knew procedure the charters would now have to undergo true real estate law and order to get your facility. fortunately folks noticed this and there was a little bit of an outcry. what it did was add tremendous layers of bureaucracy in order to stop this in his tracks. bureaucracy is definitely a danger they say it's quality control way to make sure that children are not being done wrong but how do we make sure it is not given the way of educators being able to work with kids and make good decisions? >> one thing we are very much in favor of his accountability because that is what this is all about.

and so, you know, what we what we have to do is ensure that the measure in the policies that we put in place are not a hindrance to that school's ability to be unique. so so that is what we like. what i love about the charter school environment is that schools are allowed to be unique as it relates to operations. one of the things that i want to piggyback on about, comment about the cost savings of i'm a we have found with regards to we are finding that the

dollars of taxpayer dollars the money that is originally provided to a failing school for a child given to a voucher school to help educate. >> when you say $24 million was saved,. >> absolutely. louisiana the foundation formula which creates an amount that is allocated per child. child. louisiana has about $8,600. and so that traditionally would have gone to a failing public school. a private school or catholic school. it's about 5,000, 4500 to 5,000. when when you look at the difference, over 4000 per

child that's a huge tremendous amount of savings >> when you talk about this bureaucratic freedom can you give a couple of examples to folks who don't do this stuff everyday, what it looks like. >> you make a good. every hour spent on reporting those are hours that are not spent on kids. and the many charter school students here i think you would agree with me that charters are staffing more lamely and so we don't have the additional staff to spare to dedicate to these hundreds and hundreds of hours projects. our local districts asked us to have one person at each of our school to operate the atf system the computer

system that our public schools in new york city have to operate, and it is this dark base system with the green blinking thing. from my understanding you have to if you make a mistake and have to go back you may be 30 out of 500 students and and have to start all over. the reason why i say from my understanding is the best we have been able to resist using this. it's a little bit ironic. but they wanted us to do nothing but enter student by student attendance data and things of this nature which we can do every single person in that school every single person is striving to

have each child perform at the highest possible level. that is the kind of thing. amongst the reporting it is incredibly duplicative and would be okay if we could say let's take this report from our authorizer. the the state wants it. let's pass this over tremendous amounts of money in creating their own computer system and it must be entered in their own format meaning you can't take the data you have produced elsewhere and shared across the board. we have developed a bureaucracy busting arm in our organization where that is just as important to fight the bureaucracy creep not quite as important as the education the part and parcel.

>> in this sounds disconcerting. how much of a concern is this? >> well, we look in the mirror and become the very thing we have been fighting. and that happens, this natural tendency to over bureaucratized things. the things. the end of the day we have to go back to the basics and remind ourselves why we got into this. i am somewhat concerned about the fact that we do imitate and replicate the monopoly that we tend to fight. putting rules and regulations, putting in barriers for parents who want to engage in choice. and the bottom line he said

it was terrific. and this is not a jobs program. this is about education and learning. we have double education spending of the last 30 years. you know this. yet the outputs are going down. and now even when we have so-called autonomous school miles working we have principles, for five people from central office. they want they want to rent out their jam. there is this tendency to over bureaucratized all aspects of education, and i think that the way we have to do it is have a little. the shift in our approach. when i was in texas a couple of weeks ago they asked me,

well, how we will school choice affect the local district? if you think about the tone and tenor of most of these questions, how we will it affect the system? the pivot is how will this affect the kids if we don't change? with how we engage in this whole notion the school district or the system but the kids. this is the way i look at it this great example. let's imagine you have a child. call that child a student. you you put them in a room. college classroom. in adult adjoined to teach them. them. college teacher. everything you do should be tailored toward funding that interaction between the students and that teacher so

that that child can learn. but we do with the school bureaucracy, only 60% of the dollars in some states are 50 in some states going to the classroom is spend it on everything else. we need this. and it's important. central personnel and we can do without it. if you ratchet it down down to that dynamic that is most important, the children and the teachers in the classroom there is no way if you have a school district the 1st thing any superintendent should do , where you have less than 90 percent of the dollars going into the classroom then you are not funding education, teaching, and learning. you are funding a bureaucracy. that is part of the way to get rid of bureaucracy, bureaucracy this notion that we end up replicating the thing we're fighting, to make sure that

we keep tabs on how we are funding those extraneous jobs and services that really don't have anything to do with that main dynamic of teaching and learning in the classroom. classroom. i think that is the discipline that politically is hard because folks have to change the way they do business. [applause] >> you are absolutely right when you talk about changing the way we do business. unfortunately, where we are today is this is big business. the education education is big business. we are fighting money. we are fighting tradition. we are fighting people's jobs. so until and unless we can get past the issues that this is some tradition that we must maintain and tell

we can have people understand that we need to create new traditions, and so we can get past the jobs of we are talking about are not jobs that we need to protect if those jobs are protecting our kids, kids we have to get past that. unless we can get our elected officials to understand that this will all be even more, continue more, continue to be more of a challenge. >> this is why school choice and particularly vouchers are so important. and every single state at least half if half, if not more of every dollar goes to k-12 education, a huge business. >> yes, it is. >> we are talking about fighting the power of that business. you you create this symbiotic relationship where legislators and public school groups come together. the largest employer in the rural and suburban areas the schools have the power

and so they have the legislative power, therefore they have the pack in the money that goes to candidates and there is an incredible relationship between half-year state budget. it budget. it is just, we would call that in other states corruption. if you think about it. this is the the reason why all the dollars up to follow the kids. you have to have vouchers. total choice. you're never going to change the structure of a monopoly. so so much money. my favorite example, who here knows they get kicked out of the program. that's the kind of regulatory environment you can get in. this is a system that has built itself up. is not just the legislators it's every single community

the regulatory concern it is not just a district a district charter school but also for private tour program. >> an absolute move from people who oppose to make all the charter schools and private schools if anything this is a line in the sand and when we say accountability we mean for results. in our state you can get know more knew money. >> way to change that.

>> it's okay to report even though. >> and when asked how can private schools how can private schools. >> ways we can do that i look at mine. i have two children. eighteen and soon to be 16. i have loved them to death. are they going to become taxpaying citizens? people who have a job and

pay taxes. one of the best ways they can figure that out is to show how much money they bring back. >> you were talking before about bureaucracy busting. what are some of the things you guys have done or that folks can learn? >> i think one of these things that we do kevin and i can tell you. our mantra and for folks who come into our organization the 1st thing that we ask is is it good for children? if it's not if it's going to take away from what we offer the kids we are we're going to take a position to try to push back. so every single thing i think we have become accustomed the regulators are coming the various

folks, feds, state, city, they just want one little thing and it is easier to kind of scribble it out or type it out and write it the way that they want and send it over. before too long it becomes a monolithic bureaucracy. we resist, look very carefully and enter into a regular conversation with our authorizer to understand maybe we can shortcut that for you and just give you the information and in the documents that you need. interested when people talk

about accountability for charter schools the answer they often face. the easy answer we've got it now. the additional paper. one one example of a peace of paper. every year, the teachers who are not certified have to send home in the backpack folder for their scholars a peace of paper saying just wanted you to know, i'm know, i'm not highly qualified. yes, i have been teaching for five years, but i just wanted you to no that i didn't have that thing called highly qualified and

someone thought that i should write you and tell you and let you no to a level that is absurd that we want the teacher to write home prices so we're doing to get your scholar to the highest potential and never doing it for five years successfully and this is what you need to do we will make sure that they are motivated. that is what we would like to do. >> i wanted to respond to the question. i think that this is the essence of education choice. at the end of the day if you run elementary school and the like of learning is still in the eyes of those particularly black and brown boys 4th and 5th grade

you're running a good school because unfortunately we have got, you know, nearly 2,000 dropout factories schools where we know 9 percent of the kids are going to drop out. the light of learning is out of the eyes of those kids. and if parents want to go they're because they no that that nurturing and learning is taking place and you are demonstrating that you can teach these babies in a way that we will meet them where they are and accommodate needs and not force the circle in the square, then you're doing great work. go work. go back to the bureaucracy thing. several years ago and i used to talk a lot with eva. chair of the new chair of new york public school to fun-loving, new york city council education in dc, and we were both getting beat up we used to talk all the time. but you know, at the end of the day dc had a hundred and 46 schools, schools, dc

public schools. nearly 2,000 people and center office. the archdiocese of dc had a hundred and ten schools and about ten people in the central office. and their outputs were better. at the end of the day we no that you don't need a large central office to run good schools and i think that parents know that. so why not find ways to continue to give parents those opportunities as opposed to telling parents you have to do it this way because the system works this way. the the focus on the way the system is using to operate that is an anachronism.

right now with this new way of living if you are a five -year-old today chances are you were working a job that does not exist today. we have this whole approach to school and learning to try to develop kids for careers that are even going to exist. now we have systems in place to run school districts that are going to be outdated over the next ten to 15 years. and so i think part of what we need to do is step back. we have all of these different kids no one, you no response to the same learning modalities. why don't we figure out just like that menu in a restaurant or the buffet line if there's just chicken fried steak, i'm not eating.

but you have all of these menu options for parents. what the school district does is tell you no you can only have it this way and this is the only way you're going to get it. you're going to take algebra in 9th grade even if your not ready for. that is the way we do it. we don't change it. so i think the private schools can continue to do what they do and feature that because parents are demanding something other than what they have been getting in far too many schools. >> if you want to build on that, that's fine. but you have done a lot of this work on the ground level in louisiana. curious, given all of these challenges and questions how do you bring people together? build that coalition were folks have different concerns and can find enough

common ground to go ahead and make this happen. >> you know, in the early years of louisiana introducing choice and vouchers and expanding charter schools again, we had to fight with the tradition of public schools. it was very hard and difficult at the time to convince my colleagues in the carcass, the black caucus that it did not matter where it was perceived that this will movement you know the thing i used to tell my colleagues was it doesn't matter. show an i can honestly say

today we are getting much much more many more of our colleagues in louisiana understand that this is not about writing a check, but it is about who is benefiting. i really would like to say one other thing to the person who raised the question about what can private schools do. continue to demand excellence, continue within your own organization. the beauty of choice, the beauty of choice that we found them when i here from from parents, even if the kid is in a performing school i need a school he or she. i have three beautiful daughters and i have three gorges granddaughters.

if i could have had them 1st it would have been wonderful. [laughter] but each one, honestly each one of my girls and each one of my granddaughters have totally different personalities. we hear them. we know this. they learn they learn differently and are learning differently. the ability for my girls to choose a school that not only met the academic need but the personal and nurturing need. so what you have is a unique opportunity to create that brand, to create that family of learners that is unique and is important and will be important to somebody's child. continue to do what you do.

speaking from the perspective of higher ed the board of supervisors questions the schools certain schools stand out. and so when we here schools a child is coming the excellence of that school maintaining within their own organization weirdness kids we go after them. so so that is what i can suggest to the private schools who have that opportunity to create their own brand and to continue the excellence in their own unique fashion.

>> i think we have time for one more question. it was mentioned earlier he has parks school choice questions. we know that the unions are often portrayed were often portray themselves as concerned about school choice. i'm curious why. it seems to me that much of what school choice does for students it also does for teachers attest to a chance to get away from some of the papers, bureaucracy. spend more time teaching kids. help me understand a little bit wide is the association might push back. >> well, you have stuck me with a challenging question. if i may teachers unions are not -- we think there is room for everybody.

i don't think that view is shared on the other side. i think the reason for that is because they are very interested in protecting the lowest common denominator. so in so in new york state for example, probably across the united states it is extremely, extremely challenging to take a teacher who is, as you know not performing and to remove them from the classroom and for some reason we believe that demanding extraordinary performance and quality from teachers, that elevates the teaching profession. it is it is respecting teachers as the professionals that they are. for some reason that is extremely threatening to the teachers union we demand excellence and think that if

you are not executing for children that you should not be in this profession. so they are interested in protecting the lowest common denominator of which we just won't do just as we wouldn't for our scholars. retreats to the highest common denominator. the same way we expect for our teachers to meet a very very high bar. >> empower educators. >> it can. common denominator. traditional unions fought against the firing of teachers. the only people that find it on the ones that already have it. if you have educational choice you have the luxury to say i i have the money and the resources in the neighborhood and the zip code. i i can send my kid over

here, but i don't want you to. there is something, frankly, not right about that. you need to distinguish between the political arm of the organized teachers union and teachers. when we had that rally a a couple of weeks ago, 3,000 parents and teachers. a bunch a bunch of teachers who remember the alabama teachers union in march right across the street from the union headquarters and say, i want to be able to put my kid and equality private school. i i think we have to distinguish the politics of education which is held out their in front by the union forces, the bureaucracy, the status quo and those folks who are fighting against that to try to get something

better for the kids. that kids. that is not the teachers. the school choice was increased teacher salaries up to 12 to $15,000 year. so many people run charter schools. so many charter schools teachers and principals, for the 1st time they can do there job and have the freedom from the bureaucracy to do there job. you know i'm right. rick is trying to stop me but i ain't stopping. i do think we have to distinguish the politics of education is swayed by the union as opposed to the teachers. >> i take that as a strong place to close. please join me in thanking the panel. [applause] >> please take a a little break in the next panel we will start in a few minutes.

>> have your chance to get out and speak with different audiences here in the united states about the international agenda, what do people say to you? >> before i say that i do wish to protest most emphatically

mr. botticelli's taunting of the state of texas and suggesting anything negative -- >> austin has a sense of exceptionalism. >> dr. morrison's legitimate question. i'm not going to suggest there's a monolithic set of views when i am working around the country working this issue. i would suggest as makes perfectly good sense that most american citizens look at the drug issue through the prism of their own experiences family, school community, business and are not thinking necessarily in terms of the international aspects. when they are thinking of the international aspects, they tend to see the negative side of it games in their communities that are part of this process or the belief sometimes erroneous that the product comes in universally from overseas and from foreign countries. at the end of the day the

dialogue tends to be more than 50% on the impact of the drug issue, the international drug issue on their lives their families, their communiticommuniti es and considerably less than 50% in terms of what we are doing or can do overseas. that's partly my responsibility. that's one of the things i'm going around the country to do to try to establish with them as well as with everyone in this room that there is a link between what we are doing or trying to do overseas and then what happens here on our own streets and in our own communities. our success or failure in terms of addressing the root causes that generate drug production or transportation to the united

states has an obvious impact on our lives here. it would be my long winded response to your simple question. >> for those of you standing in the back, the are open up seats in the front if you wish you grab a seat. there's a couple right here in front. there's one right there the couple over there. so please, down if you care to. grab a seat. let's stay on the domestic front for a moment. we know we have a heroin epidemic right now. is a very serious epidemic. it's linked in with oxycontin and other opioid drug abuse. can you say a few words about how you understand that, what is driving that? and i know this is a top issue a top preoccupation in the kind of strategy needed to roll that back. it has affected innumerable communities across the country and it's always quite surprising when you're in a setting and you

see a billboard on her one addiction. people are talking about this in very new and compelling ways. and you say a bit about the root causes and what you see as a strategy and the path going for? >> this doesn't international obligations. if you look at where we are, particularly with her when used we know that the root cause has been the overprescribing a prescription pain medicine by sufficient immune estate. recent report by the cdc showed that we now, physicians are prescribing enough pain medication to give every american a bottle of pain pills every day. we want to make sure people in the those medications for pain get them. if you look at her her one, new users to heroin, four-fifths of them started by misusing pain medication. as people progress in their

acuity of opiate addiction, particularly on prescription drugs, what appears to be a small percentage of them are transitioning to heroin. so why the transitioning? one cause is that we have been inundated largely from mexico and south america by a very cheap, very pure supply of heroin. if you're going to pay a dollar amount on the street for a bill to the 60-milligram pill or you have the opportunity to spend five or $10 on a bag of heroin that has the very same effect it doesn't take an economist a lot of math to send going to start using her when. we have seen -- using her when. that's what the area is that's been of significant concern. so while prescription drug overdoses still eclipse her when overdoses we've seen significant increases in the number of heroin users. to get to the question you asked before, i think it's also why we've been able to have folks a

broad continuum of folks engage on the drug policy because we've had heroin you for a long time. there is a shared threat, it's a different demographic, it's a more suburban and rural affairs than we've seen before. so we've been engaged with just all of the governors in every state, as well as folks in congress who historically for whom drug policy has never been their top priority issue. so again i think it's another area where we have been able to work with people who have had historically not seen the drug policy issues one of their top priorities. >> one of the issues that services -- surfaces often in the domestic and international debate is about improving access to palliative care for folks better end-of-life our folks that are suffering from a severe

medical condition and require that and trying to give greater flexibility both domestically but also globally that there's an issue under consideration. how does that match up against what is kind of an emergency in a way, the heroin epidemic, and the oxycontin, the abuse that predates and drives that? >> it's interesting, this conversation has come up a number of times. when you look at many of the countries that have a prescription drug issue, united states, candidate, some european countries, it's about relative access to health care. and i think the part of what we've offered quite honestly to the rest of the countries thinking about how to get good medicine to people who really need them is to basically he did some lesson learned from us and say we think there are lessons we've learned about how you can

minimize some of the diversion and abuse issues as you think about how you implement public health practice, how you think about clinician guidelines, and how you think about care to make sure that people dig a really good access to good pain medications when they need them. we have often offered some kind of opportunities and cautionary words for other countries as they think about and try to look at access better access to health care and medication to do this in a way that doesn't replicate i think things that have happened here. >> bill, is this an area where you think there's potential progress in the special session? >> yes. although i would want to qualify that pretty carefully. do keep in mind, prescription drugs are completely absolutely and totally permitted under the three international drug control conventions. you would expect them to be.

that is the one area where you would expect to be allowed to use this particular or these particular products. that is to say a trained and licensed physician who determines that this particular medication is required or called for or indicated for a particular medical condition. the problem obviously and what the conventions themselves, as well as of the bodies that provide the guidance to the united states' -- united nations system, as well as our own government, are attempting to limit, control and ideally eliminate is the abuse and diversion of those prescription drugs. now, could they come up with ideas in terms of how better to do that? i suppose so but again it's is where i come back to you with my closing comment of let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater. at the end of the day i believe,

i hope what we're all looking for is a solution and an outcome where qualified professional physicians are making the determination as to when certain products should be used as medication and not to take them out of this formula. and when we move into licensed physician can we move into the area that for the last 60, 70 80 years as a whole and within the national systems. one nations position licensing system may be very different from another. is it in a for possible consideration? yes, but it's not going to be a simple issue is what i am suggesting. >> let's talk a little bit about marijuana, canada's. he mentioned continued concern about harm. we are in a fragmented moment -- cannabis.

we have states moving ahead with legalize recreational use. we've had a number of states that already put in place the medical use. there's the existing federal law. there's the tension that exists between what's happening in colorado or washington or oregon alaska maybe d.c. the tension between that versus the conventions. so it seems to be a somewhat mixed picture one we have the president saying well, we need this as part of a criminal justice reform issue this is one about nonviolent offenders. there's a racial dimension to this. it's the shifting to a public health approach, but there's a deep ambivalence running through all of these discussions. can you say a bit about more about that? >> i think are a couple of

dimensions that are important. many of the present is talk about this a criminal justice context, that we can't continue down this path of a arrested and incarcerated particularly young kids of color at the impact it we see. i completely agree with that as it relates to drug policy but when you look at kind of what the impact of legalization might portend for us and not just legalization but i also have significant concerns with the commercialization of marijuana having been public health for a long time i think that we see quite honestly the industry being, using some of the same tactics quite honestly that the tobacco industry is the tobacco industry'sis used as they thought about marketing their product. so basically i think not of full disclosure about the health harms associated with marijuana. i think that some sense to the rate of market is not going to increase access to use. wing of more use in this country

that smoked marijuana and tobacco in we clearly know the health harms associate with marijuana as it relates to use. but not quite on a super train the substance as addictive as we know what it is. i think there's significant -- two things. one, this is were come from in terms of unanimity of policy. that's it is also made clear that he with the department of justice drink it is keep a close eye on what's happening in colorado and washington and the memo laid out eight criteria for colorado and washington broader criteria that they need to be held accountable in terms of mitigating the harms with that. the department of justice memo that basically saying we're not preempting the referenda in washington, colorado but we are reserving the right to do subsequent action based on our monitoring of age criteria. again, public health, public

safety criteria, and we will continue to monitor the situation. and in essence reserve the right to take subsequent action based on those criteria. so our office, and again i don't want to speak out of both sides of my mouth the if we say we are science and data-driven, we need to be sides and data-driven. these are largely public is available in sets as well as work with the national institute of drug abuse is looking at and in concert with colorado and washington what has been the impact? i think it's too soon to tell in terms of what those issues mean. i think colorado vital technology is think we have a problem with edibles and we need to really ratchet that back. so again i think it's important for us to continue to oppose legalization, to monitor what's happening in colorado and in subsequent states. >> house and you think will be able, because my sense is there's a lot of states sitting

and waiting to see what happens. and there is an ambivalence about thoughtful people people come down on this issue a number of different ways. so house with a people going to be able to make judgments around the wisdom of what's happening and what are going to be the key criteria? >> to our office, we do not intend to issue some level of definitive report and say it worked, or it didn't. but part of it is a commitment to continue to roll out public data, largely these are existing data sets that look at things like youth use that looks at things like treatment admissions, that look at things like drug driving episodes. the look at the version of marijuana from one state to another. so part of what we feel our responsibility at ondcp is make available those data sets to allow people to make a determination on kind of what they think, you know the impact

is. it's not our intention again to issue this definitive report saying yes, it works, though doesn't. >> i get to jump in this because what michael has laid out, quite correctly, is the united states of america's approach to marijuana and the larger legalization issue. i believe that's exactly right and correct as i understand it. in 1776 we decided we would govern ourselves, thank you very much and sometime around 1788 we decided to system in which we would do we've got states a federal government. i've got no problem with this whatsoever but bear with me on this please. we have also ratified three international drug control conventions. in two of those conventions, marijuana is placed in the annex of a proscribed product which the national government is expected to control and to the

extent possible prohibit, except for in very limited examples. my task as your representative, what you pay me to do is to march out to those international organizations and explain to them how everything that steve and michael have just talked about still leave us in compliance with our international obligations. this is a little bit tricky. i would remind all of you that most governments in the world continue to have fairly strong views on cannabis, and that the oversight bodies that united nations, of which we are a member have set up particularly the international narcotics control board has been pretty clear, i would even say at times severe with me, in terms of not accepting the argument that we are in full and complete compliance. and this is what i was talking

about earlier on in terms of saying we are an independent and sovereign nation. we will make our own decisions and determinations. we are governed by our constitution, thank you very much. but please work with me ladies and gentlemen, as we figure how to project those national realities into the international community. sorry, i got carried away i just had to. >> i know that is probably one of the more difficult things for you to try and explain right? because it's not obvious as to reconcile those things. that's just the nature of the diplomatic predicament with this, right to? >> texas are very good at that sort of thing.

>> is going can you say a bit and then ask bill to comment? >> sure. for as long as i've been doing this work i hate the farmer production because mentally different things this way different people. if we are talking about a wide variety of intervention, for active users that minimize the health harms with their using -- >> is a semantic issue something that politically this uncomfortable? >> the meaning of it is not uncomfortable. i think what's hard from a policy perspective the word we draw the line on those kinds of harm reduction policies that we support and those that we are continuing to look at. so again we have always supported needle exchange programs. we continued support overdose prevention education programs.

and a wide variety of other activities. it's interesting to me that in the international world they look at medication as treatment of harm reduction therapy which doesn't quite square with the. we look at it as a valid treatment approach. part of what we just laid out yesterday with the president's budget is even strengthening the united states' efforts about access communication assisted treatments. these are the most highly evaluated medications that we have. we do support a wide variety of interventions that diminish the health harms associated, and quite honestly the mortality associated with, particularly with injection drug use. >> i agree, not surprisingly 100% with michael. this entire area of discussion false absolute squarely in what i describe as the public health component, which we urge except, agree, support, pleaded

with and vote for enhanced consideration in the international context. this is a good area for discussion but i do not say we should agree with every single proposal that comes in under the label of harm reduction. i do say this is a valid issue for 194 member states of the united nations to discuss in the context of the formal structure of the united nations in the context of their individual national drug control policy. this is an area where i do believe the nations of the world should be able to reach some useful conclusion. as i might add doctor simon the oas states did in september of last year in guatemala city when they discussed public health in their final declaration is it

as an area where the 34 states of the western hemisphere agreed we should address and focus efforts as we addressed the drug issue. >> thank you. >> you are quite welcome. >> we suspect views leadership as we head towards a special session to bestow special emphasis on this area do you expect? >> sure. >> i mean, what you described about the oas session suggest that there's proof already, some action in that area. >> actually, we probably don't want of a tactical discussion at this particular point in time. first it would give half of the people in this room a headache and the other half would fall asleep, but i would suggest that the united states of america has placed itself more or less in a position where it can influence the dialogue in the future.

because it has associated itself with neither of the two extremes. neither those who espouse full prohibition, in other words, lock them up if they so much as think about it or if you think you might think about it, or the other extreme, those who say let's just legalize everything and the entire problem would go away. we have placed ourselves in a position where we can influence and i would like to thank helped produce at least a majority if not consensus in this area. and this would be an area where -- >> in that sweet middle ground where we're going to put all of our energy looking ahead what are the three or four things you want to take away from the special session in terms of practical advances in that middle zone? what are the concrete things where you make use of existing

flexibilities to push the rest of the world to see things more in the way we want to see that? >> first i don't want to say people should see things the way we want to see them. i do believe the way we describe this is we should find some common ground that all 194 member states of the united nations can accept. i will start, smarty-pants, with at least two of the things i said at the very beginning and that is let's keep the basic architecture that we have the three international drug control conventions, and let's keep the consensus in terms of resisting the large transnational criminal organizations. they we actually trying to accomplish within those two parameters? i do believe public health, and my guess is what the 10 people and that our we could come up with 50 different proposals on public health, some of which we have already talked about or

around in the course of our discussion. second would be criminal justice reform. in what i would describe as a logical coherent way that is not going to require governments at either extreme to have to change their fundamental position. because, ladies and gentlemen, the united nations system, for good or for ill, has developed over the last 70 years a tradition to operate by consensus. and what does consensus mean? it means that any individual government can basically stop and initiative if it feels strongly about it. but this is to a person like me who must operate in, and within that system is i've got to find proposals, ideas, concepts that will be acceptable to some governments that are still executing drug traffickers, and other governments who have completely legalized entire

categories of products. i have come up with and suggested some of those ideas earlier today. sentencing reforms in terms of having licenses do you have to surf for this purpose? alternatives to incarceration and adjudication processes that are different or separate from the criminal justice system. these are the sorts of areas where i would like to think we could find and develop some degree of consensus. is not going to be easy. if it were just us by 5:00 this afternoon we could have a perfect document to come out of the special session of the united nations in 2016. might take more than an hour of which really good. but we are operating under a very different set of rules. and that sadly is part of the

reality that i was trying to describe. if you think michael has accounted situation from time to time, trying to keep some coherence among 50 states of the union plus the district of columbia, ladies and gentlemen may i repeat, 196 individual member states of the united nations that operate by consensus. boy, under those circumstances i would trade jobs with michael botticelli any day of the week. >> thank you. >> i want to come back to michael with one big question and want to open the floor for comments and questions so please think of it about which i want to say. michael, my question to you is what more do you need do you believe in terms of tools or capacities to carry forward the mission of your office?

which is so expensive in a way and has very high ambitions attached to it and you're in the process of multiple transitions of outlook and paradigms and partnerships. i mean, it's striking reading through all policy materials that you generated it's a very dynamic environment that you're trying to shape in multiple places around this country. so where you said what more if you were to wish for an additional set of capacities and tools, what would those be? >> i've been in government so long, no one has commit up like check before and said what would you do. i think a couple things. and one i will start with continued to change public perception. i think is a really great area what are the heirs we know why people don't seek treatment is it still riddled with shame and

stigma. if i had a magic wand it would be really changing how people with addiction argued. >> being able to communicate and mobilizes because i would love to see a more vibrant politically active recovery movement in the way we have had movement in other areas that have changed public policy. people and i think that's changing of the people are beginning to come together and really having a vibrant political movement around this because i do think that that becomes really helpful. the second piece, and i do believe that one of the things that we have here in the united states, we ensure that resource across the country we lead the world in research as it relates to good evidence-based programming. everything we need to continue to focus on good evidence-based programs, particularly as it

relates to the criminal justice health care intervention but i think we have emerging models. i think we have a good few things out there but we need a better armor carrying them to make the case. and also to hand to our law enforcement folks come to say here are some good things. here we have a few of those out there. drug courts are great but we don't want people having criminal records with it. truck market interventions are promising. i think we have other promising practices a week need a better way of how can we have a different criminal justice response to this issue. so thought -- those be two things. resources are always important. the of the peace, i was having done this work for a long time but that's much treatment has come from the public dollar. private insurance needs to step up dramatically terms of how they provide a good benefit package. >> bill, what would make your job easier in terms of additional capacity?

>> tripling my budget for operation programs and activities overseas and having a single coherent and consensus position by the united states of america in terms of our drug policy. neither one of those is very likely in the course perhaps of my entire lifetime. i would say at the end of the day what is what would be most useful for me in this area would be an approach where there is some degree of consensus within the united states of america that so long as we stay within these basic parameters we will be allowed and permitted to reach understanding and agreements to cooperate and

engaged bilaterally, regionally and universally and drug control issues around the world. i'm not sure we're going to get that either but this is what i'm trying to do when i testified before congress and meet with individual members is to try to clarify as much as possible the general direction in which we are trying to go so that this issue does not get caught up in the sort of political dialogue that does make it very difficult for us to get things done internationally. >> thank you. let's open up for some comments and questions. we will bundle these together. there are two gentlemen right in the middle. we will do i guarantee you we will get to everyone. just be patient. >> dan ripple marijuana policy

project. for so, congratulations again on your nomination. it's exciting to see someone from the treatment world adding that office instead of the military, law enforcement world. in advance, congratulations in advance. to talk about it recession position on marijuana at its continued opposition to legalization. nevertheless the present is also said it's important that washington and colorado and other states that choose around -- regulate marijuana are allowed to move forward with the laws and the department of justice has issued guidance believed what the ambassador mentioned about operating within parameters sank as long as these binaries are not being implicated, and the department of justice will not intervene. to this point they have not been implicated. cdc data show's team use and colorado has gone down. my question is do you agree with the administration's position that states should be permitted to did determine their own marijuana laws? are which you prefer to see the

federal government impose federal law on all states, prohibition of marijuana even states that would prefer a new approach? >> what i would like to do is bundle together a few anaerobic. >> david with stop the drug war.org. there's an issue that lies at the intersection of our cooperation internationally with other countries in drug enforcement on the one hand, and human rights and promote justice on the other hand. that every country shares our human rights standards and criminal justice. we, for example, do not have the death penalty for drug offenses that don't involve violence. some countries do. there are international tensions right now following the execution in indonesia of six convicted drug traffickers with dozens more such executions. a number of countries have

invoked their ambassadors from there. the dea opened a branch office in jakarta in 2011 one of many such offices around the world. we cooperate with indonesia with china, with many countries that have the death penalty for drug offenses. and so my question is as we move forward on criminal justice reform in the u.s. and seek to export that philosophy in our diplomatic relations is reform also going to be operational in how we do enforcement and share intelligence, or is it only going to be of the policy level? for example, are we asking countries that we work with in drug enforcement to give us assurances that will directly lead to executions for nonviolent offense? >> and you.

are their hands in the back of? >> detective howard baldrige from leap. you said earlier in remarks that law enforcement plays a key component. i start police work in 1974 and dicing tsunamis of drugs come into this country marijuana lsd and cocaine meth, ecstasy and heroin has doubled. is my experience as a police officer that we been the mosquito on the butt of an elephant but as you know drugs today are cheaper, stronger and according to the dea drugs are readily available to america's use -- use. why do you continue to have faith that my profession can have any impact on the drug trade, either nationally or internationally?

these drug traffic organizations or the al capone for the 21st century and i know the only way we took him al capone and the rest was to end prohibition. >> and over here and then we'll hear from you and we will come back. >> my company i work for is not involved in this but i'm also a part of a president obama presidential partners and a member of a partner the human rights campaign. my question is this. domestic, in getting the cooperation of the u.s. congress to do the things, to move toward that sweet spot you described or what would make his life easier leaving aside the probability of getting 67 votes, is this an issue in which the cooperation could be relatively bipartisan rather than split along party

lines? an example is the trans-pacific partnership where the president will certainly need the public cooperation spend your question is? >> is this an issue not probability come is this an issue that lends itself to republican, democratic -- >> which issue are you talking about? >> the issue of getting a consensus on u.s. drug policy to facilitate an effective approach to the international community to the united nations. >> okay, thank you. michael, do you want to start with some of the domestic questions and then we will to bill. >> so i think your question in terms of what's our response are as kind of other states think about doing this. i was a to think that i would agree i think that many states are very, very interest in terms of what's happening in colorado and washington as they think about how they're going to go forward with this. i think you know that the department of justice as it relates to what the issues with

color and washington have same approach with oregon and alaska around this. and again i think our response to this is to continue to monitor what happens in colorado and washington and in subsequent states to see if anything a different response from the department of justice and from this administration, over to see if there are, and what that might be. do we need tighter regulations or what are the possible options the department of justice can take if it looks as if those criteria are not being met. i think it's important to do that. the president as a related to the district i think was very clear that the district should stick to its home rule as a resident of the district. i might not agree about legalization but i do agree with her own ability spend our own money the way that we want to do that. i think it's going to be

continued important as we go for to watch what happens as this rolls out. i think to your question it's been very interesting for me too, you know, i come from the public health side and the demand reduction world. and quite honestly was not coming at this work from a kind of law centric. but one of the things i've come to appreciate taken as alleged to the heroin issue here, there is a direct relation between supply and demand we can't ignore. the heroin situation we have a great example for part of the reason that we're in this situation, not owned with untreated addiction and we have to do a better job and we need to do a better job in intervention, but it's because with such a plentiful supply right? and so we do have to focus on the strategies that focus on getting the supplies out of the

communities to if i think about effective public health strategy for a long time, if we think about tobacco, unfortunately i'm still a smoker that it's harder and harder to find a place to buy a pack of cigarettes these days and it makes one think that using those trucks. getting that stuff out of the committee has been an effective public health strategy for a long, long time. i do think that law enforcement can work with a criminal organizations -- i think it will have does have a synergistic effect as relates to demand reduction. the other piece and i think you know this is would you want to give law enforcement a different set of skills and practices to be able to not rely solely on arrest and incarceration as they our approach people with addictive disorders but i think it's important to continue on those kinds of interventions. >> can you talk about the issue that david raised, the death penalty and --

>> the human rights intersection intersection, yes, but here's the way i suppose i would frame the issue. international relations, foreign relations, foreign policy are the intersection of lots of different issues. human rights and democracy issues, law enforcement or counter narcotic issues, trade and commercial issues, economic issues, security issues, terrorism issues. at the end of the day, our relations with any individual country are a combination of all of those, and we from our perspective as a government, as a nation and as a people tried to develop some sort of violence in each individual case as to what is most important, it is not. and august if all nations of the world were determined not to

have relations with a country that maintains a death penalty actually my job would become much easier due to the fact that we have relations with no other country in the world, at the end of the day our job begin is to figure what are the priorities among those. is it right for us to have a liaison law enforcement relationship with a nation that in fact, applies the death penalty in matters such as drug trafficking where we would not apply that penalty? from my perspective i would address that question i saying why do we want the liaison relationship? what do we get out of it in terms of are we protecting the american people? is into college and something? is a getting a larger or feeding a larger objective, for example, having a relationship with the largest most populous muslim country in the world which does not have a significant extremist

issue? how do we balance that against legitimate proper and correct human rights concerns and considerations and come up with a conclusion? and as is practically always the case in the hard issues the conclusion will not be accepted or agreed to by everyone. it will at the end of the day be one that has perhaps the largest non-majority accepting or agreeing with it. and may i wrap up on the bipartisan issue? brother, i would love to think that we could find something in this matter that, in fact, does generate a bipartisan support. my only comment and i've been in this government business now for 36 years, this is a policy that is now under some degree of change and adjustment.

and my own experience of the past 36 years is that is a time when it is rather difficult to find bipartisan agreement. because things are changing and that is the most difficult time for my experience to get everyone to come together and agree. i hope i'm wrong. we will find out. >> great. let's get another round of comments and questions. we have a hand here. please be very succinct and will gather together three or four come back and close. >> thanks so much. my question actually is twofold. both for each of you. the first question is, as part of the group that would be legalized and it is somewhat erroneously conclude that we are not in concern for the well being of the youth of our nation and so as you were speaking you were saying that

you articulated somewhat of a third way or an alternative sort of patch between prohibition and legalization and i was wondering if you could expand on what that is? and for the ambassador, as it relates to international narcotic control board, given the fact that large amount is perpetual by the build of the united states to control monetary donation, what exactly are the ramifications of the united states as it changes its cannabis policy being negatively impacted by being out of compliance if you will with the international narcotics are with the international convention? >> my question is for both of you regarding the policy. with the legalization of illicit drugs, crime rates have fallen by a substantial amount the county seat of impacting domestic policy in the united states as well as regional

consensus on a national policy at the u.n.? >> can you just summarize that question, slowly? >> sorry. so how do you see the impact of what happened in portugal in the past 15 years impact domestic policy both in the united states and international policy and consensus at the u.n. special hearing speak with thank you portugal. >> david holliday, latin america program of the opioid foundation. the recent report, the false report of the american academy of pediatrics also made recommended that marijuana be rescheduled as a scheduled to drug. i won't ask your position on that but what are the obstacles of the future of that and what would mean from your perspective, if marijuana was reclassified? >> thank you. do we have any other comments? there's one in the back.

>> sort of a follow-up to the. mr. botticelli, apparently yesterday morning you spoke before law enforcement officers where you suggested or you stated marijuana would remain classified as a tightly recommended schedule one drug and to quote you, you said the administration continues to oppose attempts to legalize marijuana and other drugs pick this up as he was driven by medical science and research. would you care to comment on the medical science and research that you think suggests that marijuana and heroin should be on the same schedule? do you believe they are equally dangerous? >> okay, why don't we come to bill first year and then to michael, and then we can wrap up. bill? >> i will start the international narcotics control board, it is the body which was established by the united

nations when they ratified the 1961 international first convention on control of narcotic and psychotropic drugs. and the incb's role to a certain extent is to serve as referee come accepting whether individual never states are in compliance with their treaty obligations, and it has of the more specific functions as well. >> i wish i'd said what that determines the amount of influence on the incb. there are i believe, 12 members, for which one right now is an american citizen, and a measure there's ever been more than one. and we do provide whatever our proportional share is under the united nations -- whatever it is

that we pay into the united nations system, we do provide it to them. i can offer you that over the last two years i have not detected any evidence at all of a substantial amount of deference by the incb to the united states government presentations despite the brilliance with which those presentations have been made. we do not agree that the presentations were made brilliantly. your question goes beyond that however, and it does say, so what would be the impact of the incb finally making a definitive determination that the united states is out of compliance with its obligations under the three conventions? and that is an excellent question from a question i have been wrestling with for more than a year now. i mean the world would not end to the sun will still rise in the morning and it was set in the evening, and the republic will still stand.

those are good things. it's not an existential sort of issue. it does doesn't impact as both in terms of u.s. leadership. certainly on this issue but perhaps in broader issues as well as we can to encourage other governments to abide by their rules under the human rights convention, for example or under the trade agreement of the deputy of -- deputy over other such multinational convention. we would have to factor that into our thinking i would suggest to we also would have to factor in the impact of this in terms of the three conventions themselves. if, in fact, a nation that has exercise more leadership within the united nations over the 70 years, the last 70 years and any other nation is in over and admitted noncompliance with its treaty obligations, i assume that would make it less likely

that other governments would feel any sense of obligation to comply with their treaty obligations as well. i repeat, and on this i don't mean to overstate the case. it is not the end of the world but it would be negative impacts. and my conclusion is it would be better if we could fans the incb that our domestic posture and position leaves us in compliance with our treaty obligations and the reverse. and i will continue to make the argument that i've been making now for more than two years that our federal system, our continued commitment to the fundamental objectives of the three conventions, and that is to discourage the abuse of these particular products and our discretion and authority as a sovereign state to determine how our limited law enforcement

resources would be applied to this problem set, leave us in compliance with our treaty obligations. i believe it is an argument worth making i believe it is a correct argument, and i believe we are better off if we get the incb, convinced the incb to accept that argument. >> portugal. >> portugal, portugal has been rolled out, as have a number of other nations in terms of experimentation with different approaches on drugs. the netherlands, switzerland at times, more recently, uruguay. might argue it would be, i put portugal in the same category with virtually any other nation, into which i will not add the states of colorado and washington, in terms of providing us something that we can assess, monitor and

determine what the impact of their national experiment is both in terms of positive and negative elements from that approach. i don't want to single portugal out. determine whether this works or does not work. portugal is a small nation but it is for the most part a very homogeneous nation. is a nation that is both limited in terms of population and in terms of geography. they have a different problem set, i suppose that you would find from a very large pipe is nation, a nation that is take liberal or particularly urban nation that is bull joint -- multicultural, located in the crossroads of traditional smuggling patterns. my own view is that portugal is

an additional data point as we the people of the kind of america and we the 196 member states of the united nations assess where we want to go with drug policy. >> thank you. michael, there were a couple of questions on marijuana as well as the question might post around how do you carve a third way? >> sure. and let me just, i'll also talk about the portugal peace because i think it's interesting. when you look at some of the valuations, even institutes in the portugal freely talk about the fact to the extent that a significant increase the treatment resources may really be a profound effect, right? so this leads into the third way approach, right? because what we are saying here, we are really concerned with what some attendant telephones might be about legalization. we don't want to lock folks out.

let's focus as a solution to this problem. so i do think even some of the good things that might be coming out of portugal, you know and again, could be significant result of the fact that the dramatically increased access to treatment and to use the criminal justice system as way to leverage people into treatment. i think that's important. let me talk, we had a couple questions about scheduling. one of the things i always hear is why is marijuana in the same category as and when? i think it's important for folks know that drugs are not scheduled based on well to risk. so it's really important that you understand that. so this is basically, if they meet up or down criteria as relates to the individual category? something we need to be careful when we start saying why is marijuana in the same category as everyone? it's not a relative risk scale together these that's important and i will say this because i think in the past it was a pretty fair criticism that the

usg and others were not doing an adequate job on investigating the potential therapeutics of marijuana as the relates to the work that we do. they have continually to amp up their efforts. they now have over 50 studies looking at the potential therapeutic value of the components of marijuana, right? even the institute of medicine has come out and said smoking marijuana is probably not the most efficient or health minded device or marijuana but i think we would all agree with that, but that's not the case. so this is what the schedule comes into play. how do we rely on good science, good data today take what how drugs are scheduled? there is a process that dea under hhs, really looks at the scientific evidence as it relates to this issue. you know, it's really important that we think we continued to support research that looks at

the potential therapeutic values of the components of marijuana. >> thank you. we've gotten to the end of our time here. this has been an extraordinarily rich, and they want to thank both of you for joining us this afternoon. i want to thank all in our audience for sticking with us and putting putting forward some great questions and comments. michael, we wish you the best of luck on monday. that's a wonderful moment approaching, and please join me in thanking our speakers. [applause] [inaudible conversations]

>> according to the cdc, 121 cases of measles have been reported in 14 states and the district of columbia since the start of the year. today, the senate help committee hold hearings on preventable diseases and whether they should be mandatory for children. you can see that live light starting at 10 a.m. eastern on c-span. >> the senate finance committee today examines the u.s. tax code code. the committee hears from former senate finance committee chair and former committee member bill bradley who both worked on the legislation. live coverage start attending eastern on c-span3. >> the political landscape has changed with 114th congress.

not only are the 43 new republicans and 15 the democrats in the house and 12 new republicans and one the democrats in the senate, is also 108 women in congress including the first african-american republican in the house and the first woman veteran in the senate to keep track of the numbers using congressional chronicles on c-span.org. there's lots of useful information including voting results and statistics about each session of congress the new congress best access on c-span c-span2, c-span radio and c-span.org. >> now, zeid ra'ad al-hussein discusses isis and the recent killing of hostages. he is jordan's former ambassador to the u.s. his remarks are 30 minutes. >> thank you very much for coming. i would just like to introduce

to you the u.n. high commissioner for human rights, zeid ra'ad al-hussein which took office september of last year. and i won't say anymore. i will go straight to the high commissioner. >> good morning ladies and gentlemen, of the press. permit me if you will to begin my remarks by speaking as a jordanian and the u.n. human rights chief. i am filled, filled with anger and disgust at what the sectarians and sergei to my compatriot, moaz al-kasasbeh, to the two japanese captives to the british and american captives, to the men and women and children and