You don't see a positive culture, stability among teachers, or leadership. We don't focus enough in our policies on creating conditions to educating kids with the greatest needs. There is no state that does that.

All kids are different, even when they come from you and theoretically have the same culture. Some of my kids had been more outgoing and had an easy time at school. Others were more shy and needed more support. As a parent you are very aware of these differences and are not treating them all the same, given who they are as people.

The origins of these [schooling] federal policies were tied to President Johnson's war on poverty. Supplemental funds were sent to school districts serving poor children to compensate for issues related to poverty. Since the enactment of NCLB, the focus on mitigating poverty has been replaced by a focus on accountability as measured by test scores.

Middle-class kids get to play, develop their thinking ability. Poor kids are much more likely to get regimentation under the guise of socialization. On top of it, we have huge segregation in early childhood programs. I don't see these patterns changing anytime soon, and that's a big obstacle.

Boys are still led to believe that power is associated with domination.

We need to create schools that are organized to meet the needs of the kids they serve instead of what we've been doing. We expect kids to adjust to the schools and if they can't, we say something is wrong with the child - instead of focusing on engagement and nurturing the love of learning in kids.

New York rushed to get students into early childhood programs, but the research is clear that it has to be high quality. What we are giving poor kids now in early childhood is nothing like what we are giving middle-class kids in most places.