The Fall Public Meeting of the President's Advisory Commission on Educational Excellence for Hispanics will be held Tuesday, Sept. 3 beginning at 9 a.m. CT on the campus of the University of Texas at San Antonio. Following the daylong meeting, the Commission and the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics(WHIEEH) will host a roundtable, titled "Building a Coalition for Early Learning: Promising Practices for the Hispanic Community."
Highlights of Tuesday's meeting include remarks by: U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro of Texas; Ajita Talwalker, senior policy advisor, Domestic Policy Council; Gina Rodriguez, director of Latino Affairs, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; and Mario Ortiz, San Antonio district director, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Department of Homeland Security.
WHIEEH's Executive Director Alejandra Ceja will discuss the Initiative's 2013 accomplishments and the upcoming (2015) 25th anniversary year of action, and WHIEEH's deputy director, Marco Davis, will discuss Hispanic teacher recruitment and President Obama's My Brother's Keeper initiative.
The roundtable that will follow the Fall Meeting, "Building a Coalition for Early Learning: Promising Practices for the Hispanic Community," will highlight private sector investments and partnership-building efforts taking place in San Antonio, an area with large numbers of Hispanics.
At 4:30 p.m. CT, Libby Doggett, the U.S. Department of Education's deputy assistant secretary for Policy and Early Learning, will give remarks via teleconference; and members of the Commission's Early Learning Subcommittee will moderate the open dialogue.
The 27-member President's Advisory Commission on Educational Excellence for Hispanics, which advises President Obama and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan on issues important to the Latino community, from cradle-to-career, meets twice a year as a full committee to discuss key topics relevant to the Hispanic community.
President Obama is committed to closing the opportunity gap and working with states and local communities to ensure high-quality early learning for every child, so that all children enter kindergarten ready to succeed in school and in life. The president's 2015 budget request would create a federal-state partnership that would ensure universal access to high-quality preschool for all 4-year-olds from low- and moderate-income families, with incentives for states to provide high-quality preschool for all 4-year-olds. It also includes support for other early childhood investments as part of a cohesive system of early learning and development for children, beginning with prenatal care and continuing through third-grade. Last month the Education Department and Health and Human Services announced that applications are now available for the $250 million Preschool Development Grants competition.