Thank you, Terry, and good afternoon to you all. I want to begin by thanking each of you for taking time away from your colleges, universities, foundations, and associations to be with us. You honor us with your presence.

I also want to express appreciation to the folks at BellSouth. They are supporting this Summit, as well as initiatives to improve education throughout the Southeast region and the nation.

I am also delighted that Lee Fritschler, former President of Dickinson College and my new nominee for Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education, is here as well. He is from the ranks of college presidents and is familiar with the challenges that today's higher education leaders face.

On an occasion like this, I remember the words of E. B. White, who once remarked, "When I arise in the morning, I am torn by the twin desires to reform the world and enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day."

Well today, we don't have to be torn, and it's easy to plan. We are here to reform the world by improving teacher education and preparation.

I am usually not given to bold, sweeping statements, but I am going to make a couple right now. I believe that this Summit can be one of the most important events in American education this decade. Because you can leave here the leaders of a movement that can change the face of teacher education in the 21st century.

We begin with this premise: Improving the quality of teacher education may be the most important factor in improving American education in the years ahead.

America is blessed with many teachers who are experts in their fields, have strong pedagogical skills, and care deeply about the well being of children. They are the products of America's schools of education—many attended your institutions. We are indebted to you and your teacher educators for these teachers. But the truth is, a number of classrooms in our nation aren't blessed with the skilled teachers needed for these times. There are many reasons for that, and it is time to courageously make the changes that we need to make.

One of the challenges we face is the changing nature of teaching itself. The demands we are placing on teachers today are greater than ever before. We are asking them to help students meet high standards. We expect them to be computer whizzes. We expect them to deal with some of the most diverse student bodies in our history, and teach children who come to school without breakfast and return to broken homes. And they must sometimes do it in schools that are overcrowded or where the ceilings are crumbling.

It is not surprising that many teachers do not feel up to these historic new challenges. A recent national survey found that only 36% of all teachers said they are "very well prepared" to teach to the new challenging standards in K-12 schools. And new and veteran teachers alike do not feel very well prepared to teach students with special needs and from different backgrounds.

In addition, many teachers are overwhelmed by the sheer number of students in our nation's classrooms. If I could boil down the biggest challenge to K-12 education into one sentence, it would be this: We've got a lot of children to teach, and a shortage of qualified teachers.

There is a record number of students in our schools this year—53.2 million. At the same time, many school districts across the nation are reporting the worst shortages of qualified teachers in memory. In the next 10 years, 2.2 million teachers will have to be hired to meet swelling enrollments and teacher retirements. The squeeze has gotten so tight that some schools have been forced to put any warm body in front of a classroom. It has been estimated that 250,000 teachers are working without proper preparation in course content, or without any kind of training in how to teach.

And even well prepared teachers are being forced to teach "out of field." Nationally, this applies to 28% of all teachers. You wouldn't want a podiatrist operating on you if you needed brain surgery. And you wouldn't want a brain surgeon working on your bunions. Yet we have physical education majors teaching math.

We have come to this pass because the system of recruiting, supporting, and retaining teachers has left much to be desired. Our recruiting efforts have been painfully slipshod. We lose many good teachers because of a certification process that often judges how well prospective teachers can do paperwork rather than how well they can teach. We lose many other good new teachers because they are left to "sink or swim" without good induction or mentoring programs -- even new morticians get such support. Good professional development opportunities are few, and teacher pay often cannot match what the private sector offers. Good teaching requires the best and the brightest students, and let's not kid ourselves—we won't be able to recruit or keep good teachers if we don't pay them what they're worth.

Our college and university teacher education systems have also frequently fallen short. Our colleges of education can no longer be university backwaters, as some have been allowed to become. They must have the support of the entire university, and enjoy much stronger links with the colleges of arts and science. Education students must achieve competence in the subject matter they will teach. They must combine theory and practice. And they must be better prepared for diverse, real-world classrooms—the school settings they will encounter on the job.

Those are some of the problems. The good news is, with millions of new teachers to prepare in the next decade, we've got a wonderful opportunity to get things right—if we begin right now to improve the education of our next generation of teachers.

Here's an example of what of what can be done. Just a few days ago, I was in Union City, California, and saw the excitement of new and experienced teachers in the public schools working with students and faculty from the Teacher Education Department at nearby California State-Hayward. This partnership has received a federal grant to help teacher candidates learn to use technology in the classroom. This shows that a real commitment to partnership can help solve many of the problems that we face.

That is why we have called you to this Summit—to work together to move teacher education into the 21st century. We want to take a hard look at the structure of our current system of educating teachers and modernize it. With your help and leadership, we can succeed in seeing this process through.

In the coming months, we will engage many others who can develop solutions—K-12 teachers; federal, state, and local policy makers; union leaders; school superintendents; teacher licensing officials; and college faculty members, deans, and provosts. We will create a true national partnership.

But we have begun with you—our nation's college and university presidents—because only you can provide the overall leadership to make things happen. Improving teacher education will require the attention of your entire institution, and greater coordination between your schools of education, your arts and sciences faculties, and K-12 schools. Only you have the prestige and clout to press successfully for breakthroughs across traditional boundaries.

That is why I am asking you today to put teacher education at the very top of your personal and institutional agendas. Real change will be impossible without your full involvement and the sense of purpose and urgency that only you, as distinguished and respected college presidents, can provide.

In the next day and a half, you will have the opportunity to meet with your colleagues in small groups to discuss a wide range of issues and to develop suggested action steps. For now, I would like to offer a number of questions that you might consider. This isn't an exhaustive list by any means, but it does include some of the key issues, in my view.

• Do your Departments of Arts & Sciences and other faculties collaborate with your College of Education? Integration is necessary to give new teachers a solid "content" background. If it takes a village to raise a child, it takes an entire college or university to educate a new teacher.
• Your tenure and promotion policies reward research, but do they also reward faculty for participating in local schools? In some cases, faculty may even be penalized for their participation.
• Have you developed partnerships with K-12 schools to design good teacher education programs, to provide new teachers with valuable clinical experience, and to keep your faculty well versed in the emerging, tougher standards for K-12 students?
• Are students in your colleges of education given enough chances to gain field experience working with master K-12 teachers?
• Do you have a plan to recruit talented, diverse individuals into teaching? Do you work with middle and high schools to encourage adolescents to think about teaching as a career?
• When it comes to accountability, are your graduates able to pass rigorous, performance-based assessments for initial licensing? Do schools find your graduates successful when they're on the job? How do you ensure that teaching candidates have both content knowledge and strong teaching skills?

I know that accountability is a critically important issue. It is here, and we shouldn't be afraid of it. Instead, let us use it as a lever to promote positive change and to find more appropriate ways to measure the knowledge and skills that your pre-service teachers have gained through your programs.

• Finally, what about the teachers who teach the teachers? Are they in touch with the realities of today's classroom? Let me give you an example. Terry's husband, Mark, recently began teaching at a school near Richmond, Virginia where students come from Bosnia, Russia, Yugoslavia, Vietnam, and Cambodia. One-third of these are ESL students.

Yet Mark is expected to teach these students World History and ensure that they pass Virginia's rigorous Standards of Learning exams. I know he will figure it out because he is a seasoned veteran. But the question is -- How many of your education faculty realize that this is the challenge many of their students will face when they leave the "groves of academe" and go to work?

I would also challenge you to provide leadership in areas that are not strictly within your purview, but important nonetheless. For example, if state licensing standards for new teachers are too low and prospective teachers get only a "pass-fail grade" perhaps we need new standards. One good idea being discussed in the Mid-Atlantic region is to create new levels of licensing test grades, such as "exemplary" and "advanced." "Advanced" teachers could receive higher salaries, enjoy portability of credentials, and other benefits. This is one good way to promote teacher quality.

I also want to take a moment to praise the American Council on Education and its task force on teacher education for preparing an action agenda for presidents. I have read the draft of the proposal, and it is an excellent blueprint for action. I recommend that you all read it when it is published—and then act on it.

Finally, I want to put a human face on what I've been talking about to really illustrate the power you have to bring change to American education. Let's think for a moment about the impact each qualified teacher you produce has on children. There is an incredible multiplier effect at work—a multiplier effect that no chain letter can match. Let me describe for you the power of just two qualified teachers to make the future better. I visited their classrooms two weeks ago.

In Penn Grove, California, I sat in on the 1st and 2nd-grade classrooms of Ms. Schlee. The visual organization and spirit alone in that classroom made children want to learn to read. Colorful round disks of key words hung from the ceiling.

Each year, Ms. Schlee helps 20 students learn to read. Over 30 years, she will produce 600 new readers. If your college or community produced 200 Ms. Schlees, you would put 120,000 children on the right track. That's a return on investment that would get Warren Buffet's attention.

In South Carolina, I visited Ms. Dockery's calculus class in Fort Mill High School. Each year, almost 98% of her students test out at 3 or higher on the AP test. Again, think about her impact on the future -- she produces 40 AP calculus graduates a year. If she teaches for 30 years, she'll dramatically improve the lives of 1,200 young people. Think how many young lives you can improve by producing many more Ms. Dockerys every year.

Henry Adams wrote in 1907, "A teacher affects eternity." Today, I am asking each of you to affect eternity by making dramatic changes in teacher education in America. I know that it will not be easy. I know that it will take some courage. But you don't get the chance to affect eternity every day. You have the chance right now. I know that you will seize it. Thank you very much.

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