Barbara Byrd-Bennett, EXECUTIVE-IN-RESIDENCE AT CLEVELAND STATE UNIVERSITY and a Superintendent in Residency for Harcourt School Publishers. Ms. Byrd-Bennett is an experienced educator, supervisor, administrator, and researcher of public urban education. She began her career with the New York City Board of Education where she taught at elementary and high school levels. In New York City, she also served as a school principal and the Director of Curriculum, Instruction and Professional Development. She has been an adjunct professor at Malcolm King College in Harlem, City College in New York City, the College of New Rochelle, and Fordham University.

In Brooklyn, New York, Ms. Byrd-Bennett served as superintendent of Crown Heights/Flatbush School District, where she is credited with reestablishing order and instructional focus during an administrative takeover of the troubled district. Prior to that, she was the Supervising Superintendent of the Chancellor’s District in New York City, responsible for the direct oversight of the lowest-performing schools in the New York City public school system. While there, she was credited with dramatic improvements in student achievement. She left New York City to accept the appointment by then Mayor Michael R. White to serve as the first Chief Executive Officer of the Cleveland Municipal School District—the largest in the state of Ohio.

Ms. Byrd-Bennett is a member of numerous boards, commissions and advisory councils, including the United States Department of Education National Assessment Governing Board; the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards; the Education Commission of the States’ National Center for Education Accountability; the Ohio Governor’s Commission on Student Success; the Commission of Governors’ Blue Ribbon Task Force on Financing Student Success and a member of the board of directors for the Albert Shanker Institute and the transition teams for the Governors of Ohio and New York State. She has also served as the President of the Urban Superintendents’ Association of America.

Ms. Byrd-Bennett is the recipient of numerous local, state and national honors including the Council of Greater City Schools 2001 Urban Superintendent of the Year. Her passion for education stems from one relentless goal: success for each child in each classroom in each school.

Earlier this year, Common Core's report shows a nation STILL AT RISK. Nearly a quarter of students polled could not identify Adolf Hitler and half had no idea what the Renaissance was. To learn more read the report, press release or stories at ABC News, CBS News, The New York Times, and USA TODAY. Or take the test yourself.

FROM THE BENCH: "One unintended effect of the No Child Left Behind Act, …, is that it has effectively squeezed out civics education because there is no testing for that anymore and no funding for that. And at least half of the states no longer make the teaching of civics and government a requirement for high school graduation. This leaves a huge gap, and we can't forget that the primary purpose of public schools in America has always been to help produce citizens who have the knowledge and the skills and the values to sustain our republic as a nation, our democratic form of government," former justice Sandra Day O'Connor said. (cont'd)

CAMPAIGN FILE: Sen. John McCain recalls his English teacher: “There was one friendship that enriched my life at Episcopal High School beyond measure... Mr. Ravenel was head of the English Department... He loved English literature, and taught us to love it as well... He made us appreciate how profound were the emotions that animated the characters in Shakespeare's tragedies. MacBeth and Hamlet in his care were as compelling to boys as they were to the most learned scholar.” (cont'd)

CAMPAIGN FILE: Sen. Barack Obama said “One of the problems with No Child Left Behind is that it has become so reliant on a standardized test model that—first of all—subjects like history and social studies have gotten pushed aside. Arts and music time is no longer there. So the child is not having the well-rounded educational experience I benefited from and most in my generation benefited from.” (cont'd)