originally aired 7-24-2011


What's good enough for a child you love? What's good enough parenting? Good enough early education? Good enough healthcare? Good enough schools?

DAVID KIRP, envisions a national effort to support and develop our children based on a simple "Golden Rule:" Every child deserves what's good enough for a child you love.
David Kirp, Kids First
In KIDS FIRST, he offers on-the-ground accounts of initiatives that work - and that could affordably be implemented in communities everywhere - to achieve five key priorities:
1) strong support for new parents
2) high-quality early education
3) linking schools and communities to improve what both offer children
4) giving all kids access to a caring and stable adult mentor
5) providing kids a nest egg to help pay for college or kick-start a career.Where do you think the most important changes need to take place to turn things around in terms of big issues like the economy, the environment, and social justice?

His latest book, Improbable Scholars: The Rebirth of a Great American School System and a Strategy for America's Schools, was named outstanding book of 2013 by the American Education Research Association. The book chronicles how an urban school district has brought poor Latino immigrant children, many of them undocumented, into the education mainstream.