Marguerite Kondracke, President and CEO, America’s Promise Alliance—Keynote Address at Congressional Award Gold Medal Ceremony: America’s Highest Award for Youth
United States Capitol - June 21, 2006
It is a privilege to be with you.
Down the street at the White House, President John Kennedy hosted a dinner one evening for the nation’s top scientists. There probably had never been such an impressive gathering of talent dining together in that room, he said, since Thomas Jefferson dined there alone.
Today, I can understand how he must have felt. It is both inspiring and humbling to have this opportunity to be in the room with young people who have already done so much, not only to improve themselves but to improve their communities and the lives of their neighbors. It is that service which I want to speak about today.
It’s striking to learn about your accomplishments. One of you started and managed a domestic violence project that covered 10 counties. Another of you organized food drives, worked at a home for older adults and assisted local summer recreation programs — all beginning in the eighth grade.
The gold medals you are receiving today are richly deserved. Your service is a wonderful example for all of us at a time when we need more exemplars, of all ages
It is particularly appropriate that you should be receiving this honor from the elected representatives of our nation — because service in the name of the common good is both an American ideal and, from the very beginning, a part of the American experience. Working together to build a stronger community has always been part of what it means to be an American. It is our obligation both to the future and to those in the past who did the same for us.
So on behalf of all of us, and especially of your neighbors and your communities, I salute you for this milestone you have reached, which we are acknowledging today. And I want to ask for your help.
An Urgent Need
Our young people will lead us into the future. You will be the decision-makers in business and government. You will be the teachers and the innovators, the workforce, the parents who nurture the next generation of Americans, and the glue that holds our society together.
But far too many of our young people are not ready for the future.
And that means our future as a nation is at risk. In a faster, flatter, ultracompetitive world, you can draw a straight line between how well we equip our children for success and the success of America in the 21st century.
Unfortunately, instead of stepping up, we’re falling behind.
70% of our 8th graders score below proficiency in math.
Babies born in America are less likely to see their first birthday than babies born in 27 other nations, including Cuba.
Every day, in up to 50,000 American households, at least one child goes hungry.
Thirty percent of our students do not finish high school — almost one in three. And THAT sets in motion a cascade of other problems. Did you know that half of all young men who don’t finish high school will father a child out of wedlock, compared to only 6% of those who graduate from college? Did you know that 65% of the men and women in our prisons never finished high school? Did you know that those who don’t finish high school will earn less than half the income of those who graduate?
As a nation, we have to do better. Otherwise, we cannot ensure the kind of future that our children deserve and America needs. We all have a stake in that future. Regardless of the success we may achieve as individuals, for our country to flourish, we must prepare all of our children to thrive.
A National Wake-up Call and a National Responsibility
There is reason for hope and even for confidence. Much great work is being done. Some of is being done by you here today.
But we need to do so much more. We need a national wake-up call. We need to awaken everyone that the responsibility for preparing our young people belongs to ALL Americans. As a nation, we need to make children and youth an urgent, sustained priority. If we pull together, as we have at other times of national testing, I am persuaded we will meet this challenge.
Achieving More Together Than We Can Achieve Alone
This need to pull together is the impetus behind America’s Promise – The Alliance for Youth, which I am very proud to serve. Our founding chairman, General Colin Powell, and our founding partners recognized that our nation’s best hope for preparing our youth to succeed lies in building strong national partnerships that reach every level. As the nation’s largest cross-sector alliance for young people, we bring together mayors, governors, community leaders, business, nonprofit groups, faith groups, foundations, parents, teachers, media, and young people themselves. We create partnerships with them and between them.
We all have important roles to play. Together, we can create greater impact for America’s youth than any of us can achieve alone.
One thing we have learned: The mission is too big for any one sector. Government alone can’t do it. Nonprofits can’t do it all. Schools can’t do it. But all of us can do it together. The public and private sectors have to work together. Democrats and Republicans have to work together. Young people and adults must work together. It’s the only way we will succeed in keeping the promise of America to all of America’s children and youth. That’s why partnerships between all of these sectors are so important. And that’s what the America’s Promise Alliance works to build.
The Five Promises
Our work focuses on ensuring that ALL of our young people receive the five essential resources that both research and experience show are needed for them to thrive. We call them the Five Promises because, for Americans, that is what they have always been.
1. Caring adults: To thrive, children need positive relationships parents and other family, with teachers, mentors, coaches, youth volunteers, and neighbors.
2. Safe places: at home, at school, in their neighborhoods.
3. A healthy start: Good healthcare, good nutrition and exercise, healthful habits and healthy role models.
4. An effective education that builds marketable skills.
5. Opportunities to help others: Every child and youth needs and deserves the chance to make a difference to the larger society through volunteering, leadership and service.
You here today, especially, know the value of service — not just its value to society but how it helps you to become a fuller person. You know the difference that helping others has made in your lives.
What you may NOT know is that, thanks to research, we can actually MEASURE the difference that service and the rest of the Five Promises make.
Give a child these fundamental resources, and he or she is 5 to 10 times more likely to stay in school, avoid drugs and alcohol, stay free from trouble with the law, and grow up to be an engaged citizen who contributes to the community. In other words, the investment we make together in young people comes back to us in the form of young people who do the same for new generations of young people.
We know from World Bank studies that putting just one at-risk young person on the right path produces a $2 million savings for taxpayers. Dr. James Heckman, the Nobel Prize winner in economics, estimates that the return on investment for early childhood development efforts is 17%. Investing in our young people pays big dividends in our communities, in our schools, in our global competitiveness, and, ultimately, in our national quality of life.
Research shows that, as more children receive the Five Promises, we see higher rates of high school completion — that’s the number one predictor of success. We see higher college or post-secondary enrollment… improvements in school readiness… better proficiency in math and English… lower juvenile crime rates… less drug and alcohol abuse… fewer children as victims of crime… fewer teen pregnancies… fewer childhood suicides… and more civic engagement by young people.
But here’s the rub: According to a Gallup research study last year, over 54 million young people in America — that’s over 60% — were NOT receiving all of the Five Promises. Our country can do better and must do better.
Our Goal
Accordingly, over the next five years, our Alliance has set an ambitious goal. We are committed to changing the lives of 15 million under-served young people through the power of the Five Promises. When we reach that goal, we intend to do even better in the decade that follows. Our commitment is not only to reach more children, but to do more for those we are already serving — for those who are receiving one or two promises but need more. We cannot rest until every child has every promise.
Many of the partners in our Alliance have already committed to help us reach our 15 million goal by 2011. And many of those commitments involve the collaboration across sectors — at the federal, state and local levels — that we know are the best way to get results.
For example, the Corporation for National and Community Service is working with MENTOR to double the number of mentors for children, from 3 million to 6 million.
The US Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable are working together with the education community to improve graduation rates and to help double the number of technology, engineering and math graduates by 2015.
Young people are playing a direct and important role in all of the efforts by our Alliance. Three people in your age group sit on our Board of Directors, where they help shape initiatives like Katrina’s Kids, our Alliance’s commitment to keep the Five Promises to young people affected by last year’s hurricanes. One of the members of our national Youth Partnership Team, Candace Peebles from Memphis, Tennessee, spearheaded her community’s winning application in the 100 Best Communities for Young People competition. All across the country, America’s Promise Ambassadors — young people like you — are making a difference in their communities.
The Challenge
But so much more remains to be done. That’s why, today, along with offering my congratulations, I will issue a challenge. Don’t let your Gold Medal be the capstone of your service but only the cornerstone that you build upon. Don’t let it be an end but the beginning. We need you. In fact, you are indispensable.
As President Ronald Reagan reminded us, America has always been a shining city on a hill. You, too, as young leaders of America, are shining examples to others. Never underestimate the power of your light. And use it well.
When 30% of our students don’t finish high school, or 40% don’t think they will ever realize the American Dream for themselves, it’s tempting to let ourselves think that you or I, as individuals, lack the power to change the future. It may be tempting. But it is not true.
Robert Kennedy once put it this way. Few of us, he said, “will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation… Each time a [person] stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, they send forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls.”
My challenge to you, as our leaders of tomorrow — and to those of you here who are our leaders today — is to go make a ripple in your community, in your district, in your state.
When we engage more Americans of all ages, from every sector, we create ripples that become currents of change.
Let me leave you with these words by the author Marianne Williamson. If you’ve seen the movie “Akeelah and the Bee,” you’ve heard them already. But they’re worth hearing again:
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
As you go from here, I encourage you to use your light to enlist your neighbors, your friends, your community leaders, in building the partnerships that will accomplish more for young people and for our future.
Together, let’s keep the promise of America for every American child.