Written Testimony of William H. Gates

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5 billion in partnership with non-profits, school districts, states, the private sector and others, to improve high school education, including the support of more than 1800 high-quality high schools in 40 states and the District of Columbia. Microsoft has likewise made deep investments in education, especially through our Partners in Learning program. That program creates partnerships to provide resources to educators focused on leadership development and holistic learning reform. One of the program's flagship initiatives has been our collaboration with the School District of Philadelphia to build a "School of the Future"—bringing innovation to all areas of high school redesign, including instruction, technology integration, hiring and professional development, and building design.

I would like to mention three other initiatives in particular that demonstrate what can be achieved:

• New York City has opened close to 200 new schools in the last five years with many replacing some of the city's most underperforming schools. The first set of new schools achieved an average 79 percent graduation rate compared to graduation rates ranging from 31 to 51 percent at the schools they replaced.

• Boston's business, education and civic leaders have made a commitment to dramatically increase the number of young people ready for college and career. A winner of the Broad Prize this year, Boston has increased math scores on the 4th and 8th grade National Assessment of Educational Progress at a faster rate than other large American cities participating in NAEP's Trial Urban District Assessment. The number of AP math and English exams taken by minority students is up more than 200 percent for Latino students and 78 percent for African Americans since 2002.

• Early College High Schools are perhaps the most innovative and groundbreaking initiative underway nationally and show all of us what we can do if we think differently. The early college model is counter-intuitive to most, at least initially. The approach is to recruit traditionally low-performing, struggling students to attend high schools that require enrollment in college courses. The schools provide the corresponding support and guidance for students to graduate with two years of college credit and/or an associate's degree. Today, there are more than 125 early college high schools in operation in over 20 states, and there are plans to open up to 45 more by 2008. So far, among the first class of ninth graders at the original three Early College high schools, over 95 percent graduated with a high school diploma, over 57 percent have earned an associate's degree, and over 80 percent have been accepted into four-year colleges.

I encourage all of you to visit any of these school models or districts and see this innovation first hand.

These pockets of success are exciting. But they alone cannot transform our education systems. Doing that will take political and public will. When people learn about the problems with our high schools, and they hear about the possibility of success, they demand change. That is why the Gates Foundation has joined with the Broad Foundation to support the Strong American Schools Partnership. This Partnership, which will be formally launched later this month, is intended to express America's shared vision that we need to demand more for our children now so that they will be more prepared and more successful as adults.

B. Promoting math and science education

Another area where America is falling behind is in math and science education. We cannot possibly sustain an economy founded on technology pre-eminence without a citizenry educated in core technology disciplines such as mathematics, computer science, engineering, and the physical sciences. The economy's need for workers trained in these fields is massive and growing. The U.S. Department of Labor has projected that, in the decade ending in 2014, there will be over two million job openings in the United States in these fields. Yet in 2004, just 11 percent of all higher education degrees awarded in the U.S.