Americans seek to support - not abandon - public schools, new PEN poll on community involvement in education reveals

Funkhouser Honored as Recipient of Crossing the River Jordan Award Peggy Funkhouser, president of the Los Angeles Educational Partnership, has been honored with the Crossing the River Jordan Award by the Public Education Network in Washington D.C. The Public Education Network (PEN) established the Crossing the River Jordan Award in 1994 to honor individuals whose distinguished service and commitment to public education have helped to strengthen the institution of public education in the United States. The award's purpose is to recognize and honor the work and contributions of extraordinary individuals who work on behalf of children -- especially disadvantaged children. Individuals chosen for this award have made significant changes in institutional approaches to dealing with the needs, growth, and development of children -- particularly in the fields of education, child health, legal services, psychology, environment, and philanthropy. Crossing the River Jordan signifies the way that the recipient has provided creative and insightful leadership and worked to challenge an existing system. Award recipients have created new opportunities for others, changed predictable outcomes to unprecedented new chances and choices, and fashioned new tools in the process. As a result of this visionary work, citizens can begin the journey of moving from a life of difficulty to a life of hope, possibility, and opportunity. The Awards were announced at PEN's annual conference by Dr. David Hornbeck, PEN's board chair and the Superintendent of the School District of Philadelphia. Dr. Hornbeck, a nationally recognized school reform leader,was the first recipient of the award. Other honorees have included the late Ms. Oseola McCarty, a Mississippi laundress who donated her life savings to supply scholarships to needy and deserving minority students; the late Thurgood Marshall, civil rights attorney and the first African American Supreme Court Justice; Dr. Carol Gilligan, Harvard professor and pioneering researcher and author on the differences in moral development between men and women; Robert Moses, civil and voting rights legend and founder and president of the Algebra Project; Edward J. Meade and the founders of PEN, the Ford Foundation. Also receiving the award this year was Walter Annenberg, founder of the Annenberg Foundation, which focuses on school reform. LAEP's first and only president, Funkhouser has led the development of LAEP from a start up into one of the nation's largest and most successful local education funds. During her tenure LAEP has collaborated with foundations, corporations, educators and community members to raise and invest more than $50 million in efforts to improve public education in Los Angeles. Under her leadership, LAEP has worked to foster and support excellence in public education through activities that range from the provision of support and training for teachers to complex initiatives that engage schools and communities in comprehensive educational reform. Funkhouser has recently announced her retirement. Funkhouser's award was presented by David Berkholtz, president of the George Gund Foundation and founding president and CEO of PEN. Funkhouser is also a founding board member of PEN. PEN's mission is to create systems of public education that result in high achievement for every child. The Network works to educate the nation about the relationship between school quality and the quality of community and public life. Equal opportunity, access to quality public schools, and an informed citizenry are all critical components of a democratic society. The Network works with local education funds to ensure that the availability of high-quality public education is every child's right and not a privilege.