| Arne Duncan | |
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| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office January 21, 2009 |
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| President | Barack Obama |
| Preceded by | Margaret Spellings |
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CEO of the Chicago Public Schools
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| In office June 26, 2001 – January 21, 2009 |
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| Appointed by | Richard Daley |
| Preceded by | Paul Vallas |
| Succeeded by | Ron Huberman |
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| Born | November 6, 1964 Chicago, Illinois |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Alma mater | Harvard University (B.A.) |
Arne Duncan (born November 6, 1964) is an American education administrator and currently United States Secretary of Education. Duncan had previously served as CEO of the Chicago Public Schools.
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Duncan was raised in Hyde Park, a Chicago neighborhood encompassing the University of Chicago. His father Starkey Duncan was a psychology professor at the university and his mother Susan Morton runs the Sue Duncan Children's Center, an after school program primarily serving African-American youth in the nearby Kenwood neighborhood. While growing up, Duncan spent much of his free time at his mother's center tutoring or playing with students there. Some of his childhood friends were John W. Rogers, Jr., CEO of Ariel Capital Management (now Ariel Investments) and founder of the Ariel Community Academy, Illinois State Senator Kwame Raoul, actor Michael Clarke Duncan, singer R. Kelly, IBM Fellow Kerrie Holley and martial artist Michelle Gordon.
Duncan attended the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, where he aspired to a future career coaching basketball or playing the sport professionally.[1] He then graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University with a bachelors degree in sociology in 1987. His senior thesis, for which he took a year's leave to do research in Kenwood, in inner-city Chicago, was entitled The values, aspirations and opportunities of the urban underclass. Though unpublished, it was later cited by other authors.[2][3][4]
At Harvard, Duncan was relegated to the junior varsity basketball squad his first year by coach Frank McLaughlin, but later became co-captain of the varsity team and named a first team Academic All-American.[1][5] As a freshman, Duncan narrowly lost to a Duke team that included future NBA player and Stanford coach Johnny Dawkins, as well as Tommy Amaker, who was himself later to become Harvard's basketball coach.[6][7] As a senior and co-captain, Duncan scored 20 points against the then nationally-ranked Duke team, while Duke's Danny Ferry, a future NBA star (and brother of Duncan's former Harvard teammate Bob Ferry) was held to a mere 15 points.[8]
From 1987 to 1991, Duncan played professional basketball in Melbourne, Australia with the Eastside Spectres of the National Basketball League,[9] and while there, worked with children who were wards of the state. In the U.S., he also played with the Rhode Island Gulls and tried out for the New Jersey Jammers.[10] While in Tasmania he met his future wife, Karen. A Time magazine article also mentions that he has played pickup games with Michael Jordan.[11] he's also vey creepy looking , if i do say so myself .
In 1992, Duncan became director of the Ariel Education Initiative, a program to enhance educational opportunities for children on Chicago's South Side that was started by John W. Rogers, Jr.. In 1996, along with Rogers, he was part of a network that funded and supported Ariel Community Academy.[12] In 1999, he became Deputy Chief of Staff for former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas.[13] Mayor Richard M. Daley appointed Duncan to serve as CEO of Chicago Public Schools on June 26, 2001.[14]
Duncan was a fellow in the Leadership Greater Chicago's class of 1995[15], and a member of the Aspen Institute's Henry Crown Fellowship Program, Class of 2002. In May 2003, he received an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Lake Forest College.
There had long been speculation on who President-Elect Barack Obama would choose to head the Department of Education. One of the possible candidates was California State Senator Gloria J. Romero, but this speculation closed when President-Elect Barack Obama chose one of his old friends from Chicago, Illinois Arne Duncan. On December 16, 2008, Prof Education, Duncan has repeatedly stressed that long-term economic prospects in the United States are closely tied to the quality of education its students receive. For example, Duncan told the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities that "the best thing we can do is educate our way to a better economy," and that the U.S. has an "economic imperative" to do a better job educating its people.[16] And, in a speech to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Education and Workforce Summit, Duncan said, "I believe that the quality of our education system says as much about the long-term health of our economy as the stock market, the unemployment rate and the size of the gross domestic product."[17]
Duncan is married to Karen Luann Duncan; they have a daughter and a son who both attend elementary school in Arlington, VA.[18]
| Political offices | ||
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| Preceded by Margaret Spellings |
United States Secretary of Education Served under: Barack Obama 2009 – present |
Incumbent |
| United States order of precedence | ||
| Preceded by Steven Chu Secretary of Energy |
United States order of precedence Secretary of Education |
Succeeded by Eric Shinseki Secretary of Veterans Affairs |
| United States presidential line of succession | ||
| Preceded by Steven Chu Secretary of Energy |
16th in line Secretary of Education |
Succeeded by Eric Shinseki Secretary of Veterans Affairs |
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   | Chicago Public Schools bio - CPS Staff Website: Internal Access Only |
| | Chicago Public Schools - CPS Staff Website: Internal Access Only |
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