Pepper an advocate for education

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Pepper and Advocate for Education

By David Holthaus • dholthaus@enquirer.com • March 22, 2010

A 1986 speech by Roger Semerad, a Reagan-era appointee, set John Pepper off on a 25-year second career pushing for improvements in education.

Semerad, assistant secretary of labor under President Ronald Reagan, got Pepper's attention at a National Alliance for Business dinner in Washington, D.C. "He stood up and said, 'If we don't get our act together in educating all our kids, including the disadvantaged kids, we're going to be in a mess in this country,' " Pepper recalls.

His interest piqued, Pepper asked him a question afterward that senior managers at P&G also often heard: "What do we do about it?"

What Pepper did was return home to Cincinnati, and organized Ken Blackwell, then Cincinnati's vice mayor, and Lee Etta Powell, then superintendent of Cincinnati Public Schools, to form the Cincinnati Youth Collaborative.

The collaborative now provides mentoring to Cincinnati Public Schools students, and helps ready them for college and employment, supported by more than 2,000 volunteers and 100-plus businesses.

Education, Pepper says, "has been the main focus of my efforts outside of P&G and my family since 1986."

On Thursday, Pepper will take stock of his quarter-century in education, what's worked and what hasn't, in a keynote address at the annual meeting of the University of Cincinnati's Economics Center for Education & Research. He's talked to state, local and national experts in education and business to prepare for the address and offered The Enquirer a sneak preview.

Pepper sees success, such as the increased graduation rate at Cincinnati Public Schools, now 82 percent.

New programs to improve young children's readiness for kindergarten, particularly Success by Six and Every Child Succeeds, initiatives focused on getting preschoolers ready for school, is another example.

And creation of Community Learning Centers, now in 22 Cincinnati schools, where community resources, such as infant child care and tutoring are coordinated and provided to students, is a good example of community involvement in the schools.

But there are major challenges. The 15 percent national high school dropout rate is way too high, he says, with minorities making up more than half of all dropouts.

Arching overall is the need to raise the importance and urgency of education among parents, the public and policy makers.

"We have said to ourselves that the education of our youth is the most important thing we're doing," Pepper says.

"Why don't we do more?" he asks. He recommends:

Improving the development of teachers and principals. "It's all about leadership," he says. "Great principals working with inspired teachers. Any great organization lives and dies with the recruitment and retention of great people."

Enhancing opportunities for preschoolers and using technology to help. "There's opportunity to bring more interactivity into the homes." He cites research that shows the more words very young children are exposed to, the brighter they will become.

Boosting community involvement in the schools. He cites efforts such as the Community Learning Centers and Strive, the community education partnership that includes schools, universities and not-for-profits in Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky.

"Schools have been asked to do more and more," he says. "They've been asked to solve every ill that's out there. They can't do it alone."