The metro Washington region has some of the best schools in the country located just a few miles away from consistently low-performing schools. This disparity must not be allowed to persist for the sake of continued economic competitiveness and the promotion of regional cohesion.

A great posting at Urbanophile discusses the importance of inclusive growth – one of the challenges RF aims to tackle – on creating regional cohesion. The author notes that many of the world’s global cities are becoming de facto separate cities – the “world city” and the “other city.” Preventing this from occurring in metro Washington requires in part a strong education system across the region to ensure opportunities for educational and professional advancement.

Writing about Chicago the author notes:

“Global cities…are cities within cities. The true global citizens in these cities have more to do with the global economy and hence with other global cities like Paris or Tokyo then they do with the rest of Chicago. A global city needs them because they are a terrific source of income and prestige and hence lashes out on the parks schools theaters and other amenities that bring them in. But these amenities exist to serve these global citizens not the rest of the city. This is why Chicago today has many excellent public schools including some good high schools: these global citizens have kids and they demand good schooling. Meanwhile schools in the rest of the city are nearly as bad as ever.”