Education official to speak at chamber luncheon

Staff report

Boardman

Robert Sommers, director of the Ohio Governor’s Office of 21st-Century Education, will be the guest speaker at a Regional Chamber/Government Affairs Council luncheon from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Oct. 20 at Mr. Anthony’s.

Sommers, who assumed the new Cabinet-level position in February, will speak on “Education that Gets Results: Giving Taxpayers Their Money’s Worth.”

Among reforms Sommers is advocating are:

Putting superior teachers in every classroom and excellent principals in every school.

Supporting innovative, successful schools and closing failing schools.

Investing in students, not bureaucracies, including an emphasis on shared administrative services.

Expanding school choice.

Providing a superior marketplace for technology- based educational innovations.

Making college more affordable.

Sommers has 30 years’ experience in the education field as a teacher, board member and school leader. He served as president and CEO of Cogniac Consultants, which works in the education-management industry, from 2008 to 2011, and was CEO of Cornerstone Charter Schools, a Detroit-based charter-management company, from 2010 to 2011.

He also was CEO of Butler Tech, a career-technical school, from 2001 to 2010 and was associate director of the Ohio Department of Education from 1986 to July 2001, responsible for ODE’s Office of Planning, Adult and Administrative Services.

The luncheon, sponsored by National College, is open to the public. Cost is $20.

RSVP to jennifer@regionalchamber.com, or call 330-744-2131, ext. 12.