I am not a patient person. My friends and colleagues will confirm this. But, frankly, we should all feel a little more impatient with the state of public education in America today.

Several years ago I started looking at K-12 public education. I decided that there is no more important contribution to our nation's future than a determined, long-term commitment to improve public education. Let me tell you how I came to that conclusion.

With the advent of free trade I saw our nation moving from a manufacturing economy to an information economy. Middle class manufacturing jobs have left or are leaving America. As often as not, the shoes we wear and the cars we drive are made outside of the United States.This is not going to change.

As a result, our country now has two types of workers — "service workers" and "knowledge workers." Service workers typically earn from $6 to $15 per hour. They frequently face unemployment during down cycles in the economy. Knowledge workers command significantly higher incomes and longer-term, more fulfilling professional opportunities.

Make no mistake. Public education is the key civil rights issue of the 21st century. Our nation's knowledge-based economy demands that we provide young people from all backgrounds and circumstances with the education and skills necessary to become knowledge workers. If we don't, we run the risk of creating an even larger gap between the middle class and the poor. This gap threatens our democracy, our society and the economic future of America. We must do everything we can to ensure that all of our children receive an education that allows them to become the next generation of knowledge workers.

To those of us not satisfied with the quality of K-12 education, there are three schools of thought.

The first group believes in vouchers. People who advocate vouchers believe that market forces will cure all ills. I oppose the large-scale use of publicly funded vouchers.

The second group believes in competition. Charter schools, private schools, Edison schools, parochial schools and opportunity scholarships all provide healthy competition to our K-12 public school system. I support rapidly increasing the number of seats available outside of our public school system. Healthy competition has raised the quality of higher education in the United States, which is viewed as having the best higher education system in the world. No one can say that higher education is a tired government monopoly.

Although I support many forms of public school competition, I believe these programs simply cannot grow at the pace and scale necessary to meet the needs of children in the 21st century. Over the next decade, four out of five children in America will continue to be educated in public schools.

Therefore, where I come out is in line with the third school of thought – that we must focus our attention and resources on reforming and reinvigorating the public school system itself.

There are no silver bullets or easy answers in public education reform. Public schooling is a long established institution that is often reluctant to take risks that will bring about real change. That's where The Broad Foundation comes in. We're willing to take the much-needed risks, support new ideas and showcase success wherever we find it in order to stimulate change.

The Broad Foundation's mission is to dramatically improve K-12 urban public education through better governance, management and labor relations. These are essential, often overlooked, elements in American education that will lead to higher academic achievement for all students and to greater economic opportunities for the next generation.

I believe that a strong and competent governing body combined with a talented CEO and senior management team can make a profound difference in turning our school systems from lackluster bureaucracies into high-performing public enterprises. I also believe that teacher unions need to become a greater part of the solution.

Our Foundation welcomes the opportunity to work with you to help our public schools succeed.

As for our collective impatience, it can be an effective catalyst in achieving tangible milestones today on the road to achieving important, long-term objectives. I ask you to overlook mine and indulge your own. Join me in this commitment. Our future, and the future of our children, depend on it.