A VERY flattering – deservedly so! – profile of Arne Duncan in the NYT:

Education secretaries usually keep a low profile, in keeping with their agency's backseat status to states and local districts,

But there was Secretary of Education Arne Duncan one recent day, racing through Washington traffic in a black Chevrolet Suburban, sirens wailing to clear traffic on his 13-block trip to the National Public Radio studios for an hourlong call-in show that he crammed into his hectic schedule.

Mr. Duncan is a man in a hurry. He has far more money to dole out than any previous secretary of education, and he is using it in ways that extend the federal government's reach into virtually every area of education, from pre-kindergarten to college.

"This is the most assertive secretary of education we've ever had," said Carl Kaestle, an education historian at Brown University who has studied the federal role in 20th-century American schooling.

…Mr. Duncan says he encounters no public opposition.

"Zero," he said. "And as hard as we're pushing everybody else to change, we're pushing the department to change even more. There's just an outpouring of support for the common-sense changes and the unprecedented investments we're making."

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Education Chief Vies to Expand U.S. Role as Partner on Local Schools

By SAM DILLON and TAMAR LEWIN

Published: May 3, 2010

www.nytimes.com/2010/05/04/education/04educate.html