It’s not a schoolhouse rock segment (the song would be pretty lame), nor even a Civics class topic—it’s the question that NewSchools CEO Ted Mitchell will be addressing at tomorrow’s hearing of the US House Committee on Education and the Workforce on Thursday. Ted will be among one of four witnesses testifying about the crucial things that only the federal government can do in driving reform in the education for low-income children. He will testify to the importance of an appropriate, smart federal role in fostering badly needed innovation in education, and to the power of the federal government to drive attention to the achievement of traditionally underserved student populations, as well as the power of voluntary common-core standards to help high-impact reforms spread across state lines. The hearing title says nothing about the possibility of renewal of the nation’s most important education law, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), but some think the hearing may be a warm-up for movement on ESEA.

Watch the hearing at the House Committee on Education and the Workforce website.