Best Selling Author of 'Schools Cannot Do It Alone' To Headline Annual Education Summit, 6/11

CAMP HILL, Pa., May 8, 2014 /PRNewswire/ Jamie Vollmer, who went from corporate president to articulate champion of public schools, will be a keynote speaker onWednesday, June 11, at the second annual Pennsylvania Education Summit sponsored by the new Pennsylvania Business Education Partnership at the Radisson Penn Harris Hotel here.

Vollmer, the one-time president of the Great Midwestern Ice Cream Company and a lawyer by training, started out as a harsh critic of public schools. After 20 years of working with educators, parents and community leaders to remove obstacles to student success, Vollmer now describes himself as a public school advocate. Vollmer is the author of "Schools Cannot Do It Alone," in which he outlines a "no cost plan for every school district to secure the support it needs to unfold the potential of every child."

In the book, the author presents Vollmer's First Rule of School Restructuring, which is: "You cannot change a school without changing the culture of the surrounding town."

Last year, more than 200 educators, business leaders, public officials and parents attended the first summit at the Hilton Hotel in Harrisburg, participating in workshops, panel discussions and seminars focusing on the major issues facing basic education in Pennsylvania.

"I can think of no better person to serve as a keynoter at this year's session the Jamie Vollmer," said David W. Patti, CEO and president of the Pennsylvania Business Council and the convener of the Business Education Partnership. "Vollmer represents that mix of pragmatism and idealism that public education needs today because, as he says in his book, public education is under attack from all sides at a time when it needs cooperation and encouragement to move forward."

"Bashing public schools has become a blood sport," Vollmer writes in describing his book. "We are witnessing a campaign to annihilate the emotional and intellectual ties that bind the American people to their public schools."

Other speakers at the education summit include Dr. Carolyn Dumaresq, acting Pennsylvania Secretary of Education, and representatives of students, teachers, school boards, community colleges and the Pennsylvania state system of higher education.

The Pennsylvania Business Education Partnership Summit will be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Wednesday, June 11, 2014, at the Radisson Penn Harris Hotel and Conference Center in Camp Hill. For more information about the summit and a complete list of speakers and seminars, go to http://www.eventbrite.com/e/pennsylvania-education-summit-tickets-11529363637. Scholarships are available for student participants.

The Pennsylvania Business Education Partnership is a coalition of more than 30 groups and advocacy organizations supporting measures to improve the quality and rigor of education in the state.

SOURCE Pennsylvania Business Education Partnership