Rahm Emanuel, a former Chicago mayor, member of Congress, U.S. ambassador, and White House aide, announced a proposal to reform higher education during a talk on May 26 at Dartmouth.
The former chief of staff to President Barack Obama also said the United States has "accepted failure as an option" in K-12 education while other nations race ahead.
Emanuel framed education as the central challenge facing the country while outlining his "grand bargain" for higher education. He said rising college debt has undermined higher education's traditional role as a pathway to opportunity during the one-hour discussion as part of the Law and Democracy series co-sponsored by the Rockefeller Center and Dartmouth Dialogues.
"Too many of our kids are graduating college with 30-plus-thousand dollars in debt, it's the average," he said. "Rather than a ticket to independence, it's a ticket to their parents' basement because they can't afford to live separately."
The conversation was moderated by Charles Wheelan, clinical professor of business administration and faculty director at the Center for Business, Government & Society at Tuck School of Business. Some 200 Dartmouth community members attended in person at Filene Auditorium while more than 450 have watched the livestream.
Emanuel's proposed higher-education plan would guarantee universities more certainty around federal policy while requiring institutions to provide greater affordability for U.S. students. He suggested allowing colleges to enroll up to 20% international students, compared to the 12-15% today, and who typically pay full tuition, he said. Money paid by international students could help subsidize domestic students, according to Emanuel's proposal.
Under the plan, families earning under $200,000 annually would receive free tuition, while colleges would also offer students who earn substantial college credit in high school the option of completing a bachelor's degree in three years instead of four.
(Dartmouth tuition is free for students from families making $175,000 or less, and for families making up to $125,000, room and board is also free.)
Emanuel, who also served in the U.S. House and as ambassador to Japan during the Biden administration, detailed reforms he made in education as mayor of Chicago from 2011 to 2019. Regarding K-12, he repeatedly noted only around 50% of students across the country read at grade level.
"I firmly believe that a child starts dropping out of college in third grade," he said, emphasizing the importance of reading proficiency and early childhood education.
Rahm Emanuel, who also previously served as a member of Congress, White House chief of staff, and U.S. ambassador to Japan, addresses a capacity crowd in Filene Auditorium on May 26. (Photo By Kata Sasvari)
He pointed to Mississippi's dramatic improvement in reading scores as evidence that reform is possible. Emanuel said the state has risen from near the bottom nationally to among the country's leaders by embracing phonics-based reading instruction.
"We have become, as a country that was built on the ethos that failure is not an option, we have accepted failure as an option," he said. "We have accepted it as a norm. Fifty percent of our kids today are not reading at grade level. Kids are graduating high school with about 18% absentee rating."
As mayor, he pushed for reforms that lengthened the school day and school year, expanded universal pre-kindergarten, and created free community college opportunities for students maintaining a B average in high school.
Emanuel, who is considering a run for president in 2028, also delivered sharp criticism of the Democratic Party's handling of education issues during the COVID-19 pandemic, saying Democrats "lost the plot" by keeping schools closed too long despite evidence children faced lower health risks than adults.
"We were the party of science, and we refused to follow it," he said. "We kept schools closed for two years because it was politically convenient."
The conversation later shifted to foreign policy and economic competition with China, where Emanuel argued the United States' greatest threat comes not from Beijing itself, but from domestic complacency.
"I'm not scared of China," Emanuel said. "I'm scared of this country not doing what's in the interest of this country."
He warned that cuts to scientific research funding, declining educational outcomes, and political dysfunction are undermining America's long-term competitiveness.
"China's only winning because we've defaulted," Emanuel said. "We are sleepwalking into the future."
He closed by encouraging Dartmouth students to pursue public service, urging them to dedicate at least a year of their lives to community work or national service, especially outside of Washington.
"You are one of the lucky few," he told students. "You owe this country something."
Rahm Emanuel chats with Isla Walker '29 after his talk. Walker introduced Emanuel at the event, co-sponsored by the Rockefeller Center and Dartmouth Dialogues. (Photo By Kata Sasvari)
Isla Walker '29, a first-generation student from Tulsa, Oklahoma, who introduced Emanuel, said afterwards that she was pleased by the discussion.
"I was really impressed. It's very interesting to see a candidate so focused on education," Walker said. "I feel like I don't hear that enough, and coming from Oklahoma, which is usually 50th or 49th in education, it's really nice to see someone prioritize that."
The program was co-sponsored by the Center for Business, Government and Society at the Tuck School of Business, the Office of the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, and the Associate Dean for the Social Sciences.
The next speaker in the Law and Democracy series is Harvard psychology professor Daniel Gilbert, who will speak May 28 on the science of happiness.