English: John Richard Kasich (/ˈkeɪsɨk/; born May 13, 1952) is an American politician and the 69th and current Governor of Ohio, elected to the office in 2010 and reelected in the 2014 election. On July 21, 2015, he announced his candidacy for the Republican nomination for president in 2016 at an event in Columbus, Ohio.

Kasich served nine terms as a member of the United States House of Representatives, representing Ohio's 12th congressional district from 1983 to 2001. His tenure in the House included six years as chairman of the House Budget Committee, and he was a key figure in passage of both welfare reform and the Balanced Budget Act of 1997.

He was a commentator on Fox News Channel, hosting Heartland with John Kasich from 2001 to 2007. He also worked as an investment banker, as managing director of Lehman Brothers' Columbus, Ohio office.

In the 2010 Ohio gubernatorial election, Kasich defeated Democratic incumbent Ted Strickland, 49% to 47% in one of Ohio's closest gubernatorial elections. He was re-elected in a landslide in 2014, defeating Democrat Ed FitzGerald, the County Executive of Cuyahoga County, 64% to 33% and winning all but two counties, Athens and Monroe.

Every four years, as America’s campaign cycle rumbles back to life, two of the country’s smaller states again return to the national spotlight.

Taking advantage of this political stage, The Seventy Four aims to bring the urgent conversation of America’s K-12 education system to both Iowa and New Hampshire in the coming months.

As first reported in The New York Times, The Seventy Four, a non-partisan, non-profit news website about education, announced it will be hosting and organizing two 2015 Education Summits beginning in August. Sponsored by the American Federation for Children, the nation’s leading school-choice advocacy organization, and organized in partnership with The Des Moines Register, the first-of-its-kind summits will gather prominent elected officials, political influencers, and education thought leaders to discuss the challenges now facing America’s education system.

“Last year, 1.3 million children dropped out of school, and U.S. students have flatlined on national and international tests,” said Betsy DeVos, chairman of the American Federation for Children. “It’s time to have a national conversation and no better time than as we look to 2016.” (The Seventy Four receives support from the Dick & Betsy DeVos Family Foundation.)

The first of the 2015 Education Summits will be held in New Hampshire on Aug. 19 and will be moderated by The Seventy Four co-founder and Editor-in-Chief Campbell Brown and others. Confirmed speakers (thus far) include Governor Jeb Bush, Governor Chris Christie, former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, Governor Bobby Jindal, Governor John Kasich and Governor Scott Walker. (Check out The Seventy Four's detailed education profiles of the six GOP leaders participating Wednesday) Additional New Hampshire speakers will be confirmed in the coming weeks. Watch The74Million.org and EdSummits2015.org for new announcements, and check back for video and updates from both summits.

“These summits are an unprecedented opportunity to have an honest and intelligent discussion with our leaders about the failures of the education system”

The second summit, to be held in Iowa in October, will be co-hosted by The Seventy Four and The Des Moines Register, Iowa’s most influential news outlet.

The 2015 Iowa Summit will spotlight Democrats from both Iowa and across the nation — elected officials, analysts and thought leaders with clear thoughts on how to solve America’s education challenges.

All speakers at both the 2015 New Hampshire Summit and 2015 Iowa Summit are invited in their current personal or professional capacities and will appear on stage separately for an important conversation about America’s education challenges and opportunities. When it comes to most political debates, K-12 education issues tend to get overshadowed by a landslide of other domestic policy issues. The 2015 Education Summits will keep the conversation focused on America’s most urgent policy issue, affording featured speakers time to provide in-depth perspectives outside the formal parameters of the presidential debates.

“As the political world descends on New Hampshire and Iowa, these summits are an unprecedented opportunity to have an honest and intelligent discussion with our leaders about the failures of the education system,” Brown said. “We must begin to treat fixing our education system with the urgency the crisis demands, as it is vital not only to our children’s future, but also the future of this nation