U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is in the Bay Area today and Wednesday to advocate for various reforms being sought by the Obama administration.

Duncan will stop by a preschool in San Francisco today to learn about the city’s Preschool for All initiative.

The visit will take place at 2 p.m. at the Cross Cultural Family Center on Turk Street, where Duncan will tour the school and visit with students.

President Obama is pushing for a similar plan to San Francisco’s on the federal level to provide nationwide access to preschool for 4-year-olds in low- and moderate-income families.

Duncan is also giving the keynote address this afternoon at the American Educational Research Association’s annual meeting at the Hilton San Francisco Union Square hotel.

The speech is titled “Choosing the Right Battles: Remarks and a Conversation.”

Duncan’s Bay Area tour will continue on Wednesday with three events, starting in the South Bay with a 9 a.m. town hall meeting at Fremont High School in Sunnyvale, where he will be joined by Congressman Mike Honda.

The secretary will then make a speech at the annual summit of the NewSchools Venture Fund at noon at the San Francisco Airport Marriott Waterfront in Burlingame, and will end his trip with an afternoon visit to the nonprofit 826 Valencia in San Francisco.

Dan McMenamin, Bay City News

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