Is improving schools for America’s poor a priority for Clinton?

What the op-ed didn’t mention was much of a plan to improve the country’s K-12 schools, which currently pass along economic disadvantages from one generation to the next. A wide gap still separates students living in poverty from their middle- and upper-class peers.

Clinton did briefly mention how she would help students before they enter K-12 schools. “We will work to double investments in Early Head Start and make preschool available to every 4-year-old because our children deserve the best possible start in life,” Clinton wrote.

But a 2012 study from President Obama’s Department of Health and Human Services, which administers Head Start, showed that any advantages students gained from Head Start were essentially erased by the end of third grade. Head Start is no cure-all for the educational gap between poor and wealthy students.

Clinton has commented on K-12 education throughout the campaign, saying she wants to increase spending on school construction and renovations, spend more on computer science programs and reduce the role of standardized testing in education policy.

But a presidential administration can only do so much. There’s only so much time and effort an administration can dedicate toward various efforts, whether through Congress or the executive branch.

It’s revealing that Clinton didn’t list those efforts as a priority in her plan to help the country’s poor. Perhaps she views education as a mostly state and local issue and would take a much more hands-off approach than President Obama has, but that’s probably wishful thinking.

Clinton opened her op-ed with overtures about helping children, like “The true measure of any society is how we take care of our children” and “advocating for children and families has been the cause of my life.” But without setting improvement of K-12 school as a high priority, this is just rhetoric.

Jason Russell is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.