IRVING, TEXAS–Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were in Dallas on Monday for the inaugural Globalization of Higher Education Conference. 

Bush and Clinton spoke separately at the private event co-organized by Bush.  According to the Associated Press (AP), the event offered a bipartisan twist for the nation’s two dominant political families.  Both spoke on education policy and the need to make higher education affordable and accessible across the globe. Both also were reported as chatting briefly off stage.

According to AP, Bush said in his speech, “Higher education in America has a growing affordability problem while billions in the developing world struggle with accessibility.  Exporting U.S. post-secondary education and global consumers at scale can help really resolve both issues simultaneously.”  He also said, “Expanding access through technology can bring down the cost of delivery at home and abroad.”

AP also reported that Clinton said, “When people around the world have access to this kind of American model of education it illustrates … that we believe in spreading opportunity to more people, in more places, so that they too have the chance to live up to their own God-given potential.”  She added, “she’s worried that we’re closing the doors to higher education in our own country so this great model that we’ve had that has meant so much to so many is becoming further and further away from too many.”

The AP reported that Clinton thanked Bush at start of her speech, citing his focus on education and his “passion and dedication to the issue in the private sector.”

Both Bush and Clinton’s names have come up as potential GOP and DNC 2016 presidential candidates and both are controversial figures in elementary and secondary (K-12) American education. Bush is a staunch supporter of the Common Core State Standards for which he has received harsh criticism from the public on all sides of the political spectrum. On Wednesday, March 19, he spoke at an education forum in Nashville, TN with U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander in which Bush “urged politicians to make their case to their constituents in favor of Common Core education standards,” the AP reported. 

Meanwhile, Mrs. Clinton has contributed her fair share to federally led education. Breitbart News reported on the infamous 1992 “Dear Hillary” letter penned by National Center on Education and the Economy (NCEE) president Marc Tucker to then-First Lady Clinton, a letter that may well be the blueprint for the Common Core.

The two-day conference is presented by Academic Partnerships, Queens’ College, and the University of Cambridge. A few of the other speakers include U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, UNESCO former Chief of High education Stamenka Uvalić-Trumbić, former World Bank President Robert Zoellick, and event co-host Jim Hunt, former North Carolina governor.

Follow Merrill Hope on Twitter @OutOfTheBoxMom