Meet the American Scot who now heads the US school system

Published on Thursday 22 January 2009 21:09

MORE than 150 years ago labourer William Morton and his new bride, Mary, from Kirkcudbright, boarded the vessel Corra Linn for a new life in a young nation.

On 16 August, 1853, filled with dreams for a bright future, they began the transatlantic passage to New York.

This week their great-great-grandson, Arne Duncan, took the family hopes of success beyond their wildest imagination when he was confirmed as the new US secretary of state for education, appointed by his close friend and fellow Chicagoan Barack Obama.

Mr Duncan maintains strong connections to Scotland and last November, as then chief of the Chicago public schools, he received a "distinguished citizen award" from the St Andrew Society of Illinois, of which his father was a lifelong member.

He paid tribute to educational improvements in the Scottish Enlightenment that produced "some of the highest literacy rates in the world".

Clearly playing to his audience, he joked that he was terrible at golf and not much used to drinking whisky, and talked of trying to "lure a few Scottish scholars over to Chicago to teach for a while" and soak up the local culture.

But he added: "I will make a point of learning more about the Scottish culture."

As well as his Scottish ties through the Mortons, Mr Duncan's very Scottish surname reaches back to early 19th-century Tennessee, one internet genealogy site showed yesterday. Both his parents were educators – his father a professor at the prestigious University of Chicago.

Mr Duncan, 44, is known as a close personal friend of Mr Obama, a fellow Harvard graduate who regularly plays "pick-up" basketball with him. The morning after Mr Obama won November's election, he relaxed on the basketball court with his friend, who now faces one of the toughest jobs in the US government.

Mr Obama, some genealogists claim, has his own Scottish roots through his mother, going back to William the Lion, who ruled Scotland from 1165 to 1214.

But Mr Duncan's ties are more tangible – and may play to proud claims that Scots helped shape the US educational system and philosophy. The school system he ran until recently was the largest in the country.

Scots heritage has been important in Illinois. The Illinois St Andrew Society is the largest Scottish organisation in North America and has supported a nursing home, the Scottish Home, for a century. Every year members lay a wreath of red roses and read poems at the statue of Robert Burns in the city's Garfield Park.

Kenny MacAskill, the SNP justice secretary, who has written widely on the Scottish Diaspora, has a society tie. "The Scottish community has been deeply influential in Chicago," he said.

Gus Noble, St Andrew Society president, invited Mr Duncan to the dinner last year.

"He's of Scots descent and gave a very good speech on Scotland's belief in the value of education and how his Scottish identity had helped his career," he said.

"It is my intention to play up Mr Duncan's Scottish heritage and his roots in Chicago. If he was available to join us for a Burns supper I would love to tell him about Robert Burns."

In the speech Mr Duncan said:

"During the Scottish Enlightenment, Scotland had one of the highest rates of literacy in the world. Someday I would like to be able to say the same about the Chicago public schools."