Working parents are already lining up child care plans for the summer. While they’re at it, educators say all parents of school-age children should also plan for preventing the dreaded summer slide.

“The ‘summer slide’ is the information and skills children forget during summer break from the end of one school year to the beginning of the next school year,” says Carrie Scheiner, who created Exploracise (www.exploracise.com), to provide parents and educators with award-winning products and programs that combine learning, exercise and healthy lifestyle choices.

WASHINGTON, D.C.—The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau launched the next phase of its “Know Before You Owe” student loan project by releasing a beta version of the Financial Aid Comparison Shopper, an interactive, online tool designed to help families plan for the costs of post-secondary education.

“Student loan debt has crossed the $1 trillion mark and tuition continues to climb,” said CFPB Director Richard Cordray. “Now more than ever, students and their families need to know before they owe. Our Financial Aid Comparison Shopper helps students make apples to apples comparisons of their offers and pick the one that works best for their financial future.”

Cordray unveiled the tool at an event in South Dakota with Sen. Tim Johnson, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee.

From the White House

In his State of the Union Address, President Obama laid out a blueprint for an economy built to last—an economy built on American manufacturing, American energy, skills for American workers and a renewal of American values.

HAPPY GRAD—President Barack Obama with proud grandparents at his graduation.

The President has worked tirelessly to get the economy growing again, but he says there’s much more we can and must do, and that includes making smart investments in education that lead to better jobs and a stronger middle class. The strength of the American economy is inextricably linked to the strength of America’s education system: particularly at this make-or-break moment for the middle class we must continue to invest in creating an American workforce that has the skills for success in the global economy. At a time when the average earnings of college graduates is twice that of workers with only a high school diploma, higher education is the clearest pathway into the middle class.

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan released the Obama Administration’s blueprint for transforming Career and Technical Education, by  reauthorizing the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act of 2006.  Secretary Duncan discussed how the Administration’s plan will ensure the education system provides high-quality job-training opportunities that reduce skill shortages, spur business growth, encourage new investment and hires, and spark innovation and economic growth.