b'A Recommendation to the New President:Lets Make Children a National PriorityBy Dave Ross and Daniel SteinPresident-elect Joe Biden will have a lot to tackle when he takes office, with last weeks horrific turmoil on Capitol Hill only the latest of many complex challenges presented by the coronavirus pandemic and the countrys political strife.There is one action he can take, however, thats relatively uncomplicated and would go a long way to jump-starting fulfillment of his campaign promise to Build Back Better. It is this: Issue an executive order to begin coordination of the numerous, discon-nected programs and systems that aim to improve the health, safety and well-being of our nations most-vulnerable children.Even at this deeply discordant time in our history, we believe that is a goal nearly all Americans could support. It would be the moonshot of our generation, with positive impact that would last far into the future. While there would certainly be costs to fully implement it, the launch would be relatively inexpensive and the return on investment would be enormous.Today, government systems that provide healthcare, social services, education, housing and other programs that assist children and families operate mostly independent of each other. That means parents struggle to get the help they needor even to figure out where to look for helpwhile service providers lack the ability to get a full picture of what needs have to be addressed.The solution is to connect programs and systems with the same methodology that has sparked innovation and yielded positive results in other sectors, including technology, banking and manufacturing. It is called interoperability and, quite simply, it means enabling the routine exchange of information across the various silos in which data are currently held. We strongly urge the new administration to use an executive order to jump-start a national interoperability initiative that would initiate the seamless, secure and confidential exchange of information as a hallmark of Building Back Better.The Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA) envisioned just this kind of approach to stimulateintegration and coordination across the myriad agencies and organizations that serve children and families; indeed, some interoperability efforts were made during the Trump administration. Despite a broad consensus that this approach works, however, it hasnt been widely implemented for a variety of reasons, many of them cultural and political.An executive orderperhaps even including creation of a Childrens Advocate in the White Housecould mandate actions for states and localities that most already believe are worth taking. Furthermore, provisions of the ACA specify that the federal gov-ernment can pay up to 90% of a states costs of implementing interoperability, which would enable structural changes to per-manently connect the relevant systems. The political lens through which some states have viewed the ACA has impeded wider use of those provisions, but the nature of a presidential mandate could be just the right catalyst for fueling genuine, sustainable progress.It isnt just children who would benefit. By its very nature, an interoperability initiative would lead to systemic changes that would contribute broadly to more-efficient and effective programs and services for people of all ages and all socioeconomic groups.But children are the right initial focus. Helping them should be a cause that all sides of the political divide can agree upon and, quite simply, its the right thing to do. The prescription were suggesting is not controversial. Interoperability has been enthusiastically embraced by the private sec-tor and governments at all levels, irrespective of their leaders political leanings. It entails bringing a proven methodology to scale, beginning with leadership from the top, so we can get moving ASAP on making substantive change. Taking this action would improve the lives of the tens of millions of children who dont get enough to eat, dont have a decent place to sleep, dont receive equal educational opportunities and, more generally, dont have routine, equal access to the building blocks of health, well-being and life prospects.Every politician says it: Children are our future. In its first 100 days, the new administration has the opportunity to demonstrate that they are also our priority.Dave Ross is President and CEO of The Task Force for Global Health. Daniel Stein is President of the Stewards of Change Institute3'