As chief of staff to U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, Joanne Weiss serves as senior advisor to the secretary, and was director of the Race to the Top (RTT) Fund during its early days of design and implementation. The walls of her office are covered with beautifully framed children's artwork. The view from her seventh-floor window covers an expanse of neighboring federal buildings and a sliver of the Washington Monument. Next to her door hangs a t-shirt with the words "Disrupt Ed" printed boldly across the front.