A week in the deep woods of Canada never fails to give me plenty of time for reflection and perspective, as well as a few chances to miss ruffed grouse. Returning to Rhode Island, where people everywhere are hurting and the end is not yet in sight, where a buffet of critical issues has gradually grown over the years to frightening proportions, it is easy to get discouraged.

And yet, like the optimist who said as he surveyed a room full of manure, “There’s gotta be a pony in there somewhere!” I see plenty of signs for optimism — particularly in the vital field of education, both nationally and especially in Rhode Island!

To reduce the problem to its most basic form, our quality of life depends on education and jobs, and I believe one leads inevitably to the other. Since the early 1970s, my passion has focused on education — both private and public. In 1992, when I turned over the reins of Microfibres Inc. to our son Jim, my wife Dotty and I established a charitable foundation primarily to focus on educational issues. Since that time, we have distributed funds to a wide variety of schools. Our hope has been that many of the innovations and best practices at these institutions would be adopted by the larger public primary and secondary school world.

Until two or three years ago, this has been a daunting and frustrating objective indeed! But a number of very positive events have occurred that are swinging an extended pendulum back again. Without any attempt to rank them, these include:

A new president and secretary of education committed to improvement, repeatedly emphasizing the creation of more charter schools as well as the financial incentives (the so-called “Race to the Top”) to encourage innovation and create incentives for reform.

A governor committed to improving public education, as well as a legislature willing to pass legislation enabling a mayoral academy, with key members also willing to lead an ongoing effort for positive changes to state education policy.

A dynamic Board of Regents for Elementary and Secondary Education, chaired by an outstanding leader, Robert Flanders, and aided by a very committed board member in Angus Davis. The regents have revamped charter school and alternative teacher-certification guidelines and approved a new basic education plan for the state that is already resulting in dramatic change.

A courageous new commissioner of education in Deborah Gist, who has already shown her determination to address glaring weaknesses in teacher contracts and in teacher preparation.

New superintendents in the chronically underperforming districts of Providence and Central Falls who are embracing new ideas and forging new partnerships in a manner that shows they are serious about raising student achievement.

Active efforts to bring into Rhode Island, beginning in 2010, a strong corps of Teach for America educators. These recent college graduates, young and talented teachers from Brown University, Providence College, the University of Rhode Island and outstanding colleges from around the country, have proven to be highly committed and effective in the classroom.

Now they will be able to invest in Rhode Island as teachers and future school leaders.

Standing alone, no one of these forces is sufficient to ensure that all of our youngsters, including inner-city minorities and rural and urban poor, receive the quality of education to which they are surely entitled. However, taken together and aided by a growing force of committed people and organizations, including especially The Rhode Island Foundation, good things are happening!

Without any question, this process would be helped by a cooperative effort with members of the two major teachers unions, the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers. We cannot possibly establish enough charter schools or mayoral academies to educate more than a significant minority of those who really need us, but I firmly believe these options must exist to set examples of what can and ultimately must be done. I am encouraged by examples such as New Haven, where a robust, high-performing charter-school sector appears to have aided the mayor and superintendent in passing a groundbreaking, reform-minded teacher contract with union support.

This is carpe diem time! I urge all Rhode Islanders to focus on the inseparable relationship between education and jobs and not let the other guy do it. Talk to your representatives in the legislature, to your school-committee members, to your friends in our generally stellar teacher corps. Glaringly absent is an equitable education-funding policy — Rhode Island is the only state without one. But even here, current intense efforts may soon produce a model. Good things are happening and momentum is building. In the 17 years our foundation has focused on educational challenges, I have never seen the stars in such favorable alignment. I can almost hear that pony whinny.

Norman E. McCulloch Jr. is a member of the board of Rhode Island Mayoral Academies (RIMA).