Barack Obama: October 2011 Archives

President Barack Obama meets with some of his smaller constituents during a tour of the Lab School for early childhood education at Eastfield College in Mesquite, Texas on October 4, 2011.

President Obama announced Wednesday that he will appoint pop star Shakira to the President's Advisory Council on Educational Excellence for Hispanics.

Shakira has been an education advocate since 1995, when she founded the Barefoot Foundation to operate schools and education projects in Columbia, South Africa and Haiti.

In 2010, Shakira and her Barefoot Foundation formed an alliance with the World Bank to create educational programs for children across Latin America. She also served as the 2008 Honorary Chair of the Global Campaign for Education's Global Action Week and a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in 2003.

Shakira is a founding member of  Latin America in Solidarity Action, a coalition of artists and business leaders seeking to promote integrated early childhood public policies.