Fewer than one in five American students follow a clear and uninterrupted path from high school through college to career. The promise of a public education is to prepare all learners to engage in, contribute to, and achieve purpose in the world, both as it is today and as it will be tomorrow. And yet, the American education system as we know it is insufficient to realize this commitment. Today, complex and compounding forces compel something more than incremental change in public education. Skyrocketing racial and economic inequality perpetuate generational poverty, predominantly for Black, Latinx, Indigenous people, demanding that education do more to create social and economic mobility. This report issues a call to action for states to enact a Learner Promise: a commitment that every learner will have access and support to pursue a certified pathway with system-wide opportunities that guarantee entry into a meaningful, chosen career that will build social and economic capital over the course of their lives. Operating under this promise, states would enact systems of governance, policy, and infrastructure to certify that learners who demonstrate competencies in K-12, postsecondary, workforce, and community settings along a supported pathway will have access to continuing education and a purposeful, living wage career.