[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]





                         AMERICA'S REPORT CARD:
                   OVERSIGHT OF K-12 PUBLIC EDUCATION

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               before the

                      SUBCOMMITTEE ON HEALTH CARE
                         AND FINANCIAL SERVICES

                                 of the

                         COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT
                           AND ACCOUNTABILITY

                     U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________


                            JANUARY 30, 2024

                               __________


                           Serial No. 118-87

                               __________


  Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Accountability





                 [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]




                       Available on: govinfo.gov
                         oversight.house.gov or
                             docs.house.gov

                               ______
                                 

                 U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE

54-768 PDF                WASHINGTON : 2024












               COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND ACCOUNTABILITY

                    JAMES COMER, Kentucky, Chairman

Jim Jordan, Ohio                     Jamie Raskin, Maryland, Ranking 
Mike Turner, Ohio                        Minority Member
Paul Gosar, Arizona                  Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of 
Virginia Foxx, North Carolina            Columbia
Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin            Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts
Michael Cloud, Texas                 Gerald E. Connolly, Virginia
Gary Palmer, Alabama                 Raja Krishnamoorthi, Illinois
Clay Higgins, Louisiana              Ro Khanna, California
Pete Sessions, Texas                 Kweisi Mfume, Maryland
Andy Biggs, Arizona                  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York
Nancy Mace, South Carolina           Katie Porter, California
Jake LaTurner, Kansas                Cori Bush, Missouri
Pat Fallon, Texas                    Jimmy Gomez, California
Byron Donalds, Florida               Shontel Brown, Ohio
Scott Perry, Pennsylvania            Melanie Stansbury, New Mexico
William Timmons, South Carolina      Robert Garcia, California
Tim Burchett, Tennessee              Maxwell Frost, Florida
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia      Summer Lee, Pennsylvania
Lisa McClain, Michigan               Greg Casar, Texas
Lauren Boebert, Colorado             Jasmine Crockett, Texas
Russell Fry, South Carolina          Dan Goldman, New York
Anna Paulina Luna, Florida           Jared Moskowitz, Florida
Nick Langworthy, New York            Rashida Tlaib, Michigan
Eric Burlison, Missouri
Mike Waltz, Florida

                                 ------                                
                       Mark Marin, Staff Director
       Jessica Donlon, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel
                 Reagan Dye, Professional Staff Member
                Sarah Feeney, Professional Staff Member
      Mallory Cogar, Deputy Director of Operations and Chief Clerk

                      Contact Number: 202-225-5074

                  Julie Tagen, Minority Staff Director

                      Contact Number: 202-225-5051

                                 ------                                

           Subcommittee on Health Care and Financial Services

                   Lisa McClain, Michigan, Chairwoman

Paul Gosar, Arizona                  Katie Porter, California Ranking 
Virginia Foxx, North Carolina            Minority Member
Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin            Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York
Russell Fry, South Carolina          Jimmy Gomez, California
Anna Paulina Luna, Florida           Greg Casar, Texas
Nick Langworthy, New York            Summer Lee, Pennsylvania
Eric Burlison, Missouri              Jasmine Crockett, Texas
Vacancy                              Vacancy








                         C  O  N  T  E  N  T  S

                              ----------                              

                                                                   Page

Hearing held on January 30, 2024.................................     1

                               Witnesses

                              ----------                              

Ms. Virginia Gentles, Director, Education Freedom Center, 
  Independent Women's Forum
Oral Statement...................................................     5
Dr. Nat Malkus, Ph.D., Senior Fellow and Deputy Director, 
  Education Policy Studies, American Enterprise Institute
Oral Statement...................................................     7
Ms. Denise Forte (Minority Witness), President and CEO, The 
  Education Trust
Oral Statement...................................................     8

Written opening statements and statements for the witnesses are 
  available on the U.S. House of Representatives Document 
  Repository at: docs.house.gov.


                           Index of Documents

                              ----------                              

  * Article, NPR, ``The Education Culture War Is Waging''; 
  submitted by Rep. Lee.

  * Research Report, RAND, ``Walking a Fine Line''; submitted by 
  Rep. Norton.

  * Statement for the Record, by the National Education 
  Association; submitted by Rep. Norton.

  * NSCAF School Choice Parent Survey; submitted by Rep. Waltz.

  * Questions for the Record: to Ms. Gentles; submitted by Rep. 
  McClain.

  * Questions for the Record: to Dr. Malkus; submitted by Rep. 
  McClain.

Documents are available at: docs.house.gov.








 
                         AMERICA'S REPORT CARD:
                   OVERSIGHT OF K-12 PUBLIC EDUCATION

                              ----------                              


                       Tuesday, January 30, 2024

                     U.S. House of Representatives

               Committee on Oversight and Accountability

           Subcommittee on Health Care And Financial Services

                                                   Washington, D.C.

    The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:23 p.m., in 
room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Lisa C. McClain 
[Chairwoman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives McClain, Foxx, Grothman, Burlison, 
Porter, Ocasio-Cortez, Lee, Crockett, and Norton.
    Also present: Representative Moskowitz.
    Mrs. McClain. The hearing of the Subcommittee on Healthcare 
and Financial Services will come to order. Welcome, everyone.
    Without objection, the Chair may declare a recess at any 
time. I recognize myself for the purpose of making an opening 
statement.
    Don't I have to do the witness stuff first?
    OK, I will make an opening statement first.
    In all sincerity, thank you for coming. This is an 
extremely important bipartisan, I think, topic. We are here to 
talk today about K through 12 public education and it is often 
failing our American children. Educating American children 
should absolutely be a priority. The return on that investment 
is unmeasurable, really.
    During the pandemic, children's education was put on the 
back burner. Teachers were put on the back burner. And the left 
chose to keep schools shuttered and put policies over students, 
right? We have got to get back to both sides caring about the 
student.
    The problem since the pandemic is it has only gotten worse. 
Just as the left has made work optional since the pandemic, 
showing up for school has seemingly become less optional as 
well.
    I want to talk about chronic absenteeism, missing at least 
10 percent of the school year was 74 percent higher last school 
year than prior to the pandemic. That is scary to me. I mean, 
if children and students are not in school, it is very 
difficult for them to grow, for them to learn, whether it be 
educationally as well as socially, and it shows.
    I mean, nationwide, the average reading and math scores for 
a 13-year-old declined 4 points and 9 points respectively from 
before the pandemic to this past school year. In 2022, the 
average score for 9-year-olds also declined 5 points in reading 
and 7 points in math compared to 2020.
    Prolonged school closures were a major cause of this 
failure. When children are not in school and they are not going 
to school, it is difficult for them to learn. And I think that 
the children are crying out for help.
    Students can only benefit from teaching, extra tutoring, 
and extended class time if they are at school. So, instead of 
addressing the student's performance, schools are investing in 
nonacademic programs to serve political agendas. We need to get 
back to getting the politics out of school and getting back to 
reading, writing and arithmetic. Leave the social agendas for 
the parents, please.
    Federal COVID-19 pandemic relief funds that were 
appropriated by Congress are being used to support the teaching 
of radical ideologies instead of the actual curriculum, 
reading, writing, arithmetic, right? Let us get those math 
scores up, let us get those reading scores up. And instead of 
investing these funds in evidence-based recovery for struggling 
students, many states and local governments are choosing to 
pursue politics. That is not a place for opinions, it is a 
place for facts and educating.
    Instead of investing in additional tutoring and class time, 
states and local governments are dividing students by race, 
pushing anti-Semitic tropes, teaching students that American 
institutions perpetuate White supremacy and promoting sexually 
explicit gender ideology. Again, let us get back to the facts 
and the core principles of learning.
    Leave the social issues, leave the politics to the parents. 
And they do this for the sake of equity. Schools are reducing 
advanced math courses and gifted programs. Let us focus on 
those.
    Schools are inflating grades, dummying down curriculum, and 
eliminating disciplinary actions. Those do not help students. 
It actually harms them in the long run. Equity lowers the bar 
for the sake of equivalence rather than raising the bar for the 
sake of excellence. Let us focus on the positive. Let us focus 
on what unites us.
    I mean, we do not want students to suffer because of that. 
This is not the first time that I have sat in this chair asking 
government employees to do their job. It is the state and local 
government's job to set curriculum that teach kids how to read 
and how to do math, that is the job they signed up for. It is 
the school's administrator's job to make sure the kids want to 
attend school, give them a place that they want to go. And it 
is the parents' job to make sure that their children are 
attending school.
    And finally, it is the teacher's job to teach the children 
fundamental skills that will help them grow into successful 
adults. Teaching is often a thankless job. So, we are grateful 
for the hardworking teachers and all the work that they do. We 
need to do everything we can do to support our teachers to 
enable them to educate the next generation. And the best way to 
support them is to provide them with resources that they need 
to teach the fundamentals and not saddle them with political 
agendas from each side of the aisle. The success of our 
Nation's children should not be a partisan issue.
    I hope that we can find ways to come together and agree to 
do everything possible to ensure that our children's education 
is a priority. I actually believe this Committee puts children 
first and puts their education first. And we are all trying to 
make good investments into our students for a better future, 
for not only the students but for everyone.
    To the panel, thank you for being here for the Subcommittee 
today. I am looking forward to having this very important 
discussion with you. And I now recognize Ranking Member Porter 
for her opening statement.
    Ms. Porter. I am OK actually; you can keep them. Thank you, 
Madame Chairwoman.
    As a single mom of three school-age children and a former 
eighth grade teacher, I know how important it is that kids 
learn in the classroom and that we encourage their curiosity. 
Many Members of this Committee are also parents and we all want 
what is best for our kids. We want them to feel supported and 
capable. We want them to be learning and be able to obtain 
good, high-paying jobs in the future.
    Where we as parents cannot reasonably teach our kids 
everything, we, of course, rely on our communities, including 
after school programs and sports to help fill in the gaps. We 
rely on our school to help our children learn. And working 
parents like me rely on educators to keep our kids safe so that 
we can do our jobs.
    We are here today to discuss our Nation's K through 12 
public education system. And it is true that in many 
communities, our elementary and secondary schools barely get a 
passing grade.
    I am concerned, though, that over the next hour or more my 
colleagues will be more interested in pointing fingers than in 
fixing problems, more interested in looking backward than in 
looking forward.
    Two of the fingers that are being pointed are at COVID-19 
school closures and then its so-called woke programs that 
indoctrinates students. Look, none of us, least of all me, miss 
the day of Zoom school with people yelling about who is taking 
up the bandwidth and who is using the iPad right now. It 
sucked. It was terrible for parents, it was terrible for 
teachers, and most of all it was terrible for all kids.
    There is no doubt that COVID-19 disrupted learning. Many 
kids missed out and there is a real learning recovery that we 
need to be focusing on, so I am not arguing with my Republican 
colleagues about that point.
    But the reality is that even before COVID-19 reached our 
shores and long before Republicans made critical race theory a 
rallying cry, K through 12 achievement was less than 
outstanding, less than where it needed to be for us to have a 
strong, stable, globally competitive economy.
    In 2019, our national K through 12 achievement score was a 
C. I will say it again, a C. If we are serious about solutions, 
we have to start with the facts and look at the real reasons 
that kids are struggling. There is a long history of unequal 
and inadequate funding for public education that has not set 
our kids up for success. And I fear, and I think we need to be 
careful not to devalue the hard work of teachers.
    We need to not paint them as agents of indoctrination. 
Instead, we need to be acknowledging their partnership in 
raising our kids. We should be using this hearing to discuss 
solutions and support our states and localities in fully 
funding K through 12 schools, including what we need to be 
paying our teachers to recruit the next generation of 
educators. That is how we are going to achieve better outcomes 
for students.
    So, I want to encourage my Republican colleagues today to 
look forward, to look for solutions to the problems rather than 
looking at the past, and to really have a collaborative 
approach on what we can do to make a difference.
    Not just pointing fingers at Democrats or at Progressive 
policies, but instead asking what are the best policies for our 
kid, period, regardless of which side of the aisle they are 
coming from.
    Whining about leftwing ideologies, that is not going to 
bring us closer to solving the challenges of K through 12 
education. So, if we really want to address problems in our 
school system, we are going to need to take a closer look at 
how our education system is funded, how things have changed 
post pandemic, and we need to uplift data-driven strategies 
that are working to educate kids.
    Elementary and secondary education matters to all of us, 
whether your kids are out of school, whether you have never had 
kids, whether you are glad to see them go in the morning, we 
all benefit from having a strong educational system where kids 
are safe to focus on learning. And to get there we need to find 
the solutions and make sure that we are adequately funding 
them.
    So, with that, again, I thank our witnesses. I look forward 
to your testimony and I yield back.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you.
    Without objection, Representatives Waltz and Moskowitz from 
Florida are waived onto the Committee for the purposes of 
questioning the witnesses at today's Subcommittee hearing.
    I am pleased to welcome our witnesses for today, Virginia 
Gentles, Nat Malkus, and Denise Forte.
    Virginia is the Director at Education Freedom Center at the 
Independent Women's Forum.
    Nat is a senior fellow and the Deputy Director of Education 
Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute.
    And Denise is the President and CEO of the Education Trust.
    We look forward to hearing from you and what you have to 
say on this important subject. And pursuant to Committee Rule 
9(g), the witnesses will please stand and raise their right 
hand.
    Thank you.
    Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony that you 
are about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing 
but the truth, so help you God?
    Let the record show that the witnesses answered in the 
affirmative. Thank you and you may take a seat.
    We appreciate you being here, and we look forward to your 
testimony. Let me remind the witnesses that we have read your 
written statement, and it will appear in full in the hearing 
record. Please limit your oral arguments to 5 minutes. As a 
reminder, please press the button on the microphone in front of 
you so that it is on, and the Members can hear you.
    When you begin to speak, the light in front of you will 
turn green. After 4 minutes the light will become yellow. When 
the red light comes on, your 5 minutes has expired, and we 
would ask that you please wrap up.
    I now recognize Ms. Gentles for her opening statement.

                 STATEMENT OF VIRGINIA (GINNY) GENTLES

                                DIRECTOR

                        EDUCATION FREEDOM CENTER

                       INDEPENDENT WOMEN'S FORUM

    Ms. Gentles. Thank you. Chairwoman McClain, Ranking Member 
Porter, and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for inviting 
me to appear today. My name is Virginia Gentles, and I am the 
Director of the Education Freedom Center at Independent Women's 
Forum.
    At IWF, we celebrate that states are responding to parents' 
concerns with the K-12 education system by rapidly expanding 
education options. We remain concerned about the consequences 
of lengthy school closures which severely harmed a generation 
of American students causing devastating learning loss and 
soaring chronic absenteeism and revealing the brokenness of the 
country' K-12 system.
    Starting in March 2020, bureaucrats desperate to stay in 
teacher unions' good graces implemented cruel policies that 
barred students from attending schools for months and in some 
areas over a year.
    The foolish school closures morphed into convoluted hybrid 
schedules and nonsensical quarantine policies that once again 
banned students from schools for days and weeks at a time. 
Districts bizarrely required outdoor lunches in below freezing 
temperatures, canceled sports and extracurricular activities 
and imposed mask mandates that blocked young readers from 
seeing or clearly hearing their teachers form sounds and words.
    Callous COVID policies taught students that in-person 
education is optional, so now they do not show up. Chronic 
absenteeism rates have doubled since 2019. Compounding the 
COVID era chaos, activists successfully pressured schools to 
stop enforcing discipline creating unsafe classrooms for 
educators and students.
    Over the past few years, states and districts have also 
lowered academic standards, canceled homework, and either 
inflated grades or dropped grading all together.
    Schools opened back up in 2021, but in too many places they 
still do not prioritize educating students. A common excuse for 
declining student performance, which began years before the 
COVID-era closures, is that schools are chronically 
underfunded. Yet scores have plummeted to historic lows, 
despite the $190 billion Federal Elementary and Secondary 
School Emergency Relief, or ESSER, windfall, coupled with 
soaring Federal, annual, and state annual K-12 education 
budgets.
    Plus, Congress mandated that 20 percent of the ESSER III 
funds address learning loss. So, if districts were awash in 
funding the last 4 years and required to address learn loss, 
why did they abysmally fail to educate students? Because too 
many schools do not prioritize academic instruction and too 
many districts spend irresponsibly.
    Union trained activist teachers delight in lessons steeped 
in climate alarmism, alternative identities, oppression, anti-
Semitism and decolonization. Many school district bureaucrats 
spent ESSER funds on athletic fields and trendy social and 
emotional learning materials rather than high dosage tutoring 
and added instructional time.
    In addition, and importantly, districts imprudently hired 
permanent staff and provided pay raises with temporary ESSER 
funding, creating a perilous fiscal cliff that is compounded by 
declining K -12 public school enrollment.
    Let us be honest, the students that districts profess to 
prioritize when they purchase glossy SEL materials and 
expensive DEI inspired contracts, were harmed the most by 
school closures. No amount of public posturing about DEI will 
ever undo the extremely inequitable impact of union-pushed 
extended public school closures, closures that were avoidable.
    Private schools proved that it was possible to quickly 
reopen in 2020, possibly the greatest advertisement for school 
choice in a generation. But we are all facing a learning loss 
crisis that imperils our country's future, only 26 percent of 
eighth graders are proficient in math and 31 percent in reading 
according to NAEP.
    State assessment scores continue to decline in reading, our 
PISA math scores hit historic lows, ACT and SAT scores continue 
to decline.
    It is tempting for those of us who fought to reopen schools 
to see the mounting appalling and unacceptable learning loss 
evidence and say we told you so. But this sense of vindication 
is fleeting in light of the wrongs in our education system.
    One group that was egregiously wronged is students with 
disabilities. During closures, districts either coerced parents 
like me into rewriting individual education programs, IEPs, or 
outright refused in-person evaluations, services, and 
accommodations, abandoning their responsibility to our Nation's 
most vulnerable students.
    Parents from across the country can provide evidence that 
school districts failed to provide Free Appropriate Public 
Education or FAPE. Their children have a right to compensatory 
services. Unfortunately, K -12 education headlines this year 
likely will fixate on laughable book ban claims or semi 
hysterical mass layoff assertions due to the long-scheduled end 
of Federal-funded ESSER funding. Choose instead to focus on 
students' academic recovery needs.
    Please pressure school districts to prioritize the needs of 
students rather than adult employees while adjusting the post 
ESSER budgets. Investigate districts that were closed for 
extended periods, so that students with disabilities can 
receive compensatory services. And demand the districts that 
directed billions in COVID-era Federal funding to education 
fads or permanent labor costs report on the academic progress 
of their students.
    Thank you.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you. I now recognize Dr. Malkus for his 
opening statement.

                   STATEMENT OF DR. NAT MALKUS, PH.D.

                    SENIOR FELLOW & DEPUTY DIRECTOR

                        EDUCATION POLICY STUDIES

                     AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE

    Dr. Malkus. Thank you. Chair McClain, Ranking Member 
Porter, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for inviting me 
here today to testify.
    I began tracking school responses to the pandemic at its 
outset; work that, unfortunately, is still needed today. AEI's 
Return to Learn tracker monitored weekly remote instruction for 
8,600 school districts in the first full pandemic year. The 
following year, we tracked district masking policies. We also 
tracked districts Federal ESSER allocations, enrollments, and 
chronic absenteeism. Our tracking has consistently produced 
data the Federal Government either never collected or released 
far later.
    The pandemic effects on students and schools stem from many 
sources, but chief among those that were under policymakers' 
control was the duration of school closures. Early on, school 
reopening became politically polarized as our data bear out. 
All schools closed for spring 2020, but the duration of remote 
instruction varied the following year. The weekly related to 
local COVID threats, the length of closures was strongly 
correlated with local Presidential votes. By April 2021, with 
vaccines available and COVID cases low, a third of school 
districts that voted for President Biden had fully reopened, 
compared to 60 percent of Trump districts. That year, the 
highest percentage of fully in-person Biden districts never 
reached the lowest percentage of Trump districts.
    Our district mask policy tracking the next year reflects 
similar patterns. Though masking decisions seem less 
consequential, they do reflect districts prioritization of 
restoring normalcy, and inconsistent Federal guidance was part 
of the problem. CDC's blanket guidance for universal school 
masking from September 2021 to February 2022 is an example. The 
CDC did track local COVID threats, but not district masking 
policies. When CDC changed guidance to be based on its local 
COVID data, its 100 percent masking recommendation dropped to 
37 percent overnight.
    This was not a post omicron anomaly, as we showed CDC's new 
guidance would have recommended masking for 61 percent of 
students on average while the CDC recommended 100 percent do 
so. With such uncertain guidance, it is unsurprising that many 
district masking policies did not match local COVID threats. 
The connection between closures and learning loss is clear, 
education recovery scorecard and return-to-learn data show that 
in math the most in-person third of districts lost 44 percent 
of a year's progress. The most remote third lost 60 percent, 
over a third more.
    Numerous studies bear these stark patterns out. While 
Federal assessments captured a learning loss, since the Federal 
Government did not systematically track closure data, they do 
not capture differences by school closures.
    While important, closures were not the only school pandemic 
struggle. Quarantines, social distancing, staffing, shifting 
public health guidance, and absenteeism challenged all schools, 
even those that reopened earlier.
    In my testimony last year, I said that academic recovery 
was public education's primary challenge. Learning loss remains 
a priority, but today absenteeism is the principal challenge 
facing schools.
    Chronic absenteeism exploded over the pandemic rising from 
15 percent to 28 percent in 2022, with increases in every state 
and demographic group. Regrettably, 2023 data saw scant 
improvement, falling 2 points in the 39 reporting states. At 
that pace, we will return to pre-pandemic rates in 2030.
    Worse still, absenteeism hit lower achieving and higher 
poverty districts harder, the same districts hit hardest by 
pandemic learning loss. And rates varied by race, with 2020 K-
12 rates for Hispanic and Black students hitting 36 and 39 
percent respectively.
    Addressing absenteeism is crucial for overcoming learning 
loss and it will hamper interventions like tutoring or extended 
learning time. The current levels threaten the productivity of 
American schools.
    What can be done to address chronic absenteeism? First, we 
need to bring both carrots and sticks. Positive supports, 
alone, will not meet the scale of this problem today. Districts 
should couple meaningful supports with clear communications and 
consequences for parents and students who fail to meet their 
moral and legal duties on school attendance.
    Second, we need clear leadership from the President down to 
the principal. The President and Governors, leaders on Capitol 
Hill and in districts must decisively communicate that 
pandemic-era exceptionalism is schools is over.
    Support from above, gives local leaders, principals and 
teachers the backing they need to ask for, and when necessary, 
demand that families and students do their part.
    Third, only teachers have the relationships to effectively 
communicate on attendance, no central office letter, text or 
email will carry the weight, personal contact from teachers' 
will. Teachers bear heavy burdens, but those burdens will only 
grow if chronic absenteeism does not improve.
    Finally, we ask much of schools and teachers, but students 
and families must meet their responsibilities. Standard 
behavior from a few short years ago would be a huge improvement 
and it is not too much to ask. If we are unwilling to ask this 
of them, who should we blame if this absenteeism crisis becomes 
the new normal?
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. I look 
forward to the Subcommittee's questions.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you, doctor.
    And the Chair now recognizes Ms. Forte for her opening 
statement.

                       STATEMENT OF DENISE FORTE

                           PRESIDENT AND CEO

                          THE EDUCATION TRUST

    Ms. Forte. Thank you. Good afternoon, Chairwoman McClain, 
Ranking Member Porter, and Members of the Subcommittee. Thank 
you for the opportunity to testify today.
    My name is Denise Forte, and I am the President and CEO of 
the Education Trust, a national advocacy and research 
organization committed to advancing policies and practices that 
dismantle the racial and economic barriers embedded in the 
American education system.
    But I am also very proud to have been a congressional 
staffer for 20 years, most recently as the Staff Director for 
the Committee on Education & the Workforce for Ranking Member 
Bobby Scott, but I am proudest to be the mother of two young 
boys who currently attend public school in Washington, DC.
    Today, I am pleased to share with you Ed Trust's assessment 
of how students have fared as a result of the pandemic, and 
recommendations on how we address the multigenerational 
inequities that existed long before COVID-19. We can all agree 
that we must provide the highest quality education for all 
children to reach their academic potential and overcome the 
devastating impact of unfinished learning exacerbated by the 
pandemic. We know that too far, far too many students, 
especially those of color and those from low-income 
backgrounds, suffered disproportionately due to the pandemic 
because of many structural inequities, such as instructional 
quality, home broadband access, mental health support and many 
other external factors.
    As we advise states and districts on how to best prioritize 
investments, Ed Trust research indicates there are two 
strategies most effective to accelerate learning. You have 
heard about them already from my colleagues here. Targeted 
intensive tutoring and expanded learning times. These solutions 
are agreed upon by experts across the political spectrum.
    We also know that strong, positive relationships with 
teachers and school staff can dramatically enhance students' 
motivation, academic engagement, and social skills.
    Additionally, many students have already begun investing 
in--sorry, many states have already begun expanded learning 
time in the summer and after school which research shows could 
accelerate learning.
    Parents are also deeply concerned about their student's 
recovery. They are focused on their academic progress and their 
well-being. Parents want better data to know how their students 
and schools are performing at this time. And whether resources 
are being allocated in an equitable fashion. And they want the 
Federal Government, states, and districts to invest in 
strategies for increasing access to mental health, including 
more trained counselors, nurses, and school psychiatrists.
    We are also calling for professional learning opportunities 
for educators on learning acceleration, culturally affirming 
practices in pedagogy, and technology enabled instruction to 
ensure that students have the guidance necessary to reach high 
standards.
    Finally, because the pandemic is far from over, we must 
look beyond this year. States and school districts should lay 
the foundation for long lasting structural changes. The average 
district has relied on ESSER funding to support roughly eight 
percent of its budget in recent years.
    The loss of these funds will be hardest on Title I school 
districts since they receive more Federal dollars on average. A 
state like Arkansas, for example, where 84 percent of all ESSER 
funds have been exhausted, 11 percent of their education 
revenue was supplied by ESSER funds and they have a growth rate 
of incoming revenue slowing by 6 percent, making it 
particularly challenging to avoid destructive cuts.
    School boards and superintendents are deciding school 
closures and teacher layoffs right now, and I mean right now. 
Without additional Federal and state investment, district 
budgets could be slashed by an average of $1,200 per student.
    In real terms, this means students lose. states should 
spend remaining dollars on evidence-based approaches to 
academic recovery, including increasing funding for Title I, 
Title II, to ensure that schools serving the highest number of 
students from low-income backgrounds have the resources they 
need. Schools have been essential to every community in this 
country. The risks are too high for students and for the future 
of this country.
    Failure is not an option, but working with the support of 
communities and families, Federal, state, and district leaders 
can take steps to ensure that all students, especially those 
who need the most support can obtain an education that equips 
them to excel.
    Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. And 
I welcome questions.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you, Ms. Forte.
    The Chair now recognizes Mr. Grothman for his 5 minutes.
    Mr. Grothman. I hope I have the right one here--good. A 
couple of questions, we will start with Ms. Gentles or Dr. 
Malkus, whoever wants to jump in here, what has been going on 
with math scores in this country over the last 40 years or say?
    Dr. Malkus. Over the long trajectory, math scores have been 
going up. Depending on the test you are looking at, the long-
term trend from NAEP is a great measure of basic skills. They 
have been trending up until about 2012. And at that point we 
sort of hit the zenith, you can see this in a number of scores. 
In the aftermath, they started to decline a little bit. When 
the pandemic hit, they fall dramatically.
    I think it is important to note how they fell, they fell on 
average, but the students that were scoring, sort of, at the 
higher end of the spectrum, the 90th percentile and the 70th, 
75th percentile, those students did not suffer dramatically 
over the pandemic, their scores came down.
    The students in the lower end of spectrum, 10th percentile, 
25th percentile the floor fell out on their scores. If this was 
more even, what we would have is achievement gaps fixed but 
everyone losing math progress, lower achievement than previous 
years. What we have is both lower achievement and larger 
achievement gaps.
    Mr. Grothman. So, people are not doing as well in certain 
groups.
    In Wisconsin, which is the state I know best, probably the 
district with the largest share of people of color, students of 
color is the city of Milwaukee. And we spend substantially more 
per pupil in the city of Milwaukee than almost every other 
school district in the state. Nevertheless, we get people 
running down the city of Milwaukee schools saying that you 
cannot succeed, they are somehow inferior to other schools.
    Do you think it has a negative impact on students if they 
are constantly told that their schools--particularly when it is 
not true--that their schools are unfunded or implying that they 
are less funded than other schools?
    Ms. Gentles. I think that there is a problem with 
constantly denigrating education. And I am sure we can all 
agree that we do not want to be here to denigrate K-12.
    Mr. Grothman. I guess what I am trying to get at here, are 
there people that imply that it is expected, I guess, or this 
is the reason why people of certain demographics do not do as 
well. Now it is irritating enough that we actually spend more 
on those schools, but do you think when we talk about how we 
are down on people of certain demographics that it causes any 
defeatism in those students?
    Ms. Gentles. We certainly do not want to have the bigotry 
of low expectations, something that we heard a lot during the 
Bush Administration, that there were efforts underway to put 
that in the past, but certainly we have that again now that we 
are using the pandemic as an excuse for low performance among 
low-income students in particular.
    So, we do not want to tell families from particular areas 
or particular backgrounds that they cannot achieve, that their 
students should not be expected to achieve.
    Mr. Grothman. OK. Next question, I think part of this DEI 
stuff, and insofar as we insert it in younger children, implies 
that if you are not of European ancestry, you are not going to 
do as well in this country. Now from what I read, at least 
economically, people from Asia, the India subcontinent, 
Chinese, Filipino, Cuban, even Nigerian, I think at least, I 
believe, I am not sure about Nigerian, but I think, are doing 
better than Americans of European ancestry.
    Do you--is this part of the diversity equity and inclusion 
curriculum? Are young people being taught how well people from 
non-European backgrounds from China or Philippines, or India 
are doing? Are you aware? Is that part of the curriculum.
    Ms. Gentles. That does not sound like something that would 
be part of curriculum, but we should be clear that even 
relatively affluent U.S. students do not score as high on math 
as average performing students in places like Japan or South 
Korea or Hong Kong, so all of our students are struggling.
    Mr. Grothman. OK, I guess the point I am trying to get to, 
are students from backgrounds, non-European backgrounds, doing 
better than average Americans? And are young people being 
taught that or are they being taught how we are being too 
unfairly good to Americans whose ancestry around here goes back 
decades?
    Dr. Malkus. Quite honestly, I am not sure about the 
curriculum and contents in DEI indications. There is quite a 
number of differences between different groups and my fear is, 
is that most of the curriculum is insufficiently demanding of 
students of European ancestry, or whatever other group that we 
have of them, to deal with the particulars of those arguments.
    Mr. Grothman. Thank you.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you.
    The Chair now recognizes Ms. Ocasio-Cortez for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Thank you. I do not know what I just 
heard right now, but I think--I think when we talk about 
students of a certain demographic, you know, as a woman of a 
certain demographic, I would be happy to illuminate some of the 
disparities, the discrepancies that we are talking about here. 
In fact, I wonder if any of my colleagues, anyone here can 
articulate in this discussion of absenteeism we say, you know, 
people are not showing up to school anymore, it is because they 
do not--there is an insinuation that is because people do not 
want to go or there is a different attitude. But do we actually 
know what one of leading causes of school absenteeism is? 
Asthma, asthma.
    I represent the Bronx. I represent kids whose only meal 
that they will eat in an entire day will be from school. I 
represent kids whose--the cleanest air that they will breathe 
in their entire day, maybe if they are lucky, will be from 
their school, that the safest place that they will be in a day 
will be their school. And so, when we come here, we talk about 
schools, but if you close your eyes and put yourself in a 
classroom of someone else's district you will see that the 
challenges are different here.
    So, this is not about what we are teaching about European 
versus non-European descent. This is about the fact that the 
Bronx has one of the highest childhood asthma rates in the 
country. And climate curriculum. And when we talk about the 
importance of having clean air and clean water, it has a direct 
outcome on people's scholastic performance.
    So, as we transition in this time of a pandemic, a 
respiratory disease, and we wonder why one of the highest 
childhood asthma rate geographic zones in the country is 
struggling with absenteeism, knowing that respiratory disease 
is a major factor in that, maybe we try to solve that problem. 
Maybe we take a look at some of the environmental and some of 
the economic factors in getting to a school.
    Ms. Forte, you have extensive experience in this issue, can 
you speak a little bit toward some of those economic and 
environmental factors that you see and how they affect 
communities and their ability to navigate educational outcomes.
    Ms. Forte. Thank you for that question. At the Education 
Trust, particularly when you think about the pandemic, the 
research is clearly there that what impacted our students was 
healthcare, loss of employment of their families, the lack of 
technology accessibility. And this really had an impact on 
their livelihood, which of course had an impact on their school 
day.
    And as Representative Ocasio-Cortez pointed out, for many 
of these students where they are actually are supported best, 
where they are being able to take advantage of services and the 
supports that they need to actually succeed in school is at 
school, which we believe is the right place for many of these 
services.
    In addition, we know that lack of mental health support 
that they faced during the pandemic needed to be supplemented 
while at school. And so, we are happy to see from this recent 
investment of American Rescue Plan, the significant investment 
in schools that helps schools reopen, that made sure teachers 
had the support that they needed, and most of all made sure 
that more children had support for mental health services.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Thank you so much, Ms. Forte. And this 
just correlates with what we have seen, not just the Bronx, but 
across the country. We saw admissions, mental health 
admissions, of children that were highly disruptive, their 
ability to be healthy is what can determine whether they show 
up to school and how well they do in school.
    On top of that, when we talk about social issues and when 
people want to critique social inclusion in schools, housing, 
as you mentioned, is a core underlying factor in how well 
someone does in school. If you do not have a home or a bed to 
lay your head on, how are you going to perform well in school? 
And when we talk about inclusion in those issues, one of the 
highest rates of childhood homelessness, one of the highest 
contributors and factors is if they are LGBT, because if they 
go home to a place that will kick them out of their house 
because they are gay or trans or queer, how can we imagine them 
doing well in school?
    And so, if school is not safe for them, if home is not safe 
for them and if we allow a culture that continues to 
marginalize LGBT people to the point their existence cannot 
even be affirmed in school, how can we expect them to do well?
    And with that I yield back.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you. The Chair now recognizes Mr. 
Burlison for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Burlison. Thank you, Madam Chair.
    Right now, public schools are really, in my opinion, 
failing to do their most basic duty--educating our children. We 
saw widespread closures during the COVID pandemic which led to 
students falling behind in core subjects like reading and math, 
which, by the way, I opposed the closures and the lockdowns 
because it was an absolute scam and the impact to our children, 
I think, we will see for an entire generation.
    But during that time, under the guise of COVID, Congress 
appropriated billions, $189 billion to the ESSER fund to 
restore educational services after COVID-19. Of course, like 
everything else, the government throws taxpayer dollars at, the 
money was often used inappropriately. While there were some 
school districts that appropriately spent the funds, there were 
many, unfortunately far too many, that used it for nonsense 
like DEI programs, critical race theory, gender ideology, and 
other woke programming.
    And before anyone questions whether or not it actually 
happened, I will point to my very own school district that I 
graduated from, which spent money implementing these programs.
    First and foremost, Congress has a responsibility to 
question how the schools are spending taxpayer dollars and how 
they are being effective in the use of those dollars.
    My first question is to--is it Ms. Gentles, Gentles?
    Ms. Gentles. Gentle with an ``s'', so Gentles.
    Mr. Burlison. Gentles. Ms. Gentles, will expanding school 
choice, which is a popular topic in many states, including 
Missouri, will that improve the student outcomes?
    Ms. Gentles. Yes, there have been close to 200 studies of 
existing School Choice programs and the vast majority of those 
do indicate that there are improvements in not just the 
participating students, but in the public-school students in 
the surrounding area, those competitive pressures improve the 
district services to the nearby students. So, rising tides 
lifts all boats.
    Mr. Burlison. Yes, it is amazing how powerful competition 
can be.
    My other question, often whenever I am discussing this 
topic there are teachers that we--that I think we all love 
teachers, but there is often a fear of how this might impact 
their livelihood, impact their opportunities. In your opinion, 
does expanding school choice help teachers?
    Ms. Gentles. Well, the fear comes from the unions who are 
concerned about losing the dues paying members from the public 
system. There is absolutely no need for fear on the part of 
educators or those who care about them because, of course, 
education alternatives to that traditional public school need 
teachers.
    So, teachers are teaching in these private schools and 
other education options. And again, when we talk about those 
studies its revealed that the teachers' salaries in surrounding 
areas where you have school choice programs, those increase, so 
everybody benefits.
    Mr. Burlison. You know, the sad part is that would you 
agree that sometimes what the unions would be advocating for, 
in direct conflict with what benefits the students, and what 
benefits the teachers?
    Ms. Gentles. Well, the teachers' unions are focused on 
increasing their dues paying members and so the AFT represents 
a Planned Parenthood staff members in some states, for example. 
They are not necessarily representing educators and they are in 
contrast to the needs of educators when they are advocating for 
policies that do not enforce discipline, that creates unsafe 
environments for teachers, for example.
    Mr. Burlison. Now there are a number of types of different 
of School Choice endeavors within different states. Could you 
lay out or explain for those who are watching the difference--
the different school choice opportunities and which ones work 
better in states that have experimented with this?
    Ms. Gentles. Well, according to EdChoice, 75 percent of 
students attend traditional public schools and then you have 25 
percent of students attending private schools, charter schools, 
magnet programs and home education. So that is a quarter of the 
Nation's students benefiting from alternative to the 
traditional public school. There are studies of the charter 
schools that show that they serve low-income students in urban 
areas better than the residentially assigned public schools. 
And I have mentioned the private school studies.
    Within private school choice, you have a newer development 
called education savings accounts and a growing number of 
states have these flexible spending accounts that allocate the 
state portion of the student's funding to an account for the 
parent to draw down from to use for tutoring, for tuition, for 
transportation, for technology and therapies when you are 
talking about special needs children.
    And so, these ESA programs are very popular among families 
of students with special needs.
    Mr. Burlison. Thank you. My time has expired.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you. The Chair now recognizes Ms. 
Crockett for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Crockett. OK. Thank you, Madam Chair.
    Whew, OK, critical race theory, I just want to be clear, I 
am going to go to the end real quick because I know that that 
was brought up. Critical race theory, is that typically taught 
K through 12? Yes or no?
    Ms. Forte. No.
    Ms. Crockett. OK, all right. So, we can stop with the 
nonsense because K through 12 was not teaching critical race 
theory at least in this country. I cannot talk about what 
happens in other countries, but in our country, K through 12 is 
not learning critical race theory just for those that are 
unfamiliar.
    In addition to that we just heard about AFT and what they 
are advocating for. And I noted that there was a comment that 
you made as it relates to discipline and how that is something 
AFT should be advocating for so that teachers can be safer. Is 
that correct? Am I characterizing what you say correctly?
    Ms. Gentles. I believe that both NEA and the AFT should 
endorse policies that keep educators safe.
    Ms. Crockett. OK. Let me ask you a quick question, 
actually, I would like for all three of you to answer this 
question. It is just a yes or no, we will start at this end, 
when you were growing up and going through school, did you ever 
have to go through an active shooter drill? Yes or no?
    Ms. Forte. No.
    Dr. Malkus. No.
    Ms. Gentles. No.
    Ms. Crockett. Oh, OK, all right. So, can we agree that guns 
being kept out of schools may be one of those things that could 
keep not only teachers safe but also students safe? Yes or no.
    Ms. Forte. Yes.
    Dr. Malkus. Yes.
    Ms. Gentles. Yes.
    Ms. Crockett. OK, thank you.
    So, I do want to touch on a few things that Ms. Ocasio-
Cortez talked about, because I do not really know the breadth 
of your understanding or experiences, but to give a little 
clarity to the district that I come from, 20 percent of my 
district live at or below poverty. And I do come from an urban 
district.
    I do have a majority minority district. I know that we have 
talked about DEI and diversity. And I find that when I am here, 
I am constantly fighting to make sure that I can break through 
the noise and the stereotypes that exist around not only my 
kiddos in my district, but just my constituents.
    And one of things that maybe some of you have never 
experienced, I do not know, is the fact that one of leading 
reasons that students in my district do not show up to school 
is because they are poor, because some of them are homeless. We 
found that there were children that did not go to school 
because they did not have clean clothes.
    That is something that certain people do not have to worry 
about. And they found that if they brought in washing machines, 
so the kids would not make fun of them because they had clean 
clothes that they would show up. These are things that maybe in 
a more affluent district they may not need money for so while 
one of my colleagues talked about how much investment has to go 
into some of these school districts in the inner city, I do 
want to make it clear that there are different obstacles that 
my kiddos deal with, in addition to the fact that I practiced 
criminal defense work prior to coming into the legislative 
realm.
    And in my district, I have the highest incarcerated ZIP 
Codes in the entire state. What that means, is that sometimes I 
have children that go home and they do not have parents to go 
home to or if they are going to parents, their parents may be 
involved in things that are not necessarily the best things for 
kids to be around.
    And so, as has already been stated, sometimes the safest 
space is at school for some of these children. And what is so 
annoying to me is that we debate whether or not we will invest 
in our futures.
    As far as I am concerned, there is no better investment 
than in our children. Because if we are going to make sure that 
this country continues on, it is not going to start by 
investing in people that look like me or are my age. It starts 
with making sure that there is a foundation.
    And I just want to say that I am thankful for those 
teachers that decided to go in even when they were under 
resourced, even giving their own resources to make it happen. I 
lost teachers in my district during the pandemic because they 
literally risked their lives in the midst of a pandemic to show 
up because they loved those kids that much because I can tell 
you the pay is not there.
    Teachers are not getting rich, maybe professors, but not 
teachers. And so, the fact is I have talked to my school 
districts, they were able to take advantage of the extra money 
that was given to them, but guess what? They still had gaps 
that they needed to fill.
    And the reason that I brought up gun violence is No. 1, it 
is a safety issue, but also as it relates to the mental health. 
Children nowadays know where they need to go in case somebody 
comes in. They are looking for the closet. That is no way for 
kids in America to live. So, we need to make sure that we put 
kids first.
    Thank you so much. And with that, I will yield.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you. I now recognize myself for 5 
minutes.
    One, I think my question is during the pandemic--I am not 
here to say it is right or wrong, but I am looking at during 
the pandemic, we used ESSER funds to the tune of $190 billion, 
correct? My question is where were they spent? What programs 
were they used for, right? And did they help? Do we have a 
measurable outcome? And did that $190 billion of taxpayer 
money, did it do what we intended it to do?
    Because I am sure one of the questions that is going to be 
coming up at some point in time is do with reauthorize those 
funds? Do we continue them, or do we stop them? That is going 
to be the question.
    And I think if we took a look at some facts and some data, 
which is a little concerning to me since everyone on the panel 
has talked about our math and reading scores have gone down, 
OK, I think we all want to fix them, right? Both sides want to 
fix them.
    We want to reinvest in our children. So, with that 
question, what I would like to know is where were those ESSER 
funds used? Were they used for--that we all agree on tutoring 
this is something both sides agree on, I heard it tutoring and 
expanded learning time.
    Any disagreement on that? I think that is what I heard, 
correct? Wonderful. We have got some agreement. That is a 
bonus, that is a good thing.
    All right. So, where were they spent? Were they spent? Was 
the bulk of the $190 billion spent on tutoring and expanded 
learning time? And if so, what are the results? So, I will Ms. 
Gentles start.
    Ms. Gentles. So, Marguerite Roza of Georgetown University 
has an eduonomics lab and has done her best to go into the 
reports that are available from states and districts to assess 
how the money has been spent. Unfortunately, 20 states share no 
detail beyond how much money each district spent.
    Mrs. McClain. Wait a second. So, we gave--and this is our 
fault because we did it in a hurry, we did not put guardrails 
on it, and they will not share the data with us, or they just 
have not gotten around to sharing it with us?
    Ms. Gentles. They were not asked to share the data. That is 
something that is important to note. They were given 
flexibility with this funding and broad guidelines on how to 
spend it. And 20 percent was required to be used for learning 
loss.
    Mrs. McClain. And I do not mean to be rude, but I have a 
limited amount of time. Do you know where the money was spent? 
Was it spent on tutoring and extended learning?
    Ms. Gentles. No, most of it was spent on labor--so, 
increasing that permanent staff and on pay raises and a very 
small percentage was spent on tutoring, summer school extended 
day.
    Mrs. McClain. And do you have data to back that up?
    Ms. Gentles. Pardon me?
    Mrs. McClain. Do you have data to back that up?
    Ms. Gentles. Marguerite Roza and the edunomics lab has 
that. She did say that we see a higher number of districts 
investing in social emotional learning, about half. And she 
gave an example of Wisconsin and California, just five percent 
of ESSER III expenditures have gone to lengthening the school 
day or year or adding time in the summer.
    Mrs. McClain. Well, that is not real good.
    Dr. Malkus, could you comment, please.
    Dr. Malkus. Yes, the answer is we do not know, and we will 
not know because there was not guardrails for these funds. I 
would say that there were three bills when ESSER funds came 
out. And the $13 billion that came out initially went right out 
the door on an emergency basis in March 2020, and that made 
sense.
    Fifty-four billion went out in the second bill that 
December. That probably could have had some more guardrails on 
it. There was $123 billion that went out in the American Rescue 
Plan. That did have some guardrails on it, 20 percent to some 
sort of recovery.
    But late in the pandemic, after almost all schools in the 
country were already open, that last tranche of money really 
needed to have more guardrails, more directions and certainly 
reporting requirements. I would say that if you wanted to 
design a law that would jeopardize arguments about whether the 
Federal Government can spend education dollars well, ESSER--you 
could not do much better than ESSER.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you.
    Ms. Forte.
    Ms. Forte. I would agree with Dr. Malkus, but one problem 
we still have is not all the money has been spent. So, we do 
not know.
    Mrs. McClain. So whoa, whoa, whoa. $190 billion has gone 
out and some of that 190 has not even been spent yet. I just 
want everyone to hear that, so when we come back and we 
petition for more funds, more funds that is a big concern that 
we have not spent what we had. No. 2, we do not even know what 
we spent the money on. And No. 3, do we have any data that 
shows that the money is being used for tutoring and lengthening 
of----
    Ms. Forte. Well, I think we need to remember that in order 
to have a tutor that is a labor cost, summer learning that as a 
labor cost, extending your day is also a labor cost.
    Mrs. McClain. So, in your opinion we do have data on that.
    Ms. Forte. We have some data. And we also--just pointing 
out to Ms. Gentles that even though the dollars were spent on 
labor, in order to run tutoring and after school programs 
during the summer at the end of day you need labor and people 
to do that.
    Mrs. McClain. Do you have data because that would be super 
helpful? Do you have that data? Could you share it?
    Ms. Gentles. I can get it for you.
    Mrs. McClain. Wonderful. Thank you. I am sorry, I am over.
    So, the Chair now recognizes Ms. Porter, the Ranking 
Member. I am so sorry, Ms. Porter.
    Ms. Porter. Thank you very much.
    I wanted to talk about chronic absenteeism and share a 
couple of things and ask some questions. First, I want to share 
with you that as a parent of three kids, in California, as you 
may know, has very aggressive absenteeism laws. I have seen 
that persistent, frank communication that you call for, Dr. 
Malkus, coming from my kids' school.
    When they have been sick and I have not gotten them called 
in until the next day, they have been in touch. When my 
daughter missed 4 days because she was sick, her teacher called 
to check in on her and find out if he needed to send home a 
learning packet.
    So, I do think we are seeing schools start to really own 
this issue and I think we should encourage that. But I wanted 
to share with you that I think some of that is happening and I 
do think this is something, particularly for lower achieving 
districts, that we want to be encouraging.
    One of the things I really appreciated about your 
testimony, Dr. Malkus, and I think it goes to the point that 
Ms. Forte just made, is you say things like some of the most 
resource intensive and most expensive strategies work the best. 
And I think Ms. Forte points to targeted intensive tutoring, 
these kinds of high dosage tutoring programs and expended 
learning time. And so, I just want to ask you, those things 
take money, right?
    Dr. Malkus. They do.
    Ms. Porter. And some of that money will, as she points out, 
goes to labor costs. You would agree with her?
    Dr. Malkus. I would.
    Ms. Porter. So, do we have enough resources pointed toward 
addressing closing the pandemic learning gap and toward 
addressing the learning loss that comes from absenteeism?
    Dr. Malkus. You know, it is going to depend. Those funds 
are district to district. We really do not know how much each 
district has spent. It looks at last estimate--and there is 
some time lag in this reporting, but $50 billion unspent. 
Pretty late in the game.
    We will need to have funds to do these things, there is no 
doubt about it. But I do want to make the distinction here, 
that we should be careful to look at the chronic absenteeism 
problem as if it is a problem that we can quick--not quick--but 
fix with simple narrow policies.
    What we are seeing is every demographic group is 75 to 80 
percent up, I mean, across the board. It is a widespread 
cultural change, and you do not have to be a social scientist 
to figure out why, right? We missed a lot of school; there was 
a lot of disruptions, and people are out of the rhythms of 
going back to school.
    So, I really think it is important for us to recognize this 
as we need to fight this as, yes, bring the policy game, but 
this is a cultural fight. And, if we cannot reset school 
cultures--and it is not just poor schools. I mean, it is there, 
but high-achieving, relatively well-off schools, they are up 80 
percent too.
    So, I really think that this is a cultural problem, and I 
want to encourage leadership, up and down the board, to 
approach it as such.
    Ms. Porter. Yes. So, I mean, I want to share with you, I 
think my school has done exactly that, and I have noticed a 
marked--so one of the things that, I will be honest with you, 
that has caused my kids to miss a frustrating amount of school 
for me as a parent this year is they have been sick a lot. And 
I think that we have had a rough kind of flu, winter, cold 
season, and so I have called them in. They have just been sick.
    And one of the things that I, you know, I think is hard to 
balance when you are pushing kids and parents to come and 
turning up that kind of heat, which is important to have that 
standard, is I have to argue to keep my sick kids home because 
they say I will get in trouble if I am not there. And so, they 
are--I think you have to walk that line.
    In terms of these programs, Ms. Forte, I wondered if you 
can talk a little bit about a few of these that are working, 
like the Virginia High-Dosage Tutoring Program, particularly 
the Colorado AmeriCorps Program, on encouraging partnering with 
families whose kids are not coming to school, to get them more 
engaged.
    And then, I think, you know, I just posed it to the 
Chairwoman, with the remaining ESSER dollars and if we do 
reauthorize it, I think you all have given us some programs to 
focus it on.
    And I think it is appropriate that we--if we reauthorize 
any money, we focus it on these programs that are working and 
are being deployed in states. So, I wonder if you could say a 
little more about them.
    Ms. Forte. Yes. There are many shining examples that I did 
have in my written testimony that, either from having small 
tutoring groups of three to four students with one teacher 
three to four times a week like they are doing in Tennessee to 
the program that you mentioned in Colorado, and people are 
finding different ways to provide these small learning groups, 
whether it is with the teachers, the certified teachers, or 
whether it is with AmeriCorps or a college student or whether 
it is with grandparents.
    And I think that is the way that people should be looking 
at it, just making sure that there is a responsible adult 
involved in the learning process and that the actual curriculum 
is aligned with what the child is learning in school.
    Other funds are being used for after-school programs that 
are done with a community-based program. Other programs are 
about professional learning opportunities, but I will say that, 
when we are talking about accelerating learning, the intensive 
tutoring and the extended day is where the research points us.
    Ms. Porter. Yes. Thank you very much. I hope we can work on 
really focusing some--if there is additional funding--focusing 
on these proven interventions.
    I do think--and I want to thank the Chairwoman for pointing 
to this issue--we need to treat this like the real educational 
crisis it is. The learning recovery is--the lack of learning 
recovery from the pandemic is real, and we do not get anywhere 
by pretending otherwise.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you.
    The Chair now recognizes Ms. Lee for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you, Madam Chair.
    I am--as a Black woman who grew up in a working-class 
community and went to a public school in what we would call 
divested public school system, I have sat through many hearings 
that kind of descend into the disappointing.
    I think the ones around public education are often the most 
insulting because they are the most dangerously disingenuous. I 
just want to say that, you know, my colleagues want to blame 
everything but what it is when it comes to public education.
    But the reality is, is that we know it is not CRT; it is 
not wokeness, whatever that is; it is not gay books. Right? It 
is racist and inequitable funding schemes that keep Black and 
Brown and working-class students out of the most high-
performing schools.
    When you add that, of course, to redline policy--redlining 
and predatory lending, right, these are children who have been 
in locked into school systems that our government, our systems, 
have purposefully kept under-invested.
    We know that, and even when we think about COVID and the 
necessities that we had to--or rather the adjustments that we 
had to make, I think often about, you know, private schools 
that were able to open faster because these were not school 
systems in buildings that they had to worry about HVAC issues 
or open lead and asbestos as many in the Commonwealth in 
Pennsylvania have to deal with.
    Some of the facilities at our schools that our children, 
our educators, have to learn in, are facilities that we would 
never allow our government to learn in. They would be shut 
down.
    But we still somehow cannot fully fund public education. 
So, I just wanted to point that out, that we recognize what we 
are dealing with before we bring in arguments around whether 
children of certain races are performing differently than 
others.
    But the reality is, is that our Republican colleagues--my 
Republican colleagues do not want the parents in their district 
to know that they have denied their children resources. They do 
not want folks to know that they are diverting your hard-earned 
tax dollars away from our schools and into the pockets of their 
donors.
    They are so desperate for distractions as they defund our 
classrooms and deprive our teachers that they are banning books 
and censoring teachers and bullying LGBTQ+ kids, and they are 
erasing Black histories in an attempt to turn us against our 
schools.
    If Republicans do not like what you have to say, they will 
do everything in their power to prevent you from saying it. If 
they do not like what you are reading, they will do everything 
in their power to keep you from reading it, even if it is 
literally just talking about the history of this country or 
exercising your free speech, because heaven forbid someone gets 
uncomfortable during a lesson about our history of chattel 
enslavement in America, or someone feels seen by reading about 
themselves or someone like them, or learns about White 
supremacy by reading ``The 1619 Project'' or ``The Diary of 
Anne Frank.''
    I do ask for unanimous consent to enter this article from 
the NPR entitled ``The Education Culture Wars Waging, But for 
Most Parents It's Background Noise'' into the record.
    Mrs. McClain. Without objection.
    Ms. Lee. Republicans are claiming it is about parents' 
rights to be involved in their children's classes. Which 
parents? In this national poll, NPR found that by wide margins 
and regardless of their politics, 76 percent of parents were 
happy with their kids' schools and what they are taught.
    Just 18 percent of parents were not happy with the way 
gender and sexuality was taught; 19 percent say the same thing 
about race and racism; and 14 feel that way about U.S. history.
    These numbers show what is really happening. Teachers are 
being forced to bow to a very vocal minority at the expense of 
the overwhelming majority of parents and teachers and, most 
importantly, all of our students.
    And, while we are so focused on a small group, we are 
ignoring real barriers for marginalized students, including 
language barriers, access to technology and tutoring, and a 
lack of funding for underserved schools.
    It is much easier to make teachers a political punching bag 
than to invest in our communities, even though that investment 
works. I have seen it firsthand in school districts like mine. 
For instance, Pittsburgh public schools, during the pandemic 
when it was necessary to adjust and do school from home, many 
kids were left without reliable internet.
    In Pittsburgh, our local universities--Carnegie Mellon 
University and the University of Pittsburgh--partnered with 
nonprofits and used Federal grant money to connect over 600 
families to the internet.
    CMU also set up dedicated servers with free courses and 
classes for students to access, including virtual labs and 
coding courses.
    Ms. Forte, do you think having internet access or not using 
gender-neutral pronouns is more important to a kid's education?
    Ms. Forte. I think that having access to technology is more 
important.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you.
    This learning gap is really more about a practice gap. Our 
young people need more tools to get excited about learning. In 
Pittsburgh, CMU has started programs that use phone apps and 
augmented reality to better engage young students.
    They also expanded tutoring for low-income families, backed 
by AI, to make the tutoring more effective, all funded through 
Federal grants.
    Ms. Forte, what do you think is better for students, 
creating new technology for them to learn with or removing 
books from their classrooms and libraries unless they have been 
approved by every single parent?
    Ms. Forte. Certainly, creating new technology to learn.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you.
    Without investing in our marginalized community, we are 
never going to see improvement. We have got this huge gap in 
STEM when it comes to Black and Brown people and women. This 
hearing could have focused on how to get young people excited 
about science and math and how to better reach underserved 
schools.
    But, instead, we are stuck listening to the same broken 
record. Cutting funding, banning books, and censoring 
curriculum is not the answer.
    With that, I yield back.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you. And I think you just made a very 
great argument for school of choice.
    With that, I recognize Dr. Foxx for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Foxx. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
    Ms. Gentles, in the last 4 months, we have seen a stunning 
wave of anti-Semitism sweep our education institutions. While 
many of these incidents have occurred in higher education, 
there have also been several in K-12 schools. I think that is 
simply abhorrent.
    Can you talk more about how much anti-Semitism is in K-12 
schools?
    Ms. Gentles. I think we are just getting familiar with this 
concerning issue with K-12 education, but we do have examples 
of families in both coasts--I believe New Jersey and then also 
California--going to the school district and saying that ``my 
child is experiencing intolerable anti-Semitism,'' and those 
school districts then pay for the private school tuition for 
the students to leave and go to a safe environment where they 
will not be bullied. And that is something that Jewish families 
may have to consider throughout the country if this continues.
    Ms. Foxx. Thank you very much.
    Dr. Malkus, we have heard about how serious learning loss 
and chronic absenteeism are, but the Department of Education 
does not seem to be focusing on this.
    Instead, it seems to be spending all its time pursuing 
radical, far-left agenda items, such as college loan 
forgiveness.
    Can you talk about how much work the Department is doing on 
learning loss compared to Democrat political priorities?
    Dr. Malkus. I have been tracking a number of things, 
probably too many, over this pandemic, but one of them that 
came up was student loan forgiveness. So, I do actually have 
yet another tracker at--on student debt.
    When you include all forms of that, including the pause, 
things legislated by Congress, PSLF funding, and the new IDR 
reforms, we have exceeded $370 billion in forgiven student 
loans, I might add, without--much of that, rather, without 
consent of Congress.
    That is where a great deal of the Administration's focus 
has gone. There was an agenda that came out, I think it was 10 
days, perhaps 2 weeks ago, where the Administration and members 
of the Domestic Policy Council pushed for high-dosage tutoring 
and extended learning time and talked about chronic absenteeism 
to some degree.
    While those things are worthwhile and I am glad that they 
are paying attention to it, I do not think those priorities are 
as focused on the K-12 challenges that we are facing and 
particularly showing the leadership that we need from the 
Administration on chronic absenteeism, that we need right now.
    Ms. Foxx. You used a term that I want to ask if we can 
agree that we might want to change the word ``forgiveness'' in 
terms of loans. Actually, isn't it a transfer of debt from the 
people who took it out to people who did not take out the debt?
    Dr. Malkus. The Federal student loan portfolio comes 
directly out of the Federal Treasury, and so, when loans are 
forgiven, then the balance of the loan is--that was set to be 
received by the Treasury, plus whatever interest the borrower 
agreed to, will no longer be received.
    And I just might add, because I am concerned about these 
issues as well, that the SAVE program is an enormous student 
loan entitlement that will keep on giving without congressional 
action.
    Ms. Foxx. Thank you.
    Mr. Malkus, again--or Dr. Malkus, it is a fact that test 
scores and proficiency levels have declined across the country 
since before the COVID pandemic. Realistically, what percentage 
of students should be meeting grade-level proficiency 
standards, and what role do teachers and school administrators 
have in helping students get back on track?
    Dr. Malkus. That seemingly simple question is a very 
difficult one. There was a while, in the no-child-left-behind 
era, that we thought a 100 percent of students should be 
proficient or what we would think of as on-grade level. That 
was aspirational for sure.
    Look, I think the important thing to note is that is a very 
difficult question to answer: What is the percentage? Higher is 
better, and it is going lower. That is what we need to know.
    It is not only going lower on average; it is going lower 
for our lowest performers. That means that whatever opportunity 
education gives to students, the kids who are achieving at the 
lower end are getting less of it. I am alarmed by this.
    What can teachers and administrators do? The list goes on a 
long way, but I am very concerned, not only from the chronic 
absenteeism but from other pandemic effects in schools, that we 
have a culture problem in schools.
    The culture in schools has shifted, and we need to do 
aggressive maintenance with all hands on deck. I think we need 
leadership from government leaders to give cover to lower-level 
folks to push hard on teachers but also on parents and on 
students to get back to the baseline, which was no great 
shakes, before the pandemic.
    Ms. Foxx. Thank you. Thank you. I thank the witnesses.
    I thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I yield back.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you. The Chair now recognizes Ms. 
Norton for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Norton. Thank you, Madam Chair.
    As a life-long First Amendment champion who argued and won 
a free-speech case in front of the U.S. Supreme Court and the 
daughter of a public schoolteacher, I am deeply concerned by 
the rise of book bans and increase in efforts to diminish free 
speech, especially in the classroom.
    I am acutely aware of the fact that you do not have to 
agree with what someone has to say to fight tooth and nail for 
their right to say it. I know that because I have defended 
people in court who I know would not defend me if the roles 
were reversed.
    Right now, Republicans across the country are advancing 
dangerous bills that would bar virtually all discussion about 
race and gender differences in American history and society.
    Ms. Forte, how have Republican-led book bans and anti-free 
speech initiatives affected students' ability to learn?
    Ms. Forte. Thank you for that question. I am sad to report 
that it has been a real distraction from the hard issues at 
hand that students are facing in the classroom.
    These book bans mean that fewer children have exposure to 
the things they really do want to learn. We hear from students 
that they want more engaging curriculum.
    We hear from students that they want to be able to see 
themselves in their curriculum, and the fact that a small 
number of folks have been able to enact these book bans is 
really disheartening and does a disservice to the librarians 
and the teachers across this country who work really hard to 
make sure that the curriculum put in front of young people 
today is engaging.
    And, by the way, more engaging curriculum actually helps 
with absenteeism. So, we could actually be using more robust 
curriculum in the classroom to bring our kids back into the 
classroom.
    Ms. Norton. Thank you, Ms. Forte.
    While it is incredibly important that students learn from 
developmentally appropriate materials, these book bans and 
anti-free speech efforts are designed to be intentionally vague 
to target teachers.
    Because of these Republican-led efforts, teachers do not 
know what they can and cannot say. These teachers are forced to 
do their jobs in constant fear of being fired, fined, or having 
angry parents turn on them.
    I ask unanimous consent to enter this study from RAND 
entitled ``Walking a Fine Line: Educators' View of Politicized 
Topics in Schooling'' in the record.
    Mrs. McClain. Without objection.
    Ms. Norton. This national survey of teachers and principals 
found that roughly one in four teachers have been directed by 
school or district leaders to limit conversations on political 
or social issues.
    The survey also found that 48 percent of principals and 40 
percent of teachers reported that the intrusion of political 
issues and opinions into their professions are a job-related 
stressor.
    These bills that politicize the conversations teachers can 
have with their students are harmful. They aim to terrify 
teachers into avoiding any meaningful discussion about 
important topics like racial discrimination. Even when not 
passing at all, these bills have chilling effects across the 
country that negatively impact teachers and students.
    When a new Iowa law barred educators from teaching, quote, 
``that the United States of America and the state of Iowa are 
fundamentally or systemically racist or sexist,'' end quote, a 
teacher in Iowa was told by the superintendent that she was 
unsure if he was able to teach his class that slavery was 
wrong.
    All of this is a distinction that prevents teachers from 
doing their job, which is to help students learn. This is 
shameful, especially given how urgent it is that we help 
students get up to speed after pandemic-related disruptions.
    I yield the rest of my time to the Ranking Member.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you, Ms. Norton.
    In closing, I want to thank our witnesses once again today 
for your testimony. What I was really amazed at is we do agree 
on some really key, important things, which was tutoring and 
extended learning.
    I mean, that is--I did not hear any disagreement on that 
and that dollars, if we decide to spend more dollars or the 
dollars that we have not spent, I mean, they should go there 
first and foremost. So, cats and dogs living together, look at, 
we all agree on something.
    But thank you very much for your statement and your 
testimony and taking your time today.
    I now recognize Ms. Norton for her closing remarks.
    Ms. Norton. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
    I want to reiterate the importance of getting our students 
back on track. This is an opportunity to invest in our schools 
and allocate the resources needed to address longstanding 
inequities in education exacerbated by the pandemic.
    Democrats invested in students' safety in the classroom 
during the pandemic, and we are investing in recovery efforts 
in the aftermath. House Democrats are working to empower 
teachers, families, and students and address longstanding 
inequities in education.
    In contrast, House Republicans are focused on cutting 
education funding, banning books, and censoring curriculum, 
things I fought for and won in the Supreme Court and won more 
than five decades ago. Let us not go backward.
    Before I gavel out, I ask unanimous consent to insert into 
the record a statement of the National Education Association.
    Mrs. McClain. Without objection.
    Ms. Norton. I want to end with a quote from them that I 
think should resonate across the hearing room: ``Instead of 
supporting students and the educators who match and nurture 
them, some in Congress are looking for scapegoats and 
distractions. Students and families are desperate for 
lawmakers' attention, commitment, and creativity. Parents are 
demanding more from Congress. They want students to have the 
resources they deserve and the opportunities to pursue their 
dreams. They want their children's schools to be safe from gun 
violence, places where students are free to learn, and 
experienced educators are free to teach. If you are serious 
about educating and uplifting American students, please focus 
on what they truly need.''
    I yield back.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you.
    And we are going to go a little bit out of order, but the 
Chair now recognizes Mr. Moskowitz for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Moskowitz. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I apologize for 
my tardiness.
    I want to thank the Committee and the Members who are--who 
have looked at, you know, the anti-Semitism that we have seen 
in our universities and the hearing that we saw many weeks ago 
and the fact that there is discussion to have a staff member 
specifically on the education committees to focus on the 
prevalence of anti-Semitism in our universities.
    I also want to point out that I was the emergency 
management director for the state of Florida during COVID for 
Governor DeSantis. And we did reopen our schools, and that was 
an evidence-based decision at that time because, remember, we 
were dealing with Alpha, right? That was the COVID strain that 
we had. There was no Delta. There was no Omicron. It was Alpha.
    And the data was clear, if you looked at countries in 
Europe, who were ahead of us, that it was not affecting kids.
    And now, in hindsight, it is super clear that the states 
that stayed closed on their schools has dramatically hurt kids, 
minority kids and kids from poverty-stricken neighborhoods. No 
doubt that it has hurt them more by the schools being closed.
    And so, you know, I think, on a go-forward basis, these are 
the things that have to be balanced, and I think Florida got it 
right when it came to handling schools and what to do there.
    But, Madam Chairwoman, I would be remiss if I did not bring 
up something that has not made any sense to me in the 118th 
Congress.
    I am from the city of Parkland. I am a graduate of Marjory 
Stoneman Douglas High School. I just walked the Secretary of 
Education through the freshman building that is a time capsule 
to the shooting of February 14 that happened now 6 years ago.
    The building is exactly as it was the day of the shooting, 
minus the victims. Every backpack, every shoe that fell off, 
the homework that is on the desk that day for that student, 
what is on the dry-erase board, the computers that are on the 
desk, and of course the evidence of the shooting, the bullet 
holes, the blood, the DNA, that--the horrors within those walls 
of what took place there on February 14th.
    And look, I was in the state legislature that worked on the 
Marjory Stoneman Douglas School Safety Act, the bipartisan bill 
that dealt with gun violence, mental health, and safety.
    In Florida, we raised the age to buying a gun to 21, 
instituted red-flag laws which have now been used 12,000 times 
in the state of Florida since we put that in place--12,000 
times law enforcement has deemed someone a danger to themselves 
or a danger to others and has taken their weapons and given 
them a hearing, a due process hearing, to show that they can 
have them back--being used by Republican sheriffs all over the 
state, saving lives; 3-day waiting periods and hundreds of 
millions of dollars for mental health and school safety.
    I know we have disagreements on stopping the gun from 
getting to the school, but I implore my colleagues to look at 
school safety.
    If you--and I have brought my Republican colleagues, some 
of them, through the building--if you look at the failures of 
that building and how the failures of how that school was built 
contributed to the deaths, there is so much we can do on a 
bipartisan basis on school safety: how the doors get locked, 
what the windows are made of, making sure our teachers are 
trained, making sure the students, God forbid something comes 
to school, know where to hide, what corners to go to.
    They did not know that at Douglas. They ran right into the 
site of the shooter. The shooter never entered a classroom. He 
killed either people in the hallway, or he shot through the 
window, you know, the little window that these class doors 
have. All these classrooms had steel doors. The bullets went 
right through them. They were hollow.
    And so, there are lots of things we can do on school 
safety, which is why I started the Bipartisan School Safety 
Caucus with Representative Gonzalez from Uvalde, right? Both of 
us have seen what the failures look like.
    Even if you do everything you can and the gun still gets to 
the school, we have to figure out how we can work on school 
safety, and, you know, I pleaded with my Republican colleagues, 
in the next year, we are focused on all these distractions, but 
there is a lot of bipartisan work we can do to mitigate and 
save kids and teachers and faculty who work in these schools.
    Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you, Mr. Moskowitz.
    I now recognize myself for my closing arguments.
    Thank you, again, very much for taking the time. This issue 
is critically important and how we spend the taxpayers' money, 
how we spend your money, our money, is critically important.
    And I think we need to really focus on, if we really want 
to make the investment, which we do, into our children, that we 
are getting the return on our dollars, right?
    Because one thing I have learned up here is everybody 
always asks for money, and I think it goes back to the old 
Ronald Reagan quote, is we got to make sure that we are getting 
value for our dollars.
    And I am interested--you know, I learned a lot today that 
we do not have a lot of data on how we spent this money, and we 
need to do a better job of getting that data, because maybe we 
are doing it right; I do not know.
    It would not appear--let me put it in a positive note--it 
would appear that we could do a lot better with the declining 
reading and math scores and absenteeism.
    I mean, today's hearing, I think, was a necessary step 
forward to raising awareness of the troubling state of our 
Nation's schools.
    Children are struggling academically, emotionally, and 
developmentally. The poor test scores, chronic absenteeism, I 
mean, it was just interesting, before I came here, I had a 
group of administrators and teachers from my district, and that 
was their No. 1 issue, was chronic absenteeism, right? And I am 
like, ``You got to be kidding me.'' No, chron---and I think you 
are right, Mr. Malkus, is we are out of shape; we have lost 
that muscle memory, right, in the pandemic.
    We have got to get that muscle memory back, and how do we 
do that? How do we do that to make that investment in the 
children, in their future, to really get that return on 
investment?
    I mean, we have a duty as Members of Congress, not only to 
represent our constituents but also to conduct oversight of 
Federal spending programs. It is clear that the Federal 
Government failed. We failed to adequately monitor nearly $190 
billion that Congress allocated to help schools reopen and 
students recover from the pandemic.
    I mean, that just blows my mind. $190 billion and we do not 
have any idea where that money was, and we got 50--50-some that 
we do not even know--that is not even spent yet.
    But I bet we are going to ask for more. You guys want to 
take me up on that bet? I bet.
    There is a lot to learn from the whole-of-government's 
response to the pandemic including lessons on snap decision-
making. In the height of an emergency, Congress quickly passed 
relief bills to help American people and to buoy the economy, 
but this emergency legislation failed to impose necessary 
guardrails to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse despite our 
Republican warnings.
    This Committee has done extensive work to expose the 
massive level of waste, fraud, and abuse of COVID-relief 
programs.
    The School Relief Fund, known as the Elementary and 
Secondary School Relief, ESSER, Fund, was implemented without 
sufficient reporting requirements--shame on us--nor parameters 
for appropriate uses.
    We have got to fix that. We have got to get some answers 
before we spend one more dollar of taxpayer money, because I 
think that will also help us know where to spend it on that is 
giving us the best value for our money. Right?
    As a result, we have seen state and local education 
agencies spending taxpayer dollars on programs that are not 
helping students recover from the pandemic learning loss.
    Test scores are down across the country, and schools are 
pursuing political agendas instead of teaching students the 
fundamentals of reading, writing, arithmetic. I mean, we used--
when the focus was that simple and we kept it simple, we did a 
lot better.
    They should not be keeping parents in the dark about what 
their children are learning. What is the harm in telling 
parents what their kids are learning? I got to be honest; I do 
not see that. I mean, they are children, right?
    They should not be using taxpayer dollars to fund political 
pet projects. It is clear that the status quo is not working, 
in my humble opinion. Something needs to change.
    Today we have discussed some ways in which the state and 
local governments can productively and proactively invest in 
students' achievements that will work. And we agree on it. 
Crazy, right? We agree on it. It is tutoring and extended 
classroom learning.
    We know that expanded school of choice works. We know that 
parents engaging with schools and taking their children's 
school attendance seriously works.
    And we know that teaching evidence-based math and reading 
curriculum works, right? At the end of the day, this crazy 
thing of accountability actually works.
    We have also discussed what does not work. We know that 
installing racial division is damaging to the children. Why are 
we introducing children to problems they do not even know they 
have?
    I do not understand why we are doing that. That seems very 
counterproductive. We know that not grading students fairly is 
damaging to the children because we are distorting their 
reality.
    Some of the best learnings that we get--or that I have 
gotten is from failures, right, not somebody distorting my 
reality. We know that failing to discipline children just leads 
to more disruptive behavior.
    All we have to do is look at what happened last night in 
the city of--in our city here in D.C., two carjackings. When 
there is no consequence to your action, bad things happen. And 
they do not stop happening. They do not get better. They get 
worse.
    Because if your child has a curfew of 11 and they come home 
at 11:30 and there is no consequence to that action, guess what 
behavior that incentivizes? More bad behavior.
    It is not that tough. We have rules. We have regulations, 
and we need to begin to discipline and enforce those rules. And 
the sooner we enforce those rules, the sooner children 
understand right from wrong, and maybe we can nip some of this 
in the bud as they get older.
    As parents, we must advocate for our children, and as 
elected representatives and as Members of this Committee, we 
must take these issues seriously. Our Nation's children, or the 
so-called pandemic cohort, do not deserve to be left behind.
    In closing, I do want to thank our panelists once again for 
your important testimony today. I cannot thank you enough for 
the work you do for the investment of our future, and that is 
with our children.
    And I thank you for the fact-based evidence.
    Ms. Forte, I look forward to your evidence, I really do, 
because this is an important--these are important issues.
    And, without objection, all Members have 5 legislative days 
within which to submit materials and additional written 
questions for the witnesses which will be forwarded to the 
witnesses.
    If there is no further business, without objection, the 
Subcommittee stands adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 3:57 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

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