[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 13 (Wednesday, February 5, 1997)]
[House]
[Page H290]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 PREPARING AMERICA FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

  (Ms. DeLAURO asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms.DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, last night President Clinton laid out an 
action plan to prepare America for the 21st century. We too need to 
dedicate ourselves to meeting the challenges that lie ahead, and among 
those challenges none is more crucial than that of providing all of our 
people with the opportunity to get the best education in the world. Our 
goal must be to ensure that a quality education is available and 
affordable to every American.
  Making education available to all of our kids means setting rigorous 
national standards that stress the basics: reading, writing, and 
arithmetic. Making education affordable to all our people means passing 
a new college tuition tax deduction and creating new scholarships to 
help our families send their kids to college.
  We all know that an educated work force is the key to our economic 
future. We have to invest in education, not only because it is the 
right thing to do, but because it is the one thing that we must do if 
we are to continue to be a world economic power in the next century. 
Public education has been the great equalizer in this country. Let us 
continue to make it so to achieve economic opportunity.

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