[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 129 (Wednesday, September 24, 1997)]
[House]
[Page H7738]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    GET BACK TO BASICS IN EDUCATION

  (Mr. TIAHRT asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. TIAHRT. Mr. Speaker, somewhere in the education debate, we have 
lost the reason we send our children to school. If we ask parents, they 
want their kids to capture the ability to learn, something their 
children can take with them into higher education or into the work 
environment so that they can pursue the American dream. But the 
parents' wishes are ignored. Instead the debate is about national 
education standards that measure how much paper teachers can produce 
and how much money we can spend, not how well our children are 
learning.
  This Nation is blessed with many wonderful teachers, but they have 
been betrayed. In most school systems, less than half the money 
actually makes its way into the classroom. The teachers are diverted 
from scholastics to social engineering, and the paperwork demanded by 
the education bureaucracy steals teaching time. Education is about 
learning, discipline, respect for authority, and scholastics. Let us 
get back to the basics in education.

                          ____________________