[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 19 (Tuesday, March 3, 1998)]
[House]
[Page H703]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   CONGRESS TO LOOK INTO MATH-SCIENCE EDUCATION AND NATION'S SCIENCE 
                                 POLICY

  (Mr. EHLERS asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. EHLERS. Mr. Speaker, earlier a colleague from Maine registered 
concern about the results of the third International Mathematics and 
Science Study, which indicated that in the area of mathematics we were 
at the bottom of the list of Nations who took the test, with the 
exception of Cyprus and South Africa. And in science we are very little 
better. We only passed up Italy, Lithuania, Cyprus and one other 
country.
  This is indeed a sad state of affairs. I appreciate my colleague's 
interest, and I also want to mention that the Speaker of the House, the 
gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrich), and the chairman of the 
Committee on Science, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner), 
earlier during the previous session decided that this was a serious 
problem that had to be addressed by the Committee on Science. Mr. 
Sensenbrenner has commissioned me to head up the effort on the part of 
the Committee on Science to look into math-science education as well as 
our Nation's science policy.
  In particular, we will be having a hearing tomorrow in which we will 
have Mr. Bill Nye, the Science Guy; a representative from Sesame 
Street; and others, talking in particular about the question of how we 
can maintain interest among our students in science and mathematics as 
they get older. I encourage the Members of the House to attend that 
hearing, and I am sure we will learn a great deal about what we can do 
as a Nation to improve our students' performance in mathematics and 
science in elementary and secondary schools.

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