[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 147 (Tuesday, October 26, 1999)]
[House]
[Page H10841]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]







      COMPUTERS ARE NOT NECESSARILY THE ANSWER TO EDUCATION CRISIS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DUNCAN. Madam Speaker, usually when I rise to speak in the period 
of special orders it is to talk about some specific bill or specific 
legislation. Tonight I am doing something a little different and 
discussing something that I think has the potential of becoming a 
problem in some ways, and I would just like to call some attention to 
it and get some people, hopefully, to start thinking about it.
  In doing so, I will start by reading a quote that I read, I think 
sometime last year in, I believe, an Associated Press story, and it was 
a quote from David Geleanter, who is a professor of computer science at 
Yale University. He said this. ``Computers themselves are fine. But we 
are in the middle of an education catastrophe. Children are not being 
taught to read, write, know arithmetic or history. In those 
circumstances, to bring a glitzy toy into the classroom seems to me to 
be a disaster. It reinforces our worst tendencies. The idea that 
children are in educational trouble because they do not have access to 
enough glitz and what they really need is a bigger database is 
staggeringly ludicrous. They need practice in the basics.'' That is a 
quote by a professor of computer science at Yale.
  What I am saying tonight is let us do not forget the basics in 
education. Sure, it is important to learn about computers, but we seem 
to be worse off with the computer today in thinking that it is the end-
all of education and we are neglecting the basics in many, many ways. 
Children still need to learn to read and write and know arithmetic and 
know history and the basics.
  Secondly, along this same line, I heard Tony Kornheiser, one of the 
sports columnists for the Washington Post and on ESPN and so forth, and 
he mentioned in a column, and also I heard him on the radio talking 
about this one time, about three young men who had called him at 
different times during the time of the last World Series, and he said 
they each asked for Tony Kornheiser's e-mail address. He said when he 
told them that this was Tony Kornheiser to whom they were speaking, he 
said they got so flustered that a couple of them hung up, and one got 
so nervous that he could hardly speak. He asked the question, are we 
raising a generation of young people who are spending so much time in 
front of the television set and so much time in front of the computer 
screens that they are not developing the social skills that they really 
need or that people have developed in past years.
  We became concerned as a society because children were spending so 
many thousands and thousands of hours in front of the television set. 
So we took them from in one of one screen and placed them in front of 
another screen called a computer, and I am just wondering if they are 
not isolating themselves. It is getting where people can shop at home, 
work at home, and we can all become Unibomber hermits if we want to, I 
suppose, but I do not think it will be good for society.
  I tell young people at home to watch a little television. I have no 
objection to that. Learn the computer. We all have to do that today. It 
is an important and valuable thing. But every once in a while get out 
and get involved with a real life human being. Life will mean more if 
you do. Unfortunately, we are having fewer and fewer people who are 
joining the American Legion and the Kiwanis and the Shrine and all the 
various civic and charitable organizations that have been so very 
important to this country for so many years.
  Thirdly, Madam Speaker, I heard a few months ago Barbara Walters on 
20/20 one night saying she was going to present the most important hour 
she had ever presented on television. That got my curiosity up because 
she has been on television for so long. And what it was, it was a 
program devoted to warning parents about the sick, evil things that are 
on the Internet. There again, that is another facet of this same 
problem.
  I am not against computers. I am all in favor of computers. But what 
I am saying is we still need to make sure our young people learn the 
basics in school, like reading, writing, and history. We still need to 
make sure that our young people develop the social skills that they 
need to survive.
  My father told me many years ago, half jokingly and half seriously, 
that the problems of this country grew worse when they stopped putting 
front porches on the houses. People stopped visiting with each other. 
They tell us many people do not know their next door neighbors. All I 
am saying is we need to make sure we do not get isolated unto ourselves 
to where we do not really know people and get involved helping other 
people in their lives.
  During this program by Barbara Walters, she told the story of a 
little boy who had actually become involved with such terrible things 
over the Internet that he ended up with such rage built up in him that 
he killed another child. Barbara Walters thought it was so very 
important to warn parents about some of these horrible things that are 
on the Internet and that children are exposed to that they were not 
exposed to so many years ago.
  So all I am saying tonight is we need to be aware of those three 
things, those three concerns, because it is very, very important to 
this country and to its future that we make sure that young people get 
the benefits of all this new technology but are not harmed by it.

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