[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 106 (Tuesday, September 12, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8357-S8359]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
EDUCATION
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I know we are very much involved in this
extremely important decision on the question of trade with China, but I
do want to take a few moments this morning to address another issue
which I think is of central concern to families across this country.
I think it is particularly appropriate that we give additional focus
and attention to the priority of education policy as we are coming into
the final days of this session of Congress. I think there is a
heightened interest in this issue as some 53 million children are going
back to school. They have started going back to school in the last 10
days and are going back to school this week. And, fifteen million
children are going to colleges, going back to school now, this week and
next.
Parents are wondering what the circumstances will be for their
children this school year and in the future, and who is going to ensure
their children are going to get an adequate education and will move
ahead. Parents understand full well that education is key to the future
for their children and, obviously, education is key to our country's
future as we are moving more and more into a new information-age and
technologically-advanced global economy. This is a matter of enormous
urgency.
We understand that there is a fundamental responsibility for the
education of children in the elementary and secondary high schools of
this country at the local and State level and that the role of the
Federal Government is much more limited. Approximately 7 cents out of
every dollar that is spent locally actually comes from the Federal
Government.
In my travels around my State of Massachusetts, in talking to
parents, they are interested in a partnership. They are interested in
their children doing well. They want support for programs that work,
and they are less interested in the division of authority between local
and State governments and the participation of Congress in assisting
academic achievement.
The backbone of congressional participation in the education of
children is the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. That is an act
of enormous importance. It is not only myself who is saying this, but
we have the statements of the majority leader, Senator Lott, who in
January 1999 indicated:
Education is going to be a central issue this year. . . .
For starters, we must reauthorize the Elementary and
Secondary Education Act. That is important.
Remarks to the Conference of Mayors on January 29, 1999:
But education is going to have a lot of attention, and it's
not just going to be words. . . .
Press conference, June 22, 1999:
Education is number one on the agenda for Republicans in
the Congress this year.
Remarks to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, February 1, 2000:
We're going to work very hard on education. I have
emphasized that every year I've been majority leader. . . .
And Republicans are committed to doing that.
A speech to the National Conference of State Legislatures, February
3, 2000:
We must reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education
Act. . . . Education will be a high priority in this
Congress.
Congress Daily, April 20, 2000:
. . . Lott said last week his top priorities in May include
agriculture sanctions bill, Elementary and Secondary
Education Act reauthorization, and passage of four
appropriations bills.
Senate, May 1:
This is very important legislation. I hope we can debate it
seriously and have amendments in the education area. Let's
talk education.
Press Stakeout, May 2.
Question: Senator, on ESEA, have you scheduled a cloture
vote on that?
Senator Lott: No, I haven't scheduled a cloture vote. . . .
But education is number one in the minds of the American
people all across the country and every State, including my
own State. For us to have a good, healthy, and even a
protracted debate and amendments on education I think is the
way to go.
Those are the assurances we have been given by the majority leader,
and we have had 6 days of discussion about elementary education. Two of
those days were discussion only. We had a total of eight amendments,
seven rollcalls, one voice vote, and three of those seven were
virtually unanimous. So we have not had this debate which not only the
majority leader has said is important, but which families believe is
important. The reason they believe it is important is because of the
substance of education policy that will be included in that debate. I
remind the Senate where we are on the expansion of the number of
children enrolled in school. In K-12 enrollment, it is at an all-time
high. In 1990, 46 million K-12 children were enrolled, and by the year
2000, 53 million children. There are increasing pressures on local
communities across the country.
This chart shows that student enrollment will continue to rise over
the next century. There are 53 million students enrolled in the year
2000, but if you look at the projections, 94 million are estimated to
be enrolled by the year 2100--41 million more students over the next
century, virtually doubling the Nation's population in education which
will require building schools and hiring more qualified teachers all
across this country.
This is a matter of enormous importance to national policy and family
policy. We believe we should not give short shrift to debating what our
policies may be. We may have some differences on different sides of the
aisle, but we should be debating these policy issues.
On the issue of priorities this year, such as bankruptcy--which we
debated for 16 days, we had 55 amendments; 16 days on bankruptcy, 55
amendments. As I mentioned, we had eight amendments on elementary and
secondary education. Three were unanimous and one vote was by a voice
vote. So we really have not met our responsibilities, I do not believe,
on debating education policy.
I strongly favor Federal commitment and investment in
programs that have been tried, tested, and proven to be
effective and that can be implemented at the local level and
have a positive impact on the children.
I want to take a moment to bring the Senate up to speed about what is
happening in schools across the country. More students are taking the
SAT test: In 1980, 33 percent; 1985, 36 percent; 40 percent in 1990; 42
percent in 1995; 44 percent in 2000. More and more of the children in
this country are recognizing the importance of taking the scholastic
aptitude test. Children are aware they have to apply themselves, as
reflected in the number of students taking the test, and that college
education is the key to success in America. Also, the results have been
positive. Even though more students are taking the SAT, and the
students are more diverse, math scores are the highest in 30 years.
But, in order to sustain the gains made, children need to continue to
have well-qualified teachers, they need an investment in preschool
programs, they need afterschool programs, they have to have available
to them the latest technologies so they can move ahead in their
academic work.
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This is another chart showing more students are taking advanced math
and science classes. This reflects 1990 to 2000: Precalculus, in 1990,
was 31 percent. It is now 44 percent. Calculus, 19 percent in 1990; 24
percent in 2000. In physics, 44 percent in 1990 to 49 percent in 2000.
We are finding more students are taking college level courses,
advanced placement courses, the more challenging courses, and they are
doing better and better in these undertakings.
However, our work is far from over. We cannot get away from the fact
that there are many others in our country, in urban areas and rural
areas, who are facing extraordinary challenges. Those disadvantaged
children are really the ones on which we are focused in terms of the
Federal elementary and secondary education programs.
Basically, there are important ways in which we can give some help
and assistance to these children. We believe in smaller class sizes,
with well-trained teachers, and afterschool programs. We believe in
making sure the children are going to be ready to learn, either through
the Head Start Program or through helping and assisting local groups to
try to give help and assistance to those children as they are
preparing, even for Head Start, the ready-to-learn program, which
basically was a goal we agreed to--Democrats and Republicans alike--in
their conference in Charlottesville about 10 years ago. That is an area
in which we have not been able to gain support, although we have a
bipartisan proposal that is actually currently pending--would be
pending were we to get back to the elementary and secondary education
bill.
We believe the success of the STAR Program in Tennessee and also in
the State of Wisconsin demonstrates the importance of smaller
classrooms. Also, all of the various studies have shown quite clearly
the importance of having well-trained teachers.
We can learn from States that have moved ahead in providing adequate
compensation of teachers, such as Connecticut, North Carolina, and
other States, and that have shown that when you have teachers who are
well trained and well paid, you get an enhanced academic achievement
for these students.
We support afterschool programs--they have a tremendous impact on
helping children to enhance their academic achievement.
We should also make college more accessible to every qualified
student through GEAR UP and college tuition help, the excellent
proposal that has been advanced by Vice President Gore to provide a tax
deduction for tuition for children, for parents whose children are
going on to college.
Also, in the area of skills training, we tried to address that in an
amendment. We actually were able to get a majority in the Senate to
support the restoring of a training program, but we have been unable to
get that implemented because there was a point of order made against
it. We had to amend a bill which did not make it possible for us to
carry that forward into a conference.
All of these are matters of enormous importance. We have been
impressed--I have--by the debate and discussion at the national level
about the Vice President's proposal to understand that learning has to
be a continuum and that skills training has to be a continuum.
I often am reminded of the fact that when I first was elected to the
Senate, we had a very efficient shipyard down in Fall River, MA. The
workers who worked there, their fathers worked there, their
grandfathers worked there. More often than not, the sons wanted to work
there. But there has been a change. That yard has been closed. Now what
we find out is--not only there but across my own State of Massachusetts
and across the country--everyone who enters the job market is going to
have, on average, seven different jobs over the course of their
lifetime.
We have to be able to have continuing education and training programs
accessible and available to young and old alike, so that people are
going to be able to upgrade their skills. That is enormously important.
It is enormously important not only to the young, but it is enormously
important to communities such as mine, Massachusetts, where we have an
older workforce--we have a transition from a lot of the older
industries into newer kinds of industries--and where the real
difference is in the development of skills.
We would have the opportunity to address many of those issues I have
very briefly mentioned in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.
We certainly would be able to address universal preschool, the issues
of qualified teachers, and the importance of skills training that is
going to be school based. We could address modern and safe schools. We
would be able to address afterschool opportunities, smaller class
sizes, and the higher education issues.
Lifelong training would perhaps not be exactly targeted in those
programs, but we will have an opportunity to address that, I believe,
in the final budget negotiations that are going to be taking place
between the two Houses, and with the appropriations. Being able to have
a clear indication about where we in the Congress stand on these issues
could be enormously instructive in terms of allocating scarce
resources.
I just want to say, we are continually frustrated that we have not
been able to get this matter back up in the Senate for debate. We note
that we were on a two-track agenda just last week, where we did the
trade issues during the day and the appropriations in the evening. We
would like to suggest that we could do the trade issues, as they are
going along, but we are prepared to move ahead to consider the
Elementary and Secondary Education Act in the evenings. We could
consider it this week, next week, until we have reached a conclusion to
it. We recognize the importance of it.
If we are looking around for priorities--we heard last week about the
importance of a lockbox; and we ought to certainly address that issue
before we adjourn--but I daresay for most families, this week is
education week as their children go back to school. They want to know
what they might be able to expect from the Congress, what kind of
partnership should they be able to expect, and we should not just give
them silence, which we effectively are giving them.
I welcome the fact that this week we are having Vice President Gore
speak on the various aspects of education for a series of days in
different parts of the country. I would like to see a national debate
on education. I would like to see him out there speaking about it. I
would like to have seen Governor Bush speaking about it. I would like
to see the engagement of their ideas in the forums of their debates.
But we ought to be discussing these issues here on the floor of the
Senate. That is something I think is of importance.
Every day we let this go by, every day that we refuse to bring this
up, I think we are denying the American people the kind of debate on an
issue they care about, which they deserve. We hear both of the
candidates talk about education. Let the record just demonstrate that
we, on our side, want to get back and debate this issue. We want to
take action on it. We are prepared to go forward on it. We do not need
phone calls from the Vice President on this. We are prepared to go
ahead--and go ahead today, tonight, any other time, on it.
We wish the Governor would call the Republican leadership and say:
Look, I am interested in the education issues as well. Why don't you go
ahead and have a good debate on that issue and in the Senate. Let me
tell you what my positions are. Let's have a debate. Let's let the
American people understand. Let's give them a window into this
discussion, which is so important for families in this country. Let's
not exclude them.
I can imagine, as the Vice President is going around talking about
education, there are going to be people saying: What is happening in
the Congress? I hope he understands that we, on this side, are prepared
to have these matters debated, discussed, and resolved. We wish we
could join with our colleagues on the other side to do so.
Historically, the issues on education have never been really
partisan. We have some differences in terms of accountability, which
the Vice President strongly supports. But we believe we ought to be
able to have a debate and discussion in the Senate on this issue. We
think we are denying the American people the opportunity.
So I would invite the Governor to contact the Republican leadership
here
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and say: If you are really interested in education, let's bring the
elementary and secondary education bill back to the floor. Let's debate
it.
We are glad to consider it in the evening time. We have now just
about a month left in this session of the Senate. We ought to be
resolving the issues on education, on the Patients' Bill of Rights, on
prescription drugs, and on the increase in the minimum wage. If we did
those four, if we took care of those four issues, I think we could say
that this was a Congress of considerable achievement and considerable
accomplishment.
Those are central, focused issues about which both of the candidates
are talking. But they are speaking all over the country; they are not
speaking to us here in the Senate. We have no debate on minimum wage.
We are not getting back to the minimum wage or prescription drugs. We
aren't getting back to education.
Since we are not going to be able to do that and have it rescheduled,
we are going to have to take whatever steps we possibly can on whatever
bills that are going to come up in the remaining days. We want to do
this well. We want to do it with the understanding of the leadership on
both sides. But if we are not going to be able to get focus and
attention on these issues, then we are going to have to take whatever
opportunity we have, on any of the measures that are coming down the
line, in trying to press the people's business in the form of
education. And that I commit we will do.
I thank the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senator from
Minnesota is recognized.
Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I know my colleague from Maine wants 5
minutes to respond. I ask unanimous consent that after my colleague
from Maine speaks, my colleague from California have 5 minutes as in
morning business, and that I then be able to introduce the amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Maine.
Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, first, I thank my friend and colleague
from Minnesota for his usual graciousness in allowing me to respond to
the comments made by my friend from Massachusetts, Senator Kennedy.
Let's look at the facts. My colleagues on this side of the aisle have
repeatedly said that the reauthorization of the Elementary and
Secondary Education Act is our top priority. We produced a very good
bill from the HELP Committee on which the Presiding Officer serves so
ably. We produced a bill that provides a substantial increase in
Federal funding for education to help improve education and the lives
of children all over this Nation.
We also adopted an important, innovative, new approach, one that
recognizes that Washington is not the fount of all wisdom when it comes
to educational policy. We recognize that schools have different needs,
that some need new computers. Others need to hire new math teachers.
Still others need to concentrate on providing more programs for gifted
and talented students. Schools have different needs. They want to
tailor their policies to the needs of the local community.
That is what our bill would do. It would give schools more
flexibility in spending Federal dollars while holding them accountable
for what counts; that is, results, improved student achievement. We
want to get away from the Washington-knows-best approach and let local
school boards, teachers, and parents make the decisions about what
their children best need.
Unfortunately, our efforts were derailed by our colleagues on the
other side of the aisle who insisted on weighing down the education
bill with issues completely unrelated to education. The majority
leader, Senator Lott, has tried repeatedly to get a unanimous consent
agreement that would allow us to return to the education bill that both
sides agree is so important. Unfortunately, the latest effort was once
again met with demands for unrelated, nongermane amendments that would
sink our ability to produce this important legislation this year.
Those are the facts. Our side stands ready to return to the ESEA
bill. We believe that is an extremely important priority. We are very
proud of the bill we have produced. We believe it would make a real
difference in the lives of American children. We would like to go
forward. Unfortunately, we have been met with obstacle after obstacle
from our colleagues on Senator Kennedy's side of the aisle.
That is unfortunate. But the American people deserve to know why we
have been unable to complete our work in this very important arena.
I yield the floor and again thank my colleague from Minnesota for his
graciousness.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California is recognized.
Mrs. BOXER. I thank the Chair.
Mr. President, I add my thanks to my fine colleague for allowing me
to have this 5 minutes.
I say to my dear friend from Maine that we all seem to be saying we
want to bring up the ESEA so we can debate education. Yet the format
under which we would be going back to this bill would be a closed
format. Those of us who think it is important, for example, that there
be school safety, that we be allowed to offer sensible gun laws so we
can, in fact, keep these guns away from these kids wouldn't be able to
do it. We could not offer an amendment on school modernization. We
could not offer an amendment to expand afterschool opportunities,
smaller class sizes, more qualified teachers, and accountability for
results.
When you say you want to discuss education, yet you shut out the
ability for those of us on this side to offer these amendments that, by
the way, many people in the country support by majorities of 80
percent, it seems to me you are not offering anything at all.
The interesting point is that my friends on the other side say: Well,
you are just trying to delay things. Nothing could be further from the
truth. In 1994, Phil Gramm on your side offered a gun amendment on the
ESEA. All we are asking for is the opportunity to debate this and
debate it so that it is relevant to the American people.
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