[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 20 (Tuesday, February 13, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1324-S1325]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mrs. FEINSTEIN:
  S. 307. A bill to provide grants to State educational agencies and 
local educational agencies for the provision of classroom-related 
technology training for elementary and secondary school teachers; to 
the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, today Representative Lois Capps and I 
are introducing legislation to help teachers use technology in their 
teaching, the Teacher Technology Training Act of 2001.
  This bill has three major provisions:
  It authorizes $100 million for state education departments to award 
grants to local public school districts on the basis of need to train 
teachers in how to use technology in the classroom.
  It specifies that grants may be used to strengthen instruction and 
learning, provide professional development, and pay the costs of 
teacher training in using technology in the classroom.
  It requires the Secretary of Education to evaluate the technology 
training programs for teachers developed by school districts within 
three years.
  This bill is needed because teachers say they need to learn how to 
use computers and other technology in their teaching. A 1999 Education 
Week poll found that 27 percent of teachers have had no training in 
computers, 31 percent have had one to five hours, and 17 percent have 
had six to ten hours. This means that 75 percent of teachers have had 
less than ten hours of training in how to use computers. In a 1999 
survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Education, only 23 percent 
of teachers said they felt ``well prepared'' to integrate educational 
technology into instruction. ``Most teachers want to learn, but they 
say it takes time and they need help,'' says Linda Roberts, Director of 
Educational Technology, U.S. Department of Education.
  In many schools, the students know more about how to use computers 
than the teachers do. In one Kentucky school profiled by Inside 
Technology Training magazine, the students run the school's computer 
systems. The article quoted the school district's technology 
coordinator as saying that the students had ``long surpassed'' what the 
teachers could do and reported that one student had recently trained 
twenty teachers on software for Web page construction (``Fast Times at 
Kentucky High,'' Inside Technology training, June 1998).
  In addition to helping teachers teach, technology proficiency is 
becoming crucial to survival. Most good jobs require experience using 
computers. Former U.S. Commerce Secretary William M. Daley has said, 
``Opportunities are now dependent upon a person's ability to use 
computers and engage in using the Internet,'' CQ Weekly, ``Digital 
Haves and Have Nots,'' April 17, 1999.
  The economy of California is a case in point as it shifts away from 
manufacturing and toward higher-skill service and technology 
industries. Employers are placing a high premium on the computer skills 
necessary for these positions. Students are better prepared when their 
teachers are well trained. We cannot educate students for the 
increasingly technological workplace without trained teachers.
  We have made great efforts to make technology available to students 
in their classrooms. Eighty percent of California's schools have 
Internet access.
  But computers are of little value if people do not know how to use 
them and in school, they can become diversions or entertainment, 
instead of learning tools without trained teachers.
  If we expect teachers to be effective, we must give them up-to-date 
skills, knowledge, and tools. This includes training.
  By introducing this bill, I am not suggesting that technology is a 
cure-all for the problems in our schools. Technology is one of many 
teaching and learning tools. It can bring some efficiencies to 
learning, for example, providing a new way to do math and spelling 
drills, making learning to write easier, providing easier access to 
information that without a computer is time-consuming and cumbersome to 
obtain.

[[Page S1325]]

  We expect a great deal from our teachers and students. We must give 
them the resources they need. This bill is one step.
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