[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 24 (Tuesday, February 27, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1603-S1606]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
EDUCATION
Mr. REED. Mr. President, the last election demonstrated clearly and
graphically the importance of education as a concern to the American
people. It is perhaps their highest priority. They have indicated
overwhelmingly in poll after poll that education reform and improvement
is something they desperately want and that this Nation desperately
needs. They have also indicated their top priority for the use of the
Federal budget is investment in education. Indeed, 81 percent of
individuals polled recently indicated they would approve of a bold
national commitment to improve education similar to our commitment to
build the Interstate Highway System and to do many other projects of
critical importance to the American public.
It is, indeed, fitting then that President Bush would embrace this
notion of education reform. I commend him for his interest. I welcome
the beginning of a very serious debate about how we can at the Federal
level assist local communities to improve elementary and secondary
education in the United States.
We should begin, I believe, by recognizing that over the past 8
years, we have made progress. We established in Goals 2000 a focus on
educational reform. In the reauthorization of the Elementary and
Secondary Education Act in 1994, we insisted that high standards be the
benchmark and the measuring rod of our commitment to educational
reform.
We have also over the last few years passed legislation to diminish
class size and to repair and renovate crumbling schools throughout this
country. So we begin this process with success, but we also begin with
the idea that we have to do much more, and we have to do it together.
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We recognize that historically, constitutionally, and culturally,
educational policy is the province of State and local governments.
The Federal Government does play a role, and we have played this role
quite robustly since 1965. The role may be described as encouraging
innovation at the local level and also overcoming inertia at the local
level so that every student in America, particularly students from
disadvantaged backgrounds, have the opportunity to seize all the
opportunities of this great country. This has been our role since 1965.
A characteristic of Federal participation in elementary and secondary
education is that it is targeted, particularly with respect to low-
income students. We have an obligation to continue this support. We
have an obligation to continue to work with the States and localities,
in a sense as their junior partner, but as their important partner, to
ensure that every child in this country will have the ability to
achieve and obtain a quality public education.
President Bush's proposal at this juncture is an outline, it is a
prospectus, it is a vision, if you will, for some of the things he
would like to see done to improve education. There are elements which
we all share, including concentration and focus on high standards and
accountability, emphasis on reading, teacher quality, and school
safety. And there are other elements with which we disagree.
Among the first order of these elements is the notion of vouchers. I
am pleased to see or at least sense that the President has retreated a
bit from his campaign discussions about vouchers, recognizing this is
not the answer for addressing the needs of our public school system. We
have to emphasize parental involvement, teacher preparation, resources
to improve curriculum--things that have to be done in the context of
public education.
I hope if we continue to emphasize these approaches and deemphasize
vouchers that we will make much more progress as we work on educational
reform in this Congress.
There is another aspect of the President's proposal that has drawn, I
think, justifiable criticism. That is the notion of block granting all
of the Federal funds, essentially giving the States a check and saying:
Do what you will.
We recognize that we are, as I said previously, the junior partners
in this enterprise. Federal spending is roughly 7 percent of all
spending on elementary and secondary education. Our focus has always
been on assisting the neediest children.
To put all of our funds into a block grant and simply hand it over to
the States would, I think, lead to a loss of focus, and, more
dangerously, a loss of emphasis by Federal dollars on those poor
disadvantaged students. There are many examples of how a block grant
has distorted what was a good program before. One which comes to mind
is library books. Back in 1965, we specifically committed, as an aid to
local school systems, to provide funding to acquire library books. In
fact, many of the books on the shelves today, if you open them up, are
stamped ``ESEA, 1965.'' It was a successful program. It put books on
the shelves. But, more importantly, it put books in the hands of
students throughout this country.
Years ago, this specific program was rolled into a larger block
grant. What we have seen is that libraries throughout this country in
the schools in America are not what they should be. We have seen books
on the shelves that are grossly out of date. Interestingly enough, an
effort on my part to publicize and address the lack of appropriate
library books through bipartisan legislation was reported in the
Washington Times on February 20. Most interesting, though, was a
response on February 23 by a school librarian that showed some of the
real frustrations that school personnel face with the lack of focused
Federal funding for specific programs.
This school librarian, who has worked for 27 years, saw the article
and then described the problem in her words.
The money coming down for spending has been diverted by
administrators for technology, she says. The computers are
bought with book money and the administrators can brag about
how wired the schools are. The librarians are ordered to keep
the old books on the shelves and count everything, including
unbound periodicals and old filmstrips dating back to the
1940s.
And most of all keep their mouth shut about the books--just
count and keep quiet. Now do you wonder why librarians keep
quiet?
The point is, there is an advantage and value in Federal programs
that have specific and explicit policy choices for localities. What we
sometimes get in flexibility is lost in focus. We should be conscious
and careful as we embrace educational reform to be very clear about
those programs we believe should be supported specifically--something
like library books--and make sure our education funding is not lumped
into some vast category where local administrators, under severe
pressure, can find ways to distort our intent to support a specific
program.
There is another aspect, too, of the issue of block grants. People
will say: This is not about money. If you just give the States more
flexibility, they don't need the extra money.
It turns out that most public school reform is based not only upon
administrative changes but increased resources for schools. That is the
case in Texas. Preceding Governor Bush's term, in fact, going back
several terms before that, Texas embarked on a process of
redistributing its local school aid. In fact, today it is one of those
States which takes resources from wealthy districts and gives them to
poor districts. That process began before the testing regime was put in
place in Texas.
One can argue that as much as testing might have been a source of
improvement, just as much or perhaps more was the fact that now for the
first time, local school systems are getting the needed funding to
conduct the kinds of programs--buying technology, professional
development--that are so necessary.
We have to be conscious, too, as we talk about the Federal role, to
recognize if we are going to talk big, we have to have the resources to
back it up. It is not all done simply by changing the chairs around the
table, by talking about noneconomic reforms, nonresource reforms.
There is another issue, too, that the President has advanced. This is
an issue for which I commend him. It is an issue in terms of
accountability that I fought for in 1994, along with my colleague,
Senator Bingaman.
I was a Member of the other body. Senator Bingaman was here. In the
context of the debate on Goals 2000, we attempted for the first time to
talk about not only standards that children must achieve, but the
resources those schools must have so these children can meet those
standards.
During the course of this debate, we ran into significant opposition,
principally opposition from our colleagues on the Republican side. They
objected, sometimes in principle, to the notion we would be telling
local school systems what to do.
I think this debate was important because it recognized for the first
time that Federal resources should not be committed without tough
standards of accountability, and that these tough standards should be a
way to move the system forward. It recognized when we have tough
standards and adequate resources you are more likely to get the kind of
improvement in educational quality that we all desperately want.
After the Goals 2000 debate, we started discussions on the
reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965.
This legislation focused on changes to title I. In the context of this
debate, I proposed several amendments which would deal with corrective
action, to essentially require local school districts to identify those
schools that were failing the State standards, and then develop a plan
of action that would bring those schools up to the State standards.
Once again, we ran into opposition. I was successful in passing an
amendment that exists today in law that requires the State to take
corrective action for title I schools following several years of
failing to meet the State educational standards. That is on the books
today. In fact, the States are already identifying those schools that
are not performing up to standards.
In 1998-99, 8,800 schools were identified as needing improvement by
the States. Now, interestingly enough, the States are not required to
transmit specific school names to the Federal Department of Education,
so we don't
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know specifically what schools are failing, but we know there are at
least 8,800 schools throughout the country that are not meeting State
standards.
Unfortunately, because of the time to work through the process of
evaluation and corrective action, it is not yet clear whether or not
the States have taken effective corrective action. But this notion of
accountability, this notion of making sure the States look at their
schools, evaluate their schools, propose corrective action and follow
through is not a new idea. It exists today for the title I schools. I
hope in the process of this debate and reauthorization we can expand
the concept of accountability to all schools, that we can put in place
real accountability standards, and that these standards will move
forward dramatically the educational achievement of our children
throughout the United States.
Again, another aspect of the President's proposal related to
accountability is his insistence to date that we mandate States to
require testing of each student from grades 3 to 8 in order to receive
Federal education funding. We all recognize that testing is an
essential part of education, but I hope we all recognize that testing
alone is not sufficient to improve our schools. Once again we have to
have the resources and once again we have to have the commitment to
ensure that the resources go to those schools that are most in need.
Tests should be an indicator of how well a school is doing, but they
should not be a high-risk evaluation of an individual child, in my
view. They are diagnostic tools. We can use them to see generally how
well a school is doing. But, as we have been cautioned by the National
Research Council, ``no single test score can be considered a definitive
measure of a student's knowledge,'' and that ``an educational decision
that would have a major impact on a test taker should not be based
solely or automatically on a single test score.''
As we approach this issue of testing, let me be clear: If we are
evaluating how a school or school system is doing as a way to provide
additional resources or additional corrective action, these tests can
be valuable. But if we allow these tests on a one-time basis to
determine the future of students, we will be making a very significant
mistake.
Also, we should understand the science of testing is a difficult one
indeed, and there are many consequences, both intended and unintended,
from the application of testing in schools. Again, I think it is
appropriate to look at the example of Texas since it is so much in the
forefront of our discussions these days. The Texas Assessment of
Academic Skills, the TAAS, the test that is used in Texas, has been
promoted as almost miraculous in its ability to generate significant
gains in educational improvement. But there is evidence that indeed the
success reflected in TAAS is not also shown when other tests are
applied to roughly the same group of students in Texas. The National
Assessment of Educational Progress is a well recognized test, and
studies have shown significant differences between the success rates of
students in Texas on that test versus the success rate touted by Texas
officials using their own tests.
We have to be very careful about State tests because there is both
the technical difficulty of developing those tests and also the
political pressure to make tests that everyone will succeed in passing
because it helps avoid tough choices about helping schools and tough
actions about ensuring that schools that do not work are adequately
addressed.
So we have a situation where we have to be careful about the test. We
also have to be careful about the effect on students. One other
statistic from Texas is that students who are leaving high school short
of a diploma and taking a GED instead has increased in Texas
significantly from approximately 47,000 in 1989 to 74,000 in 1996. That
is an increase of 57 percent. The increase nationally was only 26
percent. So we have to ask ourselves, were people dropping out or being
subtly or not so subtly encouraged to leave because of the testing
regime that was in place in Texas?
There is another aspect that I alluded to: Not just those who choose
to take the GED but those who choose to leave school entirely, forfeit
the opportunity to improve their education, at least temporarily, and
seek other means, either working or simply just leaving school. Once
again, if you look at the cohort class of 1991, the year TAAS was
implemented, the percentage of students who progressed from grade 6 to
graduation dropped from 65 percent to 55 percent for black and Hispanic
students and from 75 percent to 68 percent for white students. Once
again you have to ask yourself: Is this testing causing unintended
consequences: Dropouts and alternate approaches to educational
attainment, like the GED? We have to be careful as we go forward.
We also have to consider another characteristic, and that is whether
or not all the students taking the test are being counted in the test
results. Another statistic in Texas is the increase in those students
who are being classified as ``in special education,'' who are then not
counted in a school's accountability ratings.
Again, we have to be very careful as we go forward on this testing
issue to ensure that these tests are benchmarks of school performance
and are not unfairly marking students on a one-time basis for success
or failure, or driving students away from school when in fact school
could be more beneficial.
The other factor, too, and something we have to be very much
concerned about, is that these testing regimes cost money. It has been
estimated that in my State of Rhode Island, if we were to adopt the
President's proposal, each year we would have to spend $3.2 million
simply for test development. On top of that, funding would be needed to
implement and administer the tests. That is a significant amount of
money in a very small State to devote just to testing, because we also
want to do many other things: We want to improve professional
development, we want to improve parental involvement, and we want a
host of other things that cost money. If all the extra resources, new
resources at the local level, are tied up in testing, that is going to
take us away from other important initiatives.
As a result, I believe if we are going to embark on any form of
mandated Federal testing, the Federal Government should provide this
testing money, which is an additional cost that has not yet been
recognized by the President's proposal. This brings us, of course, to
the notion of how much money will there be for educational reform in
this administration.
Everyone wants education reform. We are about to embark on a process
of debate and deliberation that will lead, I believe, rather quickly,
to a new reauthorization. But whatever we do depends upon how much we
are willing to support this legislation with real resources. The
President last week announced he is proposing a $4.6 billion increase
in education spending which, by his calculation, will be an 11.5-
percent increase in educational spending in our budget.
Let's look a little more closely at those numbers. First, the
President's proposal disregards the fact that we have already advanced
funded $2.1 billion in last year's appropriation for the coming year.
So you have to, I think, fairly, subtract that $2.1 billion we have
already committed in terms of evaluating how much extra money is going
to education. When you do that, you find out the increase is not 11.5
percent but it is 5.7 percent, about $2.4 billion extra.
You also have to put this in context. That is a 5.7-percent increase,
which would be less than what we have done in the last 4 out of 5
years. So one can ask, where is all this extra money? Where is this
massive commitment, this bold innovation to fix American education?
Where is it? Indeed, if you look back over the last 5 years, we have
been averaging up to 13-percent increases in educational spending. We
need the money as well as the rhetoric. I hope whatever we do
legislatively in terms of authorization we match with robust
appropriations.
There is another aspect of the budget with respect to education. This
educational increase is not solely devoted to elementary and secondary
education, because we also have a significant support system for higher
education. When you look at that, the money available just for
elementary
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and secondary education in the President's proposal is about $1.6
billion. Again, that is not the robust, huge sums that we need to start
an educational revolution in conjunction with the States.
If you look at the President's proposal, his commitment to Reading
First, which is his literacy program, is $900 million. That is far
above what we are spending for literacy now. If that commitment is
made, then less than $1 billion would be available for all the other
programs, including title I, new testing provisions, teacher quality,
safe schools, and afterschool programs.
So we really have to ask ourselves, is there anything beyond the
rhetoric, beyond the rhetoric?
Are there resources that are going to go into this educational
reform? If we don't commit the money, then this will be an exercise
that will be ineffective in addressing the reality of the public
education problem in this country.
I believe we have to have real education reform. I believe we can do
it. We should build on the success of the past. We should recognize
that we already have in place accountability provisions of title I
schools upon which we can build. But we also have to do other things
such as reinvigorate our direct support of library materials. We have
to ensure that there is effective parental involvement. We have to
provide teachers with sustained, effective, and intensive mentoring and
professional development, as well as provide principals with effective
leadership training. We have to help schools and communities work
together to address not just the educational challenges of children but
some of the health care and social challenges that detract from their
education. We can do this, and we should do this.
I hope over the next several weeks and months, throughout the
deliberations on the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, we will
come together on an elementary and secondary education development plan
that will be significant and meaningful, that will be built on our past
success, and that will assist States and localities, and that we will
find the funds necessary to translate our words into deeds. By doing
so, we will realize educational improvement in America and ensure well-
educated young people who can not only man the increasingly complex
positions in our economy but continue to be citizens who will sustain
and move the country forth.
I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. In my capacity as a Member from the State of
Wyoming, I ask unanimous consent to dispense with the quorum call.
Without objection, it is so ordered.
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