[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 71 (Thursday, May 1, 2008)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E789]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   INJECTING THE IMPROVEMENT OF EDUCATION INTO THE POLITICAL DIALOGUE

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                         HON. CHARLES B. RANGEL

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 1, 2008

  Mr. RANGEL. Madam Speaker, in the interest of our national security, 
competitive standing in the world, and criminal justice system--I rise 
today to rouse dialogue on an issue that implicates all three: 
education. Recent numbers report that as few as 1 out of every 2 
youngsters are not earning high school diplomas in our Nation's biggest 
cities. For those of us from districts where the need is great, these 
numbers are far from new, let alone startling. But even as they 
inspired alarm in the wake of the report's release, they have failed to 
ignite a national conversation on an issue that demands action, not 
just today, but yesterday. That alarm has already, regrettably, been 
snuffed out. We remain, still, oddly hush-hush and complacent.
  Many will make an argument of the heart, that to fail to equip these 
kids with the skills and knowledge they need to eschew poverty and 
criminality demonstrates an abominable lack of compassion. This is 
true. But allow me to also make an argument of the mind. These children 
cannot afford failure--and neither can we. As a nation, we drastically 
shrink our talent pool and our ability to compete on the global stage 
when we trade bodies in our college classrooms for bodies on the 
streets, in jails, even underground. We give way to the rise in 
influence of China and India and saddle the next generation with a 
workforce unfit for competition, perennially unemployed and 
underemployed. That is an explicit and direct threat to our national 
security.
  A New York Times editorial--written by Bob Herbert, published on 
April 22, and titled ``Clueless in America''--makes the case for an 
America that rises to this challenge, that takes note of our lack of 
progress, and moves with purpose and innovation towards correcting it.

                          Clueless in America

       We don't hear a great deal about education in the 
     presidential campaign. It's much too serious a topic to 
     compete with such fun stuff as Hillary tossing back a shot of 
     whiskey, or Barack rolling a gutter ball.
       The nation's future may depend on how well we educate the 
     current and future generations, but (like the renovation of 
     the nation's infrastructure, or a serious search for better 
     sources of energy) that can wait. At the moment, no one seems 
     to have the will to engage any of the most serious challenges 
     facing the U.S.
       An American kid drops out of high school every 26 seconds. 
     That's more than a million every year, a sign of big trouble 
     for these largely clueless youngsters in an era in which a 
     college education is crucial to maintaining a middle-class 
     quality of life--and for the country as a whole in a world 
     that is becoming more hotly competitive every day.
       Ignorance in the United States is not just bliss, it's 
     widespread. A recent survey of teenagers by the education 
     advocacy group Common Core found that a quarter could not 
     identify Adolf Hitler, a third did not know that the Bill of 
     Rights guaranteed freedom of speech and religion, and fewer 
     than half knew that the Civil War took place between 1850 and 
     1900.
       ``We have one of the highest dropout rates in the 
     industrialized world,'' said Allan Golston, the president of 
     U.S. programs for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. In a 
     discussion over lunch recently he described the situation as 
     ``actually pretty scary, alarming.''
       Roughly a third of all American high school students drop 
     out. Another third graduate but are not prepared for the next 
     stage of life--either productive work or some form of post-
     secondary education.
       When two-thirds of all teenagers old enough to graduate 
     from high school are incapable of mastering college-level 
     work, the nation is doing something awfully wrong.
       Mr. Golston noted that the performance of American 
     students, when compared with their peers in other countries, 
     tends to grow increasingly dismal as they move through the 
     higher grades:
       ``In math and science, for example, our fourth graders are 
     among the top students globally. By roughly eighth grade, 
     they're in the middle of the pack. And by the 12th grade, 
     U.S. students are scoring generally near the bottom of all 
     industrialized countries.''
       Many students get a first-rate education in the public 
     schools, but they represent too small a fraction of the 
     whole.
       Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, offered a brutal 
     critique of the nation's high schools a few years ago, 
     describing them as ``obsolete'' and saying, ``When I compare 
     our high schools with what I see when I'm traveling abroad, I 
     am terrified for our work force of tomorrow.''
       Said Mr. Gates: ``By obsolete, I don't just mean that they 
     are broken, flawed or underfunded, though a case could be 
     made for every one of those points. By obsolete, I mean our 
     high schools--even when they're working as designed--cannot 
     teach all our students what they need to know today.''
       The Educational Testing Service, in a report titled 
     ``America's Perfect Storm,'' cited three powerful forces that 
     are affecting the quality of life for millions of Americans 
     and already shaping the nation's future. They are:
       1. The wide disparity in the literacy and math skills of 
     both the school-age and adult populations. These skills, 
     which play such a tremendous role in the lives of individuals 
     and families, vary widely across racial, ethnic and 
     socioeconomic groups.
       2. The ``seismic changes'' in the U.S. economy that have 
     resulted from globalization, technological advances, shifts 
     in the relationship of labor and capital, and other 
     developments.
       3. Sweeping demographic changes. By 2030, the U.S. 
     population is expected to reach 360 million. That population 
     will be older and substantially more diverse, with 
     immigration having a big impact on both the population as a 
     whole and the work force.
       These and so many other issues of crucial national 
     importance require an educated populace if they are to be 
     dealt with effectively. At the moment we are not even coming 
     close to equipping the population with the intellectual tools 
     that are needed.
       While we're effectively standing in place, other nations 
     are catching up and passing us when it comes to educational 
     achievement. You have to be pretty dopey not to see the 
     implications of that.
       But, then, some of us are pretty dopey. In the Common Core 
     survey, nearly 20 percent of respondents did not know who the 
     U.S. fought in World War II. Eleven percent thought that 
     Dwight Eisenhower was the president forced from office by the 
     Watergate scandal. Another 11 percent thought it was Harry 
     Truman.
       We've got work to do.

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