[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 84 (Thursday, May 18, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Page S1727]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                        Louisiana House Bill 12

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I am going to talk for a few minutes 
today about HB12. That is not HB12 from the U.S. House of 
Representatives; that is HB12 from the Louisiana House of 
Representatives. Why do I want to talk about it? Because it is 
important. It is important for my State, and I think it is important 
for other States.
  HB12 passed the Louisiana House of Representatives yesterday--maybe 
it was the day before--by a vote of 88 to 15, and it is headed to my 
senate.
  As the Presiding Officer knows, it is frustrating in that the 
American people can do things that take your breath away--we can 
unravel the human genome; we can take a diseased human heart--we can do 
that in America--and replace it with a new one and make it beat; we can 
send a person to the Moon--but we can't seem to teach our children how 
to read and write when we have 18 years to do it.
  I don't come here this morning to assess blame. Our problem is shared 
in other countries. That is no excuse. Our problem is caused by a 
multitude of factors, but I believe and I will bet the Presiding 
Officer believes that every child can learn--that every child can 
learn. It is harder for some than others. I recognize that some of our 
children do not have a supportive home life, not just in America but in 
other parts of the world. It seems commonsensical to me that if parents 
do not love their child, the child is not going to stop loving the 
child's parents; the child is going to stop loving himself or herself. 
But I don't know how to fix that. All we can do is continue to believe 
that every child can learn--every child.
  My State, like other States, has a problem with elementary and 
secondary education. Over half of my children--my young people--in 
Louisiana are not reading at their grade levels, and at some point, as 
a child is socially promoted in school and progresses, it almost 
becomes impossible for a child to learn if the child can't read.
  It is not just money. Go look at a list of what States spend on 
elementary and secondary education--and not just States but local 
governments and the Federal Government as well. One of our States in 
America is spending $54,000 a year on their public schools. I mean, God 
bless them, but that is a lot of money. It is not just money. We have 
to try and we have to be courageous enough to try new things that we 
think will work.
  Now, what does that have to do with HB12 in the Louisiana State 
Legislature? Here is what HB12 would do. It would say: Look, we are not 
blaming anyone, but if you are a child in the third grade in Louisiana 
and if you can't read, according to objective standards, at an 
acceptable level, then you are going to stay in the third grade. We 
don't care if you are 16 years old. We can hold you until you are 18. 
But we think you can learn, and you can't learn if you can't read.
  Now, that doesn't mean that the child just repeats the third grade 
with no help. We will assign that child special tutors. We will assign 
that child special attention. We will give that child a number of 
efforts to demonstrate that child's proficiency after getting this 
special tutoring and attention. But we think every child can learn.
  This approach has been tried in two other States--Mississippi and 
Florida--and it has worked in both States--in both States. We have 
copied it from Mississippi and Florida. We take no pride of authorship. 
I am always willing to copy other people's ideas that work and give 
them full credit. Let me just mention the success in Mississippi, and I 
hope my colleagues in the Louisiana Legislature--I love every one of 
them--are listening to me.
  After Mississippi implemented its requirement that kids can't advance 
until they can read, this is what one analysis says of the results of 
that effort:

       The results are stunning: In sixth grade, three years after 
     the intervention, retained students outperform similar 
     students by 1.2 standard deviations (a 0.8 effect size is 
     generally considered ``large''), with no measurable impact--

  None--

     on student absenteeism or special education classification, 
     negative indicators sometimes associated with retention.

  Those aren't my words; that came from an in-depth study at Boston 
University.
  This analysis goes on to say:

       The magnitude of Mississippi's accomplishments with early 
     reading is truly impressive and rightly deserves attention 
     and replication by other states. For low-income, Black, and 
     Hispanic students, by 2019, Mississippi had risen to the top 
     five of all the states on the fourth grade NAEP, with each 
     group showing more than a year's additional progress since 
     2013.

  I could go on. I could cite you similar analyses and statistics for 
the State of Florida.
  Every child can learn. It just requires a little extra attention and 
love for some of our children.
  Now, HB12 in the Louisiana Legislature would copy the program in 
Mississippi and Florida. It has passed, as it did last year, 
overwhelmingly, as I mentioned, in the Louisiana House of 
Representatives. Last year, in the Louisiana House of Representatives, 
it passed overwhelmingly. This year, just recently, it passed by a vote 
of 88 to 15. Last year, when the bill went to my State's senate, the 
bill died. We are on our second try, and the bill is now before the 
Louisiana State Senate.
  I know every member of my Louisiana State Senate. I respect all of 
them, and I am pleading with them. Please, please, please, pretty 
please with sugar on top, pass this bill. It has worked in other 
States. If it doesn't work in Louisiana, I will come right to this 
lectern and say it didn't work, that we tried it. We gave it our best 
shot, but it didn't work.
  But I think it will, and I think our kids deserve the chance. Every 
child can learn. Every child can learn, but some of our children need 
special attention. This bill, HB12, before the Louisiana State Senate 
will provide that attention.
  Please, members of my Senate, pass this bill.
  I yield to my colleague from Hawaii.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.

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