[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 14]
[House]
[Pages 20532-20533]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



         BILL GOODLING: DEDICATED CHAMPION OF EDUCATION POLICY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 19, 1999, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind) is recognized 
during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. KIND. Mr. Speaker, as a Member of the Committee on Education and 
the Workforce, I also rise to pay tribute to an individual that is 
clearly one of the most dedicated champions of education policy in this 
country, our departing chairman, Bill Goodling.
  As a relatively new member of the Committee on Education and the 
Workforce, I can honestly say that Chairman Goodling has been the best 
chairman it has been my pleasure to serve with, but also the worse 
because he has been the only chairman that I have had the chance to 
work with on the Committee.
  Mr. Speaker, what has impressed me over the last 4 years, is an 
opportunity to sit there in front of him, to watch, listen, to learn, 
but also to watch how he runs the committee with such decency and 
fairness. Even though we had some heated discussions, disagreements at 
times over the best policy to pursue in regards to education, he was 
always eminently fair and decent in allowing Members to make their 
arguments during the course of debate.
  But what also impressed me about the Chairman was that in the final 
analysis, everyone knew that for the chairman it always came down to 
one thing, and that was the kids. And for the chairman, it was really 
one word that we heard repeatedly during the course of committee work, 
and that was ``quality, quality, quality.'' I especially appreciated, 
that emphasis given the fact that I sat right in front of him during 
committee, so I would be bombarded with quality, quality, quality, 
every day during the course of debates. Granted, some of that may have 
gone over my head, but a lot of it did sink in.
  I appreciated the chance to work with the gentleman on a few very 
important education initiatives: the Education Flexibility Act, which 
will provide local school districts greater flexibility in the use of 
Federal funds for programs that are working for them at the local 
level.
  The hard work that we put in on the Teacher Empowerment Act, again 
emphasizing quality. He knew that it does not matter what else goes on, 
but if we do not have quality teachers in the classroom, we are not 
going to see the type of student performance that all of us hope to see 
in the course of education reform.
  And the chairman has been one of the strongest earliest proponents of 
early childhood literacy and family literacy programs. That is why a 
lot of Members have already paid tribute to him for the work he did 
with the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee) on the Even Start program 
and now the LIFT Act that recently passed in this session of Congress.
  These are things that I think we have a lot of hope and promise of 
building upon, realizing that ultimately it is going to take quality 
educational instruction to see the type of student achievement that all 
of us would like to see achieved in this country.
  I do not know what the outcome of the November elections are going to 
be, and I do not know if I would hold much sway in a possible Bush 
administration if it comes to that, but I for one would be one of the 
first to recommend under a Bush administration for Secretary of 
Education, a person of the integrity and fairness and knowledge that 
Chairman Goodling would bring to that postition. I wish him well in 
retirement and I hope he realizes his leadership will be missed on the 
committee and in this House.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. George 
Miller).
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman 
from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind) for yielding me this time. I want to join in 
this tribute to our chairman, Bill Goodling.
  Mr. Speaker, we have had our battles. They even got to the point one 
time where he threatened to hit me over the head with the gavel, and I 
thought the next committee meeting I would come wearing a helmet so 
that we could continue our amicable discussions.
  But I think the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind) has hit it on the 
head. There was a core principle there. And as much as we come from 
different parts of the ideological spectrum, I was amazed at how well 
we were able to work together, once I understood the code. The code was 
simply: You mean what you say and you say what you mean.
  Bill Goodling has held that principle all of the time that he has 
served on the Committee on Education and the Workforce. We came 
together to the Congress and served our entire careers on that 
committee. His focal point was the children and whether or not we 
really meant what we said. If we were going to have quality, then we 
were going to have quality and we were going to hold someone 
accountable for delivering that quality. And if they were not going to 
do that, we were not going to fund them or we were going to know why.
  When we said we were going to fund the excess cost of special 
education,

[[Page 20533]]

the 40 percent, in his time as chairman he has moved us further toward 
that goal than any other single individual. When they said that a 
diploma ought to mean something, he asked those questions and that is 
what teacher empowerment was about, whether or not a diploma would, in 
fact, mean something.
  For schools of education where we are turning out our teachers of the 
future, if they did not know the subjects they were teaching, he wanted 
to know why, and has dramatically changed the manner in which schools 
of education will now educate the teachers of the future so they will 
be better equipped to provide that quality education that has always 
been at the core of all of his dealings on this committee.
  He has not been much for the politics. He has not been much for the 
posturing. But he has certainly done a great deal for the education and 
the well-being of the children of this Nation, and we are going to miss 
him.
  Mr. Speaker, it has been a pleasure to serve with the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling).

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