[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 12]
[House]
[Pages 16281-16282]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                EDUCATION IS CRITICAL FOR TODAY'S YOUTH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I join my colleagues in the 
Congressional Black Caucus to discuss the important issue of education. 
Obtaining an education is critical for today's youth. An individual's 
prosperity and quality of life will be directly affected by the 
education they receive.
  We all know the phrase, ``The more you learn, the more you earn.'' In 
addition to increased earnings, individuals with higher levels of 
education are less likely to be unemployed, less likely to need public 
assistance, and less likely to become involved in the criminal justice 
system.
  Mr. Speaker, today's communities will also benefit by increased 
education. Those communities will suffer lower crime rates, have fewer 
people on welfare, and will benefit from a better economy.
  In fact, we have found that in this global economy, our competitive 
advantage is in education because we can't compete on wages. There are 
people in countries around the world who work for pennies and a few 
dollars a day. We're not going to compete with that.
  We can't compete because people don't have to be in the United States 
to work. If you can work with your coworkers from across the hall, you 
can work with your coworkers across the globe. All you need is a cell 
phone, a computer and a modem, a fax machine, you can work anywhere in 
the world.
  You don't need to be close to your customers. You can manufacture 
your goods anywhere and send them anywhere else in the world almost 
overnight.
  And you don't need to be in the United States to finance a new plant. 
Used to be you had to be here to finance a plant. With worldwide 
banking you can have that plant located anywhere in the world.
  The competitive advantage we have is the fact that businesses know 
that they can get well-educated and well-trained workers if they locate 
in the United States. But unfortunately, we're losing that competitive 
advantage.
  In a recent measure of high school achievement, we found that 
students in the United States ranked below dozens of other countries in 
math and science. And so we're losing that competitive advantage. And 
the Education and Labor Committee is, therefore, focused on improving 
our international standing.
  Earlier this year, the House passed the bill to renew the Head Start 
program with renewed emphasis on early Head Start. These programs are 
critical to getting our children on the right path early in life and 
the earlier, the better. At the K-12 level, the committee is also 
working towards renewing the No Child Left Behind Act. We will be 
addressing issues in that bill, for example, finding ways to 
meaningfully measure and reduce the achievement gap; ensuring that all 
students have access to high-quality teachers, and to effectively 
improve those schools which fail to make adequate yearly progress.
  One of the most critical issues that must be addressed in No Child 
Left Behind is the fact that approximately one-third of all high school 
students in the United States fail to graduate with their peers. And in 
some communities, as many as half of the students fail to graduate and 
find themselves on the path to hopelessness.
  The Education and Labor Committee will also consider renewing the 
Higher Education Act, which is primarily focused on access to college. 
Last year, approximately 1 million qualified students did not go to 
college because they could not afford the cost. Since the 2001/2002 
school year, tuition at a public 4-year college has risen 55 percent. 
But during that same period the

[[Page 16282]]

maximum Pell Grant only went up about 8 percent, and in the last 4 
years didn't go up at all.
  Unfortunately, this means that many of today's students, unlike 
previous generations, are being denied the opportunity to live to their 
fullest potential because they were denied the opportunity of a college 
education.
  This year, the Education and Labor Committee is leading legislation 
that will significantly improve access to college with improved Pell 
Grants and cuts in student loans.
  So, Mr. Speaker, education affects many issues that we deal with: 
economic competitiveness, crime and welfare. And so I'd like to thank 
the gentlelady from Michigan, the chairman of the Congressional Black 
Caucus, Ms. Kilpatrick, for organizing the effort to focus on education 
tonight.

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