[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1996, Book I)]
[March 9, 1996]
[Pages 403-406]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks on NetDay in Concord, California
March 9, 1996

    Thank you so very much. I want to say again how much I appreciate 
the wonderful welcome we have received here today. I thank your 
principal, Sheila Walker; Superintendent Allen; your fine superintendent 
of public instruction, Delaine Eastin; and Lieutenant Governor Davis;

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my good friend Senator Boxer; and Representative Miller. I want to say 
again what a good job I thought--I want to join the Vice President--I 
thought Brian DeGrassi did a good job up here. We didn't even need to 
speak after he talked.
    I want to thank John Gage and Michael Kaufman for originating the 
idea of NetDay. The country will long be in their debt. They have come 
up with something truly remarkable. And I want to thank the Merrills and 
all the wonderful volunteers here. And because of my own past I don't 
want to leave here without acknowledging your award-winning band and 
flag team. I thank them for being here as well. Thank you very much.
    And I want to thank Vice President Al Gore, who 20 years ago--20 
years ago--coined the term information superhighway and is now helping 
every American child to become a part of it. I thank you for that.
    The Vice President and I have looked forward to coming back for this 
day ever since last September when we came to California and met with 
leaders of the communications industry. That day we challenged 
Californians to connect at least 20 percent of your schools to the 
information superhighway by the end of this school year. You didn't fret 
about it; you're simply doing it.
    Think about it. On this day, March 9th, 20,000 of your fellow 
citizens are meeting this challenge. I am honored to be here with you.
    Today one out of five California schools will be wired to the 
future. Within 4 years every school in the State will be wired to the 
future. We are putting the future at the fingertips of your children, 
and we are doing it together in the best American tradition.
    We are living through a moment of absolutely astonishing 
transformation, a moment of great possibility. All of you know that the 
information and technology explosion will offer to you and to the young 
people of the future more opportunities and challenges than any 
generation of Americans has ever seen.
    Our country is changing just as profoundly as it did when we moved 
from farm to factory, from the country to the cities and towns 100 years 
ago. The microchip and the global marketplace are opening up undreamed-
of prospects but real challenges. If we want to keep the American dream 
alive for every single person who is willing to work for it, we know 
that more than ever before we have to give all Americans the skills, the 
education they need to be winners in this time of change. We must not 
send our children into a 21st century unprepared for the world they will 
inhabit and the jobs they will have to fill.
    All of us are here today because we know purely and simply that 
every single child must have access to a computer, must understand it, 
must have access to good software and good teachers and yes, to the 
Internet, so that every person will have the opportunity to make the 
most of his or her own life.
    I have spent a great deal of the last 3 years trying to open up 
educational opportunity and help educators and parents raise educational 
standards in America. There is more that we must do. Of course we need 
high standards and high expectations. Of course we should open the doors 
of college education to every single American who needs to go.
    That's what the new student loan program is about, which cuts costs 
and makes repayments easier. That's what the national service program is 
about, promoting this kind of community service in return for funds to 
go to college. That's why I believe the most important tax cut we could 
give in passing a balanced budget is to give every American family the 
opportunity to deduct up to $10,000 a year of the costs of college 
tuition.
    But whatever else we do, we must bring the information and 
technology revolution to every, every classroom in America. Every child 
in America sees a computer at work in a grocery store, in a video 
arcade, many at home. One of the few rooms that you can't enter in 
America today and know for sure that you will see a computer and to see 
computer technology is a classroom.
    We are changing this today in the same way our Nation has always 
changed for the better, by working together united as one America. We 
understand there is no generation gap between old-fashioned American 
values of hard work, teamwork, and optimism in our forward march into 
the technological world of the 21st century.
    In a way, NetDay is a modern version of an old-fashioned 
barnraising. Government's not doing this alone, nor is business, nor can 
schools do it alone. All of us are joining together, students, 
scientists, business leaders, engineers, parents, and old-fashioned 
American citizens who have no other interests other than a love

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for their country, a love for their children, and a belief in the future 
of America. What you are doing today is America at its very best, and it 
is guaranteeing America's future.
    Just think about it. Today in California we are installing 6 million 
feet--6 million feet--of computer cables and plugs. That's a message 
that all America will hear tonight and tomorrow and be proud of, and I 
hope will emulate.
    I want to say a special word of thanks, as the Vice President did, 
to the business leaders all across the State, from Sun Microsystems to 
AT&T, MCI, Netcom, America Online, the Scholastic Network, Apple, which 
is donating computers, Netscape, and Microsoft giving free software--
we're having trouble with these speakers. Just pretend you hear it even 
if you don't. [Laughter]
    I want to ask every one of you to stop and give a special applause 
to every single business in California that is supporting this endeavor 
today. This is corporate citizenship at its best. I thank the IBEW and 
all the labor organizations that are helping today.
    There are some truly impressive things being done by students today. 
In San Diego, one class sold cupcakes to pay for the cost of their 
NetDay kit. All across the State, teenagers today will be able to teach 
their parents a thing or two about the Net. In Palo Alto, one school 
which was wired a short time ago this NetDay is providing the first time 
many parents will see their child's classroom. But after the classroom 
is wired, the parents are painting the classrooms and repairing a 
decayed building.
    I say that to make this point. One of the most probing comments I 
have seen in reading the press out here in California in preparing to 
come is that some have said, ``Well, should the President and the Vice 
President, should the State be emphasizing computers in all the 
classrooms when some of our school buildings are falling down, some of 
our play yards are in disrepair?'' My answer to you is yes. If everybody 
has those skills, our school districts will be wealthier and better. But 
we do not have to choose; the same volunteers that are wiring the 
schools can also fix them up. And I hope people will do it all across 
California.
    I also want to thank the teachers that are working today. And what I 
think is a real picture of what is so special about today, the teachers 
on strike in Oakland are putting their pickets down and participating in 
NetDay.
    We are trying to do our part. In the telecommunications bill I 
signed a few weeks ago, thanks to the long efforts of the Vice President 
and many in the Congress, there is a guarantee that schools and 
libraries and hospitals will all be able to be hooked up at affordable 
rates. And last month I announced a $2 billion technology literacy 
challenge to help communities all across this country get the right kind 
of computers in every classroom and every library by the end of the 
century.
    But more than anything else, we need volunteers, trained teachers, 
good software. That is what we are celebrating today as well. I cannot 
think of a single endeavor which has involved so many different 
Americans from so many different walks of life to do something that is 
so clearly in the interest of every single American citizen. And again 
let me say to all of you who are here, thank you. Thank you for the 
enthusiasm. Thank you for the numbers. Thank you for your commitment.
    I want to make just one more point, and I want to emphasize 
something the Vice President said. The other question which has been 
raised is whether or not somehow this advance of technology will divide 
our people more, whether or not the poor children or the poor school 
districts will be left behind, whether or not this will inevitably give 
greater advantages to those who already enjoy them. Let me just give you 
one story that will refute that, I hope, forever.
    Last month, I had the opportunity with the Vice President to visit 
the Christopher Columbus Middle School in Union City, New Jersey. Just a 
few years ago the schools there were so bad the State was on the verge 
of taking them over and taking them away from the local school board and 
the parents. But it was a revitalized community effort, involving Bell 
Atlantic and all the local citizens we celebrate here in California 
today, that put computers in every seventh grade classroom and in every 
student's home in a school district that had a low per capita income 
where most of the families are first generation immigrant families.
    New Jersey is one of the wealthiest States in America, and in a 
matter of just a couple of years in this far from wealthy school 
district with first generation immigrants, the children have an 
attendance record, a graduation rate, and most important of all, test 
scores that are above the State average. Technology is going

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to liberate Americans and bring them together, not hold them back.
    And that's what I want to happen to California. Look at this sea of 
faces here. You are America's present and America's future. Now the 
children will not only be able to access the Magna Carta and the 
Declaration of Independence, they will be able to, how uncomfortably it 
might be, follow how Congressman Miller and Senator Boxer vote--
[laughter]--and send E-mail to me and the Vice President, telling us 
what mistake we have made that day.
    To the younger people in this audience, I hope you will never forget 
this day. Someday your children will marvel at the idea that there ever 
was a classroom without a computer. You can tell them you were a 
pioneer. Just as our parents and grandparents built our schools and 
libraries and highways for their children, you will leave your children 
a legacy of opportunity along the information superhighway.
    The 21st century is America's for the taking if we are bold enough 
and strong enough and confident enough to go forward together. We will 
make the best of this new technology together. We will educate our 
children with it, improve our businesses with it, make our Government 
more democratic with it, and build a brighter, freer, more prosperous 
future with it. That is the American way. Let the future begin.
    Thank you, and God bless you all.

Note: The President spoke at 10:04 a.m. at Ygnacio Valley High School. 
In his remarks, he referred to Paul Allen, superintendent, Mount Diablo 
School District; Lt. Gov. Gray Davis of California; Brian DeGrassi, 
student, Ygnacio Valley High School; John Gage, director, science 
office, Sun Microsystems; Michael Kaufman, director, information 
services, KQED; and Charlie and Margie Merrill, NetDay volunteers.