    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1997, Book I)]
    [June 10, 1997]
    [Pages 714-717]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks on National Education Standards
    June 10, 1997

        Thank you very much. Let me say, first of all, I'm glad to be here
    with Pat Forgione, the Commissioner for the National Center for
    Educational Statistics. I thank him for the fine work that he has done.
    I thank the educators who are here, Linda Vieth, Lourdes Monegudo, and
    Sharon Simpson. I thank Secretary Riley for his excellent work. And I
    want to thank all of those out in the audience who have done so much to
    make this day come to pass, those who were introduced, the leaders of
    the NEA and the AFT and the other education groups who are here. All of
    you, thank you very much for being here.

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        Today is a good day for American education. Today we announce the
    new results from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study
    for fourth graders, showing that America's fourth graders are performing
    above the national average in math and science. In fact, in science they
    are doing very well, indeed. According to this report, just issued
    today, our fourth graders rank second in the world in the Third
    International Math and Science Tests, just behind Korea. We are making
    great strides. We've built a solid foundation in our national effort to
    establish standards of excellence in education.
        In 1989 and 1990, when I was a Governor, I worked with the other
    Governors and the White House and the Department of Education to
    establish national education goals. I remember the night we spent
    staying up all night at the University of Virginia, asking ourselves
    whether we should have a goal in math and science and, if so, what
    should it be. You remember, don't you? You were there. We were up all
    night long, and people said to me, ``There's no way in the world we can
    have a goal that we should be first in the world of math and science
    because we have a more diverse population, we have more poor children,
    we don't have uniformity of ''--so I remember looking at the person who
    made the argument--it was a perfectly sane and rational argument--I
    said, ``Well, what do you want me to say, we're going to be third in the
    world in math and science? That's our goal? We'll be fourth? We'll be
    eighth?'' So we decided we would embrace the goal that we would be
    first.
        These fourth grade examinations proved that if our educators, our
    parents, our schools, the rest of us in a supporting role, if we all do
    the right thing, that our children can achieve if we give them the
    chance to do it and if we have high expectations for them. So again, I
    want to say, I thank the educators who are here. And I think that if you
    look at where we were--just in 1991, there was a test similar to the
    TIMSS test in which our fourth graders were below average in math, above
    average in science, but nowhere near where they are today. So this shows
    you what can happen in a few short years if people are working together
    for the right things for our children and the future of this country.
        So I just want to say again to all those who were serving with me,
    the Republicans and Democrats alike who were Governors back then, I
    still think we did the right thing, and now we have to do what it takes
    to make sure we meet the goal. We have to have the conviction that every
    child in America can learn. And we have to know that this report proves
    that we don't have to settle for second class expectations or second
    class goals.
        Now, we also have to remember that we've got a long way to go. Last
    November, when Secretary Riley and Commissioner Forgione released the
    first results from the eighth grade test, we found that we were above
    the international average in science but still below the international
    average in mathematics. That is why I have asked us to begin not just
    participating in the TIMSS test with a few thousand of our students but
    to voluntarily embrace national standards beginning with reading and
    mathematics and begin with examinations that would embrace every child
    in America with fourth grade reading and eighth grade math by 1999.
        Since I issued that call, six States--education leaders or
    Governors--in Maryland, Michigan, North Carolina, California, West
    Virginia, and Massachusetts, along with the Department of Defense
    schools, have adopted this plan of embracing national standards and
    agreeing to participate in the testing program. I'm pleased to announce
    today that the State of Kentucky is joining the national standards
    movement, becoming the sixth State to agree to participate in the
    examinations. And I want to especially thank Governor Paul Patton, who
    has been a national leader in education, for joining in this endeavor.
        The results today give us a roadmap to higher performance. In no
    other country in the world did performance in math drop from above
    average in fourth grade to below average in eighth grade. That didn't
    happen anywhere else, which means that we are doing a very good job in
    the early grades but we've got a lot more work to do in the later ones.
    We know parents have to remain involved in their children's education as
    they move through schools, not withdraw when their children reach
    adolescence. We know our curriculum will have to be more focused and
    more demanding. We know we'll have to hold all of our students to higher
    standards as they grow older and measure the schools and the students
    against the standards.
        As the school year comes to a close, I want to thank the many
    thousands of parents and

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    teachers, principals who have done the hard work necessary to achieve
    these positive results. They have told us over and over and over again
    that if we can redouble our efforts, especially now in middle school and
    high schools, we can meet our goals of national excellence. Bipartisan
    progress on education shows what we can accomplish here in Washington,
    too, when we reach across party lines, to balance the budget but to
    invest more in the education of our young people as well as our adults
    who need more access to education.
        So let me just say, before I go on to make one or two more points,
    there are a lot of people who never believed the United States children
    would score in the top two in the world on any of these international
    tests. And now they know that they were wrong and they underestimated
    our children, underestimated our teachers, underestimated our schools,
    underestimated our parents. But let's not kid ourselves. We are still
    nowhere near where we need to be in these other areas, and all this
    fourth grade test does is to show us that we can be the best in the
    world if we simply believe it and then organize ourselves to achieve it.
        This ought to be a clear challenge to every single State that has
    not yet come forward to agree to participate in the national standards
    movement and the test in 1999 that they ought to do it. We don't have to
    hide anymore. We don't have to be afraid of the results anymore. We're
    not trying to punish anybody. We're trying to lift the children of this
    country up, and the TIMSS test proves that they will lift themselves up
    if we who are adults and in charge of their future do what we ought to
    do to give them a chance to do it. And I hope all of you will take that
    message out across the country now.
        Let me finally say that whether we in the National Government
    continue to do our part for education depends upon our good faith in
    implementing the budget agreement that overwhelming majorities of both
    parties have voted for and, specifically, what we do with the tax
    portion of the agreement, which overwhelming majorities agree would be
    used to help working families to pay for education, to buy and sell a
    home, to raise their children. That is fair to all Americans.
        Yesterday the Republican majority on the House Ways and Means
    Committee released their plan to fill in the details of the tax cut
    agreed to by the Congress and by me. I have reviewed this plan, and I
    believe that in its present form, it does not meet the tests that I
    would hold myself to: one, being faithful to the budget agreement;
    second, having a tax cut that will grow the economy; third, having a tax
    cut that is fair to middle class families; and fourth, having a tax cut
    that genuinely helps to increase the quality and volume of education in
    America today for people of all ages. I do not believe it meets those
    tests for the following reasons.
        Number one, it falls $13 billion short in the amount of higher
    education tax cuts specifically agreed to in the balanced budget
    agreement. We agreed to roughly $35 billion. You might say that $34
    billion is roughly $35 billion, but $22 billion is not--not even roughly
    $35 billion--[laughter]--and if that were a question in the fourth grade
    TIMSS test, I'm quite sure what the answer would be. [Laughter]
        Second, it shortchanges those in the work force who want to gain new
    skills and those who want to go on to community colleges. Those who go
    to less expensive schools, like community colleges, would have the HOPE
    scholarship I proposed, specifically agreed to in the budget agreement,
    cut in half by the House plan.
        Third, the plan falls short for working families in other ways. I
    favor a $500-per-child tax credit. We have people favoring the $500-per-
    child tax credit all the way from the most liberal coalitions in the
    Democratic caucus to the Christian Coalition. But I want to make it even
    more fair. I think it ought to be refundable, so it's fair to working
    parents with lower incomes. Instead, the Republican plan would deny the
    full child tax credit to millions of the hardest pressed working
    families simply because it is not refundable. And they would deduct the
    availability of the child's tax credit from the earned-income tax credit
    that lower income working families already earn.
        Moreover, and unbelievably to me, they would reduce tax benefits to
    working families where both the father and the mother are working and
    paying for child care and getting some credit for that. They want to
    deduct the child tax credit from the credit people already get to pay
    for child care, apparently designed to make it more difficult for people
    who are parents to work outside the home. I think most working families
    will tell you, it's hard enough

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    already; what we'd like is a little help raising our children. I do not
    believe we should discriminate against parents who are working and
    raising their children in the availability of the children's tax credit.
        In short, the tax plan cuts in half the tax cuts for those who go to
    community college. It shortchanges 6 million families who are already in
    the work force and having to pay for their child care. That does not
    meet the standards of fairness to families and promotion of education,
    nor do I believe it is consistent with the budget agreement. So I hope
    that the House Democrats and Republicans and the Senate Democrats and
    Republicans will work with us to meet those tests.
        Finally, let me just say one other thing. The people of the Dakotas
    and Minnesota earned the great compassion and concern of all Americans
    because of what they went through this year. We've worked hard to help
    them stave off the worst, to get their communities back together, to
    rebuild. It has been 80 days since I forwarded to Congress my request
    for disaster relief to allow the process of recovery to begin. Instead
    of giving me a disaster relief bill, the congressional majority insisted
    on weighing it down with a political wish list. In the name of the
    people who have had to face the floods, in the name of the families who
    suffered and need their help now, I ask the majority to put aside the
    political games, to set aside the political wish list--we can negotiate
    on all this later--and instead just send me a straightforward disaster
    relief bill. Again, I believe if this were a question on an elementary
    school exam, 90 percent of the fourth graders in America would say, do
    the right thing, and have your political arguments later.
        So as we celebrate today, let's do the right thing and resolve that
    we're not going to stop until we get those TIMSS tests and we're first
    in the world at the 4th grade level, at the 8th grade level, at the 12th
    grade level. Our fourth graders have proved that we can do it. We dare
    not let them and the other children of this country down.
        Thank you very much.

    Note: The President spoke at 11:24 a.m. in the Rose Garden at the White
    House. In his remarks, he referred to Gov. Paul E. Patton of Kentucky.