[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: WILLIAM J. CLINTON (2000-2001, Book III)]
[January 9, 2001]
[Pages 2866-2871]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks at James Ward Elementary School in Chicago, Illinois
January 9, 2001

    Thank you very, very much. I want to say, first of all, I realize 
now that I'm in an elementary school that I should get a tardy slip 
today. [Laughter] But even in these closing days of my Presidency, I 
can't stop doing my job, and I was unavoidably detained. I'm sorry.
    One thing I have learned in over 20 years of visiting schools is 
that you almost never have a good school without a great principal. And 
I want to thank Sharon Wilcher for her 
introduction and for her leadership.
    I want to thank Secretary Riley, who 
has been my friend since the 1970's, and we go back a long way. Our 
families have been friends; we've shared the joys of our children and 
the stories of our respective governorships. And I knew he would be a 
good Secretary of Education, but I think after 8 years, the record will 
reflect that he is clearly the finest Secretary of Education this 
country ever had. And I'm very grateful to him.
    I want to thank Secretary Alexis Herman, our Secretary of Labor, for joining us today. I brought 
the Deputy Attorney General, Eric Holder, all the way from Washington. He had never been on one of 
these trips with me, and he's been working like a dog for years, so I 
asked him to come. To continue our school analogy, this is recess for 
him today.
    I want to thank Senator Dick Durbin 
for his friendship and his leadership over all these years. Congressman 
Bobby Rush, who worked in my campaign for 
President in 1992, I'm proud of what you have done, sir. Thank you. 
Treasurer Dan Hynes; the president of the 
Chicago Teachers' Union, Tom Reese; Gery 
Chico; Paul Vallas.
    And let me say a special word of thanks to your mayor for the 
partnership that we have enjoyed for education, for economic development 
and housing and so many other areas. I have constantly looked to Chicago 
for leadership. I tell people all the time, it's probably one of the 
best organized big cities in the entire world. And the work that has 
been done by all of you in education, in reviving the system here over 
the last 6 years, is exhibit A. Thank you, Mayor Daley.

[[Page 2867]]

    I came to Chicago today in the closing days of my Presidency for two 
reasons. First of all, as I'll say more about in a few moments in 
another setting, it's doubtful that I could have become President 
without the support I received from the people of Chicago and the State 
of Illinois. It began over 9 years ago, way back in 1991, when only my 
mother thought I could be elected President. [Laughter] And through the 
elections of 1992 and 1996, starting with the Democratic primary and 
then the election of 2000, you've been very good to Hillary and Bill 
Clinton and to Al and Tipper Gore. And I thank you very much for that.
    I also wanted to come because one of the primary reasons I ran for 
President is to do what I could in the White House to make a positive 
difference in the schools of America. I wanted to come to James Ward 
Elementary because I want people all across this country to know that 
there are schools like this, where teachers and parents and 
administrators and community leaders are succeeding, sometimes against 
great odds, in bringing educational excellence to our children. It is 
important that people know it can be done.
    I came because I have so often told anyone who would listen about 
Chicago and the accomplishments of your school reform effort. Indeed, 
you have been very, very good to me today. I asked Paul Vallas when I came in, I said, ``How many times since you've 
been in office have I been in your school system, in your school?'' He 
said, ``Six--six.'' So the way I figure it, I'm either entitled to a 
diploma or to a property tax bill. I can't figure out which. [Laughter]
    You have raised standards and accountability and ended social 
promotion in the right way, by giving students in schools the tools they 
need to meet high standards and succeed--higher pay and better training 
for teachers and principals, after-school and summer school programs, 
better quality facilities. The results are clear. In this entire, huge, 
increasingly diverse school district, the test scores of third through 
eighth graders have risen in every single year since 1994. And you heard 
the results about James Ward.
    What I want the members of the traveling press corps to know, who 
are here with me, is, every year this school gets students coming from 
China, Croatia, Central America. This school has a large Asian-American 
population and a very substantial African-American population, a very 
substantial Hispanic population and a very substantial white ethnic 
population. It is a picture of America's future. We have to make 
education work here if we want America's future to work.
    Using almost every proven educational strategy, this school is 
demonstrating dramatically what we could accomplish in every school in 
America if every school would work together the way your people work 
together, based on a common conviction that all children can learn and a 
common devotion to the proven best practices in education.
    Now, for the past 8 years, our administration has worked hard to 
make education our number one domestic priority. We started out early, 
doing more to help early childhood education, doing a lot to expand and 
improve the quality of Head Start. And I'm very proud that in our very 
last education budget, achieved after the election this year, we had the 
largest increase in Head Start in the entire history of the program. I 
think that's a very good sign.
    But we have then focused on a proven strategy in schools: higher 
standards, more accountability, greater investment, equal opportunity. 
Simple ideas: higher standards, more accountability, greater investment, 
equal opportunity.
    In 1992, believe it or not, only 14 States in this entire country 
had academic standards for core subjects. And not surprisingly, test 
scores were dropping as a result. As more and more kids came into the 
school, the student bodies were more and more diverse, more and more 
schools had children whose first language was not English, more and more 
kids whose parents could not speak English.
    And as more and more kids came into the schools, ironically, a 
smaller percentage of the kids had parents who themselves were property 
tax payers, who were property owners, so that the tax base of many of 
our districts were severely stressed.
    And so, we came in with a commitment to higher standards, and we 
passed legislation to encourage and support States in setting those 
standards. In 1992 there were 14 States with core academic standards. 
Today, there are 49 States with statewide core academic standards.
    We also wanted to increase accountability. We asked the States--
indeed, we required the States--to identify schools that were failing 
and then develop strategies to turn them around. We then gave them funds 
to help turn around

[[Page 2868]]

or shut down failing schools, this year $225 million in this year's 
budget alone to help schools identify, try to turn around, or shut down 
and put under new management schools that are not giving our children 
the education they deserve.
    We also said, like Chicago, that we should end social promotion. But 
like Chicago, we said it's not fair to hold the kids accountable if the 
system is failing them. So for the very first time, we put the Federal 
Government on the side of the after-school programs and the summer 
school programs. I was so glad you mentioned that.
    Four years ago, we had a $1 million demonstration project. This 
year, in this education budget, we have $850 million for after-school 
programs. They will serve 1.3 million kids like the children in this 
school, and I am very proud of that. More than half the students here 
participate in Federal and State funded after-school programs. And I 
understand there would be even more of them if you had the 
transportation to get them home, which is something that I would like to 
see addressed in the next administration.
    I might also say something that won't surprise you. In every 
community where there are comprehensive after-school programs with real, 
meaningful substance, like the ones described by your principal, every 
community in the country where this is the case, the juvenile crime rate 
goes down; the juvenile delinquency rate goes down; the school 
attendance rate goes up; the on-time graduation rate goes up. This is a 
big deal.
    I'm glad we've got 1.3 million kids in these programs. But there are 
basically 6 million kids in America who don't have anyplace to go under 
supervision when they get out of school. So we're barely meeting--we're 
right at a quarter of the national need being funded by the Federal 
Government. And of course, some places like Chicago are using their own 
funds. But we need--if I were going to be around 4 more years, one of 
the things I'd do is figure out how many people--[applause]--wait a 
minute; you are going to be around, so you can participate in this--one 
of the things we need to do is to figure out how many kids are being 
served with all the Federal and the State and local funds, how many 
still need to be served. And we need to fill the gap. We've got the 
money. We need to fill the gap. This is a huge, huge opportunity and 
responsibility.
    To further support young students, another thing we did was to start 
the America Reads program, which now has involved 1,000 universities and 
colleges in sending out student mentors to help make sure kids can read 
by the time they get out of the third grade. And there are also 
countless other religious and other community organizations presenting--
doing it and supporting schools.
    Eight years ago only 35 percent of our schools--and listen to this--
3 percent of our classrooms were connected to the Internet. I said 8; 
the truth is, it was 1994, 6 years ago. Today, with the help of new 
Federal dollars to support Internet hookups and the E-rate program, 
which was pioneered and supported by the Vice President--the E-rate basically guarantees that every 
school can afford to log on to the Internet and hook up to access it, no 
matter how limited their resources are--we have gone from 3 percent of 
our classrooms to 65 percent of our classrooms connected, from 35 
percent of our schools to 95 percent of our schools connected to the 
Internet, including this one.
    And you just heard your principal say, before you had this last 
remodeling, even if you had the money, you couldn't do it because the 
wiring wouldn't support it. You'd be amazed how many schools I've been 
in that can't be connected to the Internet because the wiring in the 
school won't support it. I was at an old school in Virginia about a year 
ago, and they kept laughing about how the whole place shorted out every 
time the classrooms tried to log on. I was in Philadelphia, where the 
average school building is 65 years old--the average school building--
and I couldn't--I can't tell you how many school buildings I've been in 
just in that one city that couldn't be wired.
    On the other hand, as you see in this facility, there's another 
thing we have in common. This building was built when Grant was 
President. Every night in my private office, I work on Grant's Cabinet 
table. It was built in 1869, and it served me quite well, but I don't 
have to wire it. [Laughter] I don't have to air-condition it. I don't 
have to put heating in it. All it has to do is stand up.
    But as you see from this building, a lot of these old school 
buildings are fantastic in their construction. And things were done then 
that you couldn't afford to do now. But they have

[[Page 2869]]

to be modernized. Now, in 1995 the city of Chicago found the resources 
to make this school safe, warm, beautiful, and usable. That makes a big 
difference. But across this country, there are 3\1/2\ million students 
who attend schools that need extensive repairs or should be replaced. 
There are millions of other students going to schools in housetrailers. 
I've been to one elementary school in Florida, in a little community in 
Florida, an elementary school like this one, that had 12 trailers 
outside it used for classes.
    Now, again I will say, we've got the biggest and most diverse 
student body in history, more important to educate them than ever 
before, but a smaller percentage of the property tax payers in most of 
our school districts are parents in the school than ever before. More 
people are renters. You know all the reasons why this is so.
    I have believed for 4 years that the National Government should give 
both tax incentives and direct cash investment to the repair, the 
modernization, and the building of school facilities. I've also been in 
one of the mayor's new school buildings here to highlight this. We've 
done this--did you ever see that movie ``Groundhog Day,'' where every 
day is the same thing over and over again? Every time I--Mayor 
Daley thought I was casting him in 
``Groundhog Day,'' I think, for a long time, because every time I'd come 
back here, we'd have to talk about the same thing, because we could 
never get anything done.
    But I'm happy to report that this year, for the first time, we have 
finally secured $1.2 billion to help repair schools like this one across 
America where the need is greatest. Now, let me say to you, one of your 
former United States Senators, Everett Dirksen, once said in his droll 
way that when you mentioned a billion here and a billion there, pretty 
soon you're talking about real money. And that sounds like an enormous 
amount of money, but the truth is that the aggregate net need for school 
construction and school repair in the United States of America is over 
$100 billion.
    That's why I think it is so important for the Congress to continue 
to try to get the tax relief that I have suggested, which would, in 
effect, cut the cost of school financing, so that if school districts 
went out and floated their own bonds, or cities floated their bonds for 
school construction or school repair, the cost would be dramatically 
reduced to the taxpayers, making it easier to sell such issues to 
taxpayers whose kids are not in the schools. And I think we should 
continue to invest direct resources from the Federal Government.
    But this is a big beginning. And I predict that this program will be 
wildly popular throughout America, because I can see how you feel about 
this school building today, and I can only imagine how different it was 
before it was fixed 5 years ago.
    Eight years ago we knew that children learn best in smaller classes, 
but classes were getting larger for the same reason school buildings 
were deteriorating: more kids, limited tax base. Today, we are in the 
third year of hiring 100,000 teachers for smaller classes in the early 
grades. If we can get them all hired, we'll be able to bring down 
average class size to 18 in grades K through 3 all across America.
    Again, I'm really grateful to the Congress. In the last education 
budget, concluded after the election, we went from a budget which hired 
about 29,000 teachers last year to one that will hire 37,000 this coming 
year. So we'll be more than a third of the way home in a 6-year program. 
And I hope and pray that the Congress will continue to do this.
    We've also funded initiatives to help recruit new teachers, retain 
the best teachers, train and certify more board-certified national 
teachers, and let every teacher keep learning on the job. And one of the 
things that I think Sharon Wilcher should 
be commended for, I understand, is giving her staff every chance to 
continue to learn and grow. Staff development is a big, important part 
of keeping the school going in the right direction.
    Eight years ago there was one charter school in America, a public 
school which has the freedom to chart its own mission. If every school 
were like James Ward, we might not need them. But the truth is, it both 
gives more choices to parents and provides more competition when the 
school system is not working, without draining resources away from the 
public schools. There was one 8 years ago; there are 2,000 today in this 
budget. We're going to be well on our way to 3,000 by the end of the 
year.
    Eight years ago we said we wanted our kids to be safe in school, and 
we wanted them to have an orderly, disciplined environment. Secretary 
Riley has used Federal funds to help build 
partnerships between school districts and local police departments to 
support things like

[[Page 2870]]

character education and voluntary uniform policies and zero tolerance 
for guns in schools. And violent crime in the schools, notwithstanding 
the tragic and heartbreaking incidents which have been widely reported, 
violent crime in our schools has fallen steadily since 1993. It is much 
lower today than it was 8 years ago.
    Eight years ago college was priced out of reach for a lot of 
students. I'll never forget one night when I was Governor in the early 
nineties, I was in Fayetteville, Arkansas, the home of the University of 
Arkansas, and I went to a cafe to have a cup of coffee with a friend of 
mine. And I was doing what I always do; I went out and shook hands with 
everybody there. And there were four students there, and two of them 
told me they were dropping out of school. And I said, ``Why?'' And they 
said, ``Well, we'll never be able to pay our student loans off--never. 
So we've got to drop out of school, make some money, hope we can save 
enough to come back, and somehow get out someday.''
    I also met a lot of students who thought they were going to not be 
able to find very good jobs if they got out. One of the things that I 
committed myself to do when I ran for President is to open the doors of 
college to all Americans. So, what have we done? With the HOPE 
scholarship tax credit, $1,500 a year off the tax bill directly in the 
first 2 years of college, and the lifetime learning credit for junior 
and senior year and graduate school and for adults to go back and get 
training, which can be worth even more, we are now helping 13 million 
Americans to go on to higher education.
    We also have more affordable student loans. We've saved students $9 
billion by directly loaning them the money from the Government--$9 
billion. The average student on a $10,000 loan today is saving $1,300 in 
repayment costs over what they were 8 years ago. And it makes it a lot 
easier.
    They also have the option to pay back the loans as a percentage of 
their income, which means if you want to be a schoolteacher and you know 
you'll never get rich, you can still borrow whatever you need to go to 
college, because you can pay your loan back as a percentage of your 
income. And if you strike oil in your backyard, you have the option to 
go out and pay it off the next year, anyway. It's a very good deal.
    We also have had a big increase in work-study slots, a big increase 
in Pell grants, another big one this year, up to $3,700 a year now, the 
maximum grant. And 150,000 of our young people have earned money for 
college while serving in AmeriCorps. I just met one of them outside on 
the way in--150,000 in 6 years. It took the Peace Corps 30 years to 
amass 150,000 volunteers. And I might just say, to the side, so much for 
those who say this generation of young people is self-seeking. It is the 
most stunning example of community service in modern American history, 
and it's also helping a lot of people to go on to college.
    We started a program called GEAR UP, which is now serving 1.2 
million disadvantaged middle school students. We send college students 
out to help mentor them and convince them they can go on to college, 
come up with a plan for the rest of their academic career until they get 
out of high school, and tell them right then in middle school what kinds 
of financial aid they can get where, so they will know from the time 
they're in the sixth or seventh or eighth grade that they can actually 
go to college and the promise will be kept.
    All told, we have doubled education funding in 8 years, more 
investment, provided the largest expansion of college opportunity in 50 
years, since the GI bill, and gotten the results for more 
accountability: Test scores are up; the dropout rate is down; advanced 
placement courses in high school are being taken by 50 percent more 
kids--in the last 5 years, 50 percent more--300 percent more Hispanic 
kids, 500 percent more African-American kids are taking advanced 
placement courses.
    Not surprisingly, the SAT scores are at a 30-year high in America, 
and the college-going rate has gone up 10 percent. This strategy works. 
Higher standards, great accountability, more investment, equal 
opportunity--it works. And we have come a long way toward an America in 
which every child enters school ready to learn, graduates ready to 
succeed, and has the opportunity to go on to college.
    Of course, the lion's share of the credit belongs to people like 
you, to the teachers, the principals, the parents, the community 
leaders. But it is up to the rest of us to create a framework in which 
those four objectives can be pursued.
    We will hear a lot of talk in the future, I'm sure, about education 
reform, and I applaud it.

[[Page 2871]]

I hope that education reform all across America will become more and 
more a bipartisan issue. In the last four budgets that we had, we had a 
bipartisan budget. We fought about it. We argued about it. I had to 
threaten a bunch of vetoes, but in the end we had a bipartisan majority 
for every single thing that I talked about here today. And we ought to 
give credit where credit is due. This should not be a partisan issue.
    When my wife was growing up in a suburb of Chicago, I'll never 
forget my father-in-law and my mother-in-law talking about how it was an 
overwhelmingly Republican place. Goldwater carried it 4 to 1 in '64, and 
the other 20 percent thought he was too liberal. It was a big Republican 
place. They never voted down a school bond issue, ever. The difference 
in the Republicans and the Democrats on education was where the money 
ought to come from.
    And we ought to go back--we need to look at the reality here. Who 
are the children in our schools? Who are the leaders of our future? What 
strategies have been proven? It's not like there's no evidence here. All 
we tried to do was to take what you proved worked. It is not true that 
we tried to rewrite every local school's education policy. Dick 
Riley cut Government regulation in the 
Department of Education by two-thirds. We just took what works.
    And I hope that in the future there will continue to be a passion 
coming out of people in Washington and in every State capital and every 
community in this country of both parties. But every proposal should be 
measured against what we now know works, what you have proven works 
here. And if it works, whoever has got the idea, we ought to put it in.
    But it's not like--I remember when I started this, when Hillary and 
I started going into classes in the late seventies, and we started 
trying to write new standards for our State in the early eighties, we 
had hunches. Educators thought they knew. There was a little evidence 
here and a little evidence there, but we were kind of making it up as we 
went along. And it was happening all over America. We've now had 15 
years of solid evidence. You have given us that in schools like this 
one.
    And so I would just say, I wanted to come here because Chicago has 
been good to me, and Chicago has been very good to its children these 
last 6 years. I wanted to come here because, as I leave office, I don't 
want America to let its concern for education reform and improvement 
abate; I want it to increase. I want more people to believe that every 
child can learn, and that in this global economy, every child must 
learn, not only for himself or herself but for the rest of us, as well.
    Of course, there are big challenges that remain. But your school, 
like so many I visited over the past 8 years, teaches us all the most 
important lesson: We can do it.
    Thank you very much, and God bless you.

Note: The President spoke at 5:35 p.m. in the auditorium. In his 
remarks, he referred to Sharon R. Wilcher, principal, James Ward 
Elementary School; Mayor Richard M. Daley of Chicago; Illinois State 
Comptroller Daniel W. Hynes; and Gery Chico, president, board of 
directors, and Paul Vallas, chief executive officer, Chicago Public 
School District.