[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George W. Bush (2003, Book II)]
[July 7, 2003]
[Pages 839-843]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks at Highland Park Elementary School in Landover, Maryland
July 7, 2003

    Thank you all. Thanks for coming. Please. Windy, thank you very much. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of your 
dedication. It is a great country where Windy can come from a Head Start 
program and is now a leader in the movement to make sure Head Start 
fulfills the promise of the program.
    First, I want to thank the good folks here at Highland Park 
Elementary School for letting me come by and see a program which works. 
I don't know if the people in the State of Maryland know this--I know 
the Governor does--that the teachers 
here and the program here uses a strategy, what they call a Center for 
Improving Readiness for Children, Learning, and Education, C.I.R.C.L.E., 
which is a model program. It's a program that incorporates profound and 
simple reading lessons necessary to lay the foundation for future 
readers. And it's a program that's working. There is a strong emphasis 
on learning. There is obviously the continued Head Start focus on good 
nutrition and health care. This program also works well because the 
parents are involved.
    So, I've really come to say a couple of things. One, I want to thank 
the good folks at this learning institution for your focus and 
dedication. I also want to say that this is possible, this program is 
possible, to be spread around the country. I mean, this is what we need 
to do. That's what we're here to talk about. We're really here to talk 
about how to make sure Head Start works.
    I'll never forget the lady in Houston, Texas, who stood up at one 
time and she said, ``Reading is the new civil right.'' Her point was, is 
that if you can't read, it is hard to access the greatness of America. 
And if reading is the new civil right, a good place to start with civil 
rights is at the Head Start programs all across the country.
    And that's what we're here to talk about, how to make then work 
better. They're working okay. We want better than okay in America. We 
want excellence. Windy understands that, and I want to thank her for 
working with my Secretary for the Department of Health and Human 
Services, Tommy Thompson. I appreciate you 
coming, Tommy.
    And I appreciate my friend Rod Paige. 
He's the Secretary of Education. If you noticed, the two Secretaries are 
here, Health

[[Page 840]]

and Human Services and Education. The idea is to combine both focuses, 
both Departments into one when it comes to Head Start. The Head Start 
program will stay under Tommy's purview, 
but we want it to become an Education Department as well.
    I mean, after all, you've got a million kids gathered together at 
one time during the day. If you've got a million kids that may be, as 
they call them in the education world, at-risk readers, let's get it 
right early then. That's what we're saying. And that's what this 
initiative is attempting to do.
    I appreciate Bob Ehrlich, the 
Governor of this great State. He knows what he's doing when it comes to 
education. He's got a great wife, the first lady, Kendel, with us as well. Governor Ehrlich sets high standards. 
He challenges what I call the soft bigotry of low expectations. He 
understands if you lower the bar, assign certain kids to failure based 
upon demographics, that's precisely what you'll get in the State of 
Maryland. So he said, ``We ought to raise the bar.'' He believes every 
child can learn. And so does the Lieutenant Governor, Michael 
Steele. They understand that high 
standards will yield high results. And the best place to start in 
achieving high standards is with the littlest of children.
    I want to thank very much Congressman John Boehner for coming today. The Congressman is not from Maryland; 
he's from Ohio. But he's an important figure since he's the chairman of 
the House Education Committee which is marking up legislation which will 
help us spread excellence to the Head Start programs all across the 
country. Congressman, thanks for coming. I look forward to continuing to 
work with him.
    He also is one of the authors of what we call the No Child Left 
Behind Act, which I'll talk about a little bit later. But the No Child 
Left Behind Act essentially says we expect every child to learn, and 
there is going to be high standards and strong accountability measures 
to every State in the Union. In return for increased Title I funding and 
in return for an increase in the Federal budget of elementary and 
secondary schools act money, we expect results. You see, we're not going 
to just spend money and hope something positive happens. We're going to 
spend money and see results.
    Well, if you believe in high standards and accountability, then it's 
really important to get the young kids up to the starting line at the 
same time. And that's why the Head Start reforms we're going to talk 
about are important, the reforms which John 
and his committee are carrying to the floor of the House relatively 
soon.
    I want to thank Nancy Grasmick, who is 
the State superintendent of schools in Maryland. I'm honored that you're 
here. Thank you for coming, and thank you for taking on a tough job. I 
appreciate Andre Hornsby as the 
superintendent of schools, an even tougher job. Government closest to 
the people is sometimes government that's the hardest. And I want to 
thank Guylaine Richard, who is the program 
director for the Head Start. I appreciate, Guylaine, you opening up this 
chance for me to come and see a program which works.
    I want to thank Lori Ellis, the principal. 
When we leave, she can take a deep breath and relax and say, ``Thank 
goodness the entourage has departed.'' [Laughter] I appreciate the--
Tonya Riggins, who is the Highland Park Head 
Start Center coordinator. I want to thank Lisa Dunmore and Alice Williams, the two 
fine teachers we had to meet. For the teachers who are here, thank you 
for doing what you're doing. You're a part of a noble profession, an 
incredibly important profession for the future of this country. You know 
what I know, that reading is the key to all learning. It's where you've 
got to start.
    And the research--I see some of my friends from the National 
Research Council, National Institutions of Child Health who are here. 
Reid Lyon is an expert. He's

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not a political person. He's a scientist. He understands how the brain 
works, and he's spent a lot of time analyzing what works and what 
doesn't work. He caught my attention when I was the Governor of Texas. I 
would ask him a question, ``Are you sure we can teach kids, you know, 
the so-called impossible-to-teach?'' He said, ``Sure, I know it. I'm 
absolutely certain.'' And so he started doing 
research to convince the people about the real future. And he says 
that--he and his fellow researchers--that preschoolers can learn much 
more than we ever thought possible about words and sounds.
    In other words, society limited how much a certain--how much a 
preschooler could learn. At least our imaginations weren't very open. It 
kind of felt like certain things were impossible to--certain knowledge 
was impossible to impart to our children, particularly the young.
    And so I want to thank Reid and the good 
folks who are focusing on science, who have opened up a tremendous realm 
of possibility now to achieve that which we want, a literate America. He 
also says there--he and other researchers say, and this is just as 
important, kids love to learn. They love to learn to read. Even the 
youngest child can learn that we read words and letters from left to 
right or that letters are associated with sounds; even the youngest of 
toddlers can figure that out over time.
    In one exercise, children clapped for each syllable in a word. They 
can trace letters on the page to begin to understand the movements we 
use to write. They can play word games and learn rhymes and songs that 
help them to develop their own vocabulary. That sounds like a simple 
curriculum, but it is research-based, all aimed at laying the foundation 
for children to become good readers. These are what we call the building 
blocks, and these building blocks need to be a part of Head Start 
programs all across America. That's the mission. That's the goal.
    Research also shows that if children do not develop these skills 
before they reach kindergarten, they will struggle to achieve success in 
their lives. Now, we need to listen to that kind of research in America. 
If the scientists come together and say, ``If we fail in our mission to 
give children the foundation necessary for reading, they will fall 
behind and may not be able to develop the skills necessary, so they have 
to struggle in life,'' we got a--this is an opportunity that we better 
not miss.
    We cannot let our children down. Now look, Head Start is a great 
opportunity to provide the foundation for reading. And first, I just 
want everybody to understand, Head Start does a good job of giving 
children nutrition and medical care. That has been primarily the focus, 
and the program needs to be applauded for meeting that goal. And nobody 
in this room wants Head Start to change that focus. We just want an 
additional focus to Head Start, and the Head Start focus is teaching the 
basics for reading and math. That's the new focus, along with health and 
nutrition.
    The Department of Health and Human Services did a report, and here 
is what it said: ``Even though most children in Head Start make some 
educational progress, most of them still leave the program with skills 
and knowledge levels that are far below what we expect.'' Now, in my 
line of work, if you see a problem, you address it. And I see that as a 
problem. If we're not meeting expectations, if we're not challenging the 
soft bigotry of low expectations, let's start right now in America. We 
want Head Start to set higher ambitions for the million children it 
serves.
    And so I laid out a plan. Every Head Start center must prepare 
children to succeed by teaching the basics of learning and literacy. 
That's the cornerstone of the plan. And every Head Start teacher must 
have the skills necessary to do so.
    And so we started last year when we launched the Strategic Teacher 
Education Program, STEP, to train 3,300 Head Start

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teachers and supervisors in the C.I.R.C.L.E. program, which is used 
right here at this school. In other words, it's a go-by. It is a 
curriculum. It's easy to understand. It's easy to teach. It's easy to 
implement. It is not a difficult chore for a teacher to take the basic 
learning from the C.I.R.C.L.E. program developed by the scientists and 
implement it at the Head Start program in which he or she teaches.
    Tonya Riggins, the assistant Head Start 
supervisor at Highland Park, was one of the teachers in the program. 
Tonya and thousands of other trained teachers went back to train other 
teachers at the program. So it's going to--we started with 3,300. Those 
3,300 went back to their local communities and talked to teachers with 
whom they teach how to teach a basic curriculum. It is a--and by the 
way, as new teachers are added, they too will be given the tools 
necessary to teach the program.
    Now, in order to make sure that the C.I.R.C.L.E. program is--and 
other curriculums which work--are being used, is working, I believe 
there needs to be an evaluation program. And after all, if we're 
spending a lot of taxpayers' money, which we are, it makes sense to 
determine whether or not these programs are, in fact, laying the 
foundation for reading.
    Now, I fully understand a 4-year-old child is not going to take a 
standardized test. That would be absurd. That we would--we would be 
defeating the purpose of accountability before we even began if we said, 
``Okay, we'll give standardized tests to 4-year-olds.'' But we can have 
children assessed by asking simple questions. You know, words go left to 
right. Are you able to identify certain sounds? Are they developed by--
developing the key skills necessary?
    And I think what needs to happen is--and I hope Congress agrees--
that the simple evaluations at the beginning of the year and the end of 
the year will tell us whether or not progress is being made in 
developing a curriculum necessary to teach children how to read. And if 
they are, we ought to be praising the programs, and if they're not, 
something else ought to happen. We cannot miss the opportunity much 
longer in America. Otherwise, children will be left behind.
    And so Boehner is here because his 
committee and the Congress is considering legislation that would put a 
new emphasis on language skills and literacy skills in Head Start 
programs. In other words, we're going to codify into law that which we 
have started through the teacher training program.
    The legislation will require Head Start providers to teach language, 
reading, and writing skills, as well as early math skills. In other 
words, it now becomes a part--when they pass the law that says the Head 
Start mission is further defined as an educational mission. And those 
programs that are used must be proven by scientific research. The 
legislation would hold Head Starts accountable for getting the job done.
    Now look, as I mentioned before, the No Child Left Behind Act says 
every child can learn. We're going to have high standards. We're going 
to trust the local people to develop the curriculum, but in return for 
Federal money, we want you to measure to tell us whether or not children 
are learning to read and write. And that's a heavy lift for some 
communities, because there hasn't been a proper focus on the little 
children.
    And therefore, we're asking people to develop an accountability 
system without everybody being at the same starting position. And that's 
why it's so important for preschool programs to be focused on literacy, 
so that when the accountability systems kick in in Maryland or Texas or 
anybody else, we can truthfully say that every child has been given the 
tools necessary to be at the starting line at the same time, so that we 
have true accountability, true measurement. And that's why the Head 
Start program is important.
    Now, there's Governors around the State, the country that have said, 
``Look, give us

[[Page 843]]

the flexibility to be able to dovetail the Head Start program into our 
preschool programs so that all students--so we have a better control 
over whether or not the students are given the skills necessary so that 
when you hold us to account, we can achieve that which we want to 
achieve, which is excellence in the classroom.''
    I appreciate the desire for flexibility. I support the Governors' 
desire for flexibility so long as, one, Federal monies going to the 
States are used only for Head Start. In other words, what we really 
don't want to do is say we're going to focus on Head Start; the Head 
Start money goes for, you know, a prison complex. I know that won't 
happen with Governor Ehrlich, but 
there needs to be a guarantee that the Federal money spent on Head Start 
only go to Head Start.
    Secondly, States and local governments must put money into the 
program, which would lock in the Head Start money for Head Start. So, in 
other words, the flexibility given to the State would not allow the 
States budget flexibility. It's management flexibility to be able to 
take the Head Start program, dovetail into the preschool program, then 
the kindergarten program, and then into the elementary school program.
    Governors ought to have that flexibility to--hope that Congress will 
provide that flexibility so that when the accountability systems kick 
in, fully kick in, that a Governor can truthfully say, ``Well, I've had 
the tools necessary to make sure the Head Start program fits into an 
overall comprehensive plan for literacy and math for every child in the 
State of Maryland,'' in Governor Ehrlich's case.
    This is a very important initiative I'm talking about. It is--it 
seems like to me a fantastic opportunity for the country to make sure 
that the desires of this country are met, and that is, every child 
become a good reader. If reading is the new civil right and human 
dignity and freedom is what this country is all about, let's make sure 
every child learns to read.
    So I want to thank you for giving me a chance to come today. We know 
what works. We've got the pros and the experts that have laid out a 
curriculum that will help us achieve a goal. We've got a million kids 
anxious to learn, showing up on a daily basis at Head Start programs all 
across the country. We've got teachers who want to teach. We're writing 
the checks for the local governments and the local Head Start programs. 
Let's combine it all into a comprehensive strategy that will allow us 
all to say, ``We have done our duty for future generations of children 
by laying the most important foundation of all, and that is the ability 
for each child to learn to read.'' I know it can happen. There's no 
doubt in my mind.
    I want to thank those of you who are working on the frontlines of 
education. I appreciate your willingness to accept a new mission to be 
incorporated with the old mission. And I appreciate your willingness to 
work hard, to see to it that not one single child in America is left 
behind.
    May God bless your work. And may God continue to bless America. 
Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 11 a.m. at the Head Start Center. In his 
remarks, he referred to Windy M. Hill, associate commissioner, Head 
Start Bureau, Administration for Children and Families, Department of 
Health and Human Services; Andre J. Hornsby, chief executive officer, 
Prince George's County Public Schools; Guylaine Richard, program 
supervisor, and Tonya Riggins, acting assistant program supervisor, Head 
Start, Prince George's County Public Schools; and G. Reid Lyon, branch 
chief, Child Development and Behavior, National Institute of Child 
Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health. The Office 
of the Press Secretary also released a Spanish language transcript of 
these remarks.