Speaker Frequently Deviates from Prepared Text

Thank you very much for inviting me here today. One of the things I often need to do is remind people of their stake in public education. In too many instances, people think that public education is only the concern of parents, teachers, and politicians.

But those of you here today know better. The newspapers you run cover the activities of people in our communities, so you understand as well as anyone that public education concerns everyone. And for your interest and your actions, I thank you. But I did not come here today just to thank you. I also came to discuss the President’s bold new plan for American education, and how you can help.

This is a plan that will affect every community and every state and children of every race and creed. As a Houstonian, I always think of the words of the great Houston Congresswoman, Barbara Jordan. "We may have come on different ships," she said, "but we’re all in the same boat now."

As passengers on this boat, we have a right to know whether it’s seaworthy. In some ways, it’s not, and it hasn’t been for decades. We need a new boat and we need everyone rowing in the same direction to make it work.

Our public education system is not meeting the needs of our children. It’s been almost twenty years since my predecessor, Terrel Bell, created a commission to examine our public school system. That commission’s final report, "A Nation at Risk," highlighted just how complacent we had become towards mediocrity and failure in our schools.

• Twenty years later – where are we? Nearly 70 percent of our inner-city fourth graders are unable to read at even a basic level.

• Twenty years later, our high school seniors trail students in nearly every industrialized nation on international math tests.

• Twenty years later, nearly one-third of our college freshmen arrive unprepared for their college level courses, and must take remedial courses instead.

• Twenty years later, our biggest failure is the growing achievement gap that exists between disadvantaged and minority students and their peers. Older students who need the most help are not getting it, and young children trapped in poverty are not getting the education that would help them secure a strong future.

And this is twenty years after we started a period of so-called school reform.

Our education system is simply not preparing students for the modern workforce. When our high-tech industries need skillful hi-tech workers, where do they turn? To foreign workers. In 1999, the Immigration and Naturalization Service granted 115,000 H-1B visas, and last year, Congress voted to increase that visa cap to 195,000.

There is nothing wrong with the H-1B program, but there is something wrong when American schools fail to prepare American students for these valuable jobs. Frankly, it’s a betrayal of our children.

Here’s the good news on education. President Bush understands the problem. That’s why his number one priority is education. In Texas, he increased teachers’ salaries – and test scores. President Bush actually came over to the Department of Education for my swearing-in. He was the first President ever to do that.

The other good news is the bipartisan spirit of reform on Capitol Hill. You’ve probably written stories recently on the spectacle of Ted Kennedy praising a Republican President on education. Senator Kennedy and other Democrats have been gracious and kind to me since I arrived in Washington. They have talked with me at length about their dreams for a better education system, and I know they are sincere, just as Republicans are sincere.

Democrats and Republicans in both the House and the Senate have achieved a consensus on the need for reform and greater accountability that no one could have imagined even a few months ago. Yesterday, John Boehner introduced H.R. 1, his version of the President’s No Child Left Behind proposal. We’re delighted by the support so far.

The President’s proposal will fundamentally change the way our nation approaches elementary and secondary education. And with his budget, he has provided the resources to take that plan and make it a reality.

Under the President’s budget, the Department of Education will receive a larger increase than any other federal agency. This funding will ensure that states and schools will get the resources they need to enact real change.

The President’s budget is a tremendous boost to education efforts all over America. But I know that the problems at hand require a lot more than extra funding. They require a new approach. We must focus our education system on the fundamentals of organizational effectiveness.

• Fundamentals like high standards
• Fundamentals like annual assessment for results
• Fundamentals like accountability for results
• Fundamentals like flexibility and local controls, and
• Fundamentals like expanded parental choice

These are fundamentals that work for businesses and individuals. And they are fundamentals that will work for our schools.

Setting high standards is the first step. When we expect more from our children, we will get more. Children know when they are being sold short. The President calls this "the soft bigotry of low expectations." We can’t help our children by asking less of them, but we can help them by expecting more.

Setting standards is important, but it does us no good if we aren’t making sure that our kids are meeting them. To ensure that children are meeting high standards, we must test them – every child, every year – and leave no child behind.

Some people are frightened of the word ‘test,’ but testing can be a powerful and effective tool for teachers. Tests that are aligned with standards, objectives, and curriculum are our best tool for identifying where students and schools are succeeding. Tests are also the best way for us to identify failing schools and failing students. When we can see them – and we cannot be afraid to see them – we can give them the resources they need to succeed.

We have a responsibility to make sure that schools get the resources they need. But schools in turn have a responsibility to make sure kids are learning. And when schools aren’t teaching children, they will be held accountable.

When investors create a business, they demand that it demonstrate results. When customers buy a product, they demand that it perform as advertised. Why should a school be any different? The taxpayers are the investors, and parents are the partners. They have every right to demand results.

When schools are failing to teach their students, taxpayers are not getting their money’s worth, and parents are not getting their wishes, so we must intervene. We cannot allow children to remain in perpetually broken schools. Help the schools – yes. Improve them through rigorous reforms – yes. But give options to parents and kids that never get options. We may or may not agree on what those options ought to be, but we should all agree that these parents should get a viable option for their child to get the help they need.

In most cases, no one is going to take a greater interest in a child’s education than the parents. What could be a more arrogant abuse of government than to trap a child in a school that the parents know is failing?

Greater parental choice and flexibility are crucial to the President’s plan. We are going to demand more from our schools. We will reward success. And we will sanction failure. But we will not tell schools how dollars must be spent, or how decisions must be made.

Dollars and decisions belong in our communities and classrooms. Just as a business gives resources and flexibility to those workers who are closest to the action, we want to assist and take regulatory burdens away from those who are responsible for teaching children.

We have discussed the achievement gap between disadvantaged students and their peers, but there is also a technology gap between these students. We must do more to make sure that the latest technology is available to all American students, regardless of where they live or what school they attend.

Somewhere in your city, there is probably an office building that is neither fancy nor expensive, where companies that are not very famous do their work. Workers in those buildings stay in instant touch with their colleagues through email, cell phones, and other communications devices. Instant communication is so reliable it’s become boring to them. They count on it.

But down the street from that office building, there is probably a school where the principal has to print out a memo to send a brief message to all of her teachers, and where a teacher must set up a meeting to communicate with a parent. Even if the school district knows there is money available to install better communications, it may not have figured out how.

The President is committed to making sure that the federal government helps in this effort. The President’s plan would streamline the numerous federal technology programs into a performance-based technology grant program. This simplified structure will ensure that more technology dollars get into our classrooms. When schools are free of the administrative burdens that they must currently endure to receive technology funding, they can spend more time focusing on how to best use that technology funding.

Technology can be a powerful tool to approve academic achievement. But we must not use technology as a crutch – or a lack of technology as an excuse. Technology must be integrated into our classrooms in ways that will help increase student achievement. When technology is properly incorporated into our classrooms, more students will develop the skills it takes to succeed in the modern workforce. And American companies will finally be able to look within our own nation to find the high-tech employees they need.

I know that you, as citizens and journalists, are ready and willing to do what it takes to improve education. And we will need your help. The President’s plan may have the weight of the federal government behind it, but it is not the federal government that will make this plan succeed. It will be the combined efforts of the federal and local governments, the public and private sector, and parents, teachers and students.

If you agree that the time has come for a new approach to education, then I urge you to get involved in this debate. Your words can make a powerful impression, and I ask you to use them in the service of our children.

I know that sounds general, so let me make a specific suggestion. When you get back home, set up a meeting with your local superintendent. Ask about the district’s best and worst school, and ask for guesses about why they are different. Ask what the district is doing to improve its schools, and ask for suggestions about how you can help. You may want to add a weekly section on education, or create a student internship program, or you may think of something new.

Talking about education reform here in Washington is useful, but we must also talk about it back home where the decisions are made. It is only through hard work at the local level that reform will lead to results, and that the day may come that no child is left behind.

Thank you.