Unlike the administration's plan to offer temporary waivers that keep schools tied to a failing law, the proposals before us today take a step closer to enacting lasting education reforms that will raise the bar for student achievement and…

No one said rewriting a law as influential as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act would be easy.

For the sake of our children, we must continue working toward a consensus.

We acknowledged No Child Left Behind's shortcomings and convened a series of hearings in which dozens of witnesses described the challenges facing our nation's education system.

The stakes couldn't be higher.

Again, I want to thank Chairman Kline for these proposals to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, what today we refer to as No Child Left Behind.

We urgently need Congress to reauthorize the ESEA law because for the past 10 years American schools have lived under a law that I have referred to as--it reminds me of the old Clint Eastwood movie, 'The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly,'…

We are proud to stand with the voices of opposition to these bills.

I commend Chairman Kline for offering a bill that acknowledges and respects that it is the state and local leaders who are driving education reform.

The current federal law is the only thing left that stands in the way preventing us from helping the children of Denver.

The combined effect of these bills is to rely on state-designed accountability systems, state-designed academic standards and state-designed assessments.

Granting more freedom from the federal mandates of NCLB does not mean lowering the bar for any child.

The sincere, ongoing efforts of this committee to reauthorize ESEA and improve America's schools over the last 4 years are recognized across this nation.

The recently introduced Student Success Act and Encouraging Innovation and Effective Teachers Act represent a strong step in the right direction.

Thankfully, states have not waited for the federal government to act on ESEA and we have acted on our own to advance meaningful, state-driven levels of high accountability.

As long as the federal government spends tax dollars to fund public education there must be accountability for how those dollars are spent.

Congress must empower states also to define and lead education reform efforts, while limiting the federal role to supporting authentic, comprehensive state and local reform efforts.

Why should we have to go through all that effort, time and expense just to be able to act like an actual state?