Political Quotes

“passage of the Goals 2000 bill is something to be proud of. In fact, it may turn out to be one of the most important pieces of legislation that we pass in many years. If this bill turns out to be the catalyst that we need to take action to improve America's schools, it may well be the most important bill of the decade. Goals 2000 establishes goals that will lead to the kind of educational achievement that America needs. It is a sad commentary, however, that it has taken 10 years since the publication of ``A Nation at Risk,'' and 6 years since the education summit to get around to passing this legislation. Hard work remains. We have much to do to reform our schools to make them responsive to the needs of today and tomorrow. Even more important, we have a great challenge before us to help the children and families who are at risk, to make sure they see education as the way out of the cycle of poverty. It is sad that we have let the situation go so long before taking action. The effect on our economy of our current school system is significant. Up to $1 trillion is lost in GDP because of our failure to educate our populace. American business spends approximately $200 billion per year to perform remedial training for its employees. This is training necessary to provide these individuals minimum skills require to perform on the job. The Department of Education estimates that 30 million adult Americans are functionally illiterate.”