Heidi Alexander: “I thank the Senator from Ohio. He is exactly right. I know of no State that has more small colleges of the kind that…”

“I thank the Senator from Ohio. He is exactly right. I know of no State that has more small colleges of the kind that would take advantage of Perkins loan probably than the State of Ohio. It is important to say that Senator Baldwin, Senator Casey, and Senator Ayotte have been urgently making their case on the floor over the last several weeks and have done so in such an effective way that we have been able to come up with a bipartisan compromise. The more of that we are able to do, I think the more confidence the American people will have in their Senators. So I appreciate his leadership in making this possible. Another Senator who is a member of the Senate's committee that oversees education is the Senator from Pennsylvania, Mr. Casey. He, too, has just completed work on the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which many people thought we had no chance of passing this year and which we passed by a very large margin. I thank him, as I did Senator Baldwin, for working in such a constructive way. Some people look at the Senate and say: Well, you all are always arguing. Of course we are. That is what we do. That is like looking at the Grand Ole Opry and saying: You all are always singing. We have different points of view--and we do on the Perkins loan. But once we make our points of view known, we then do our jobs and we say: OK. Now we need to get a result.…”