Heidi Alexander: “I thank the Senator from Washington for her comments. At 10:45 a.m., we will begin voting. We have six amendments--five…”

“I thank the Senator from Washington for her comments. At 10:45 a.m., we will begin voting. We have six amendments--five or six that we expect to vote on, and then at 1:45 p.m. we will have passage of the bill or cloture and final passage of the bill. So we will finish our bill fixing No Child Left Behind today. Of course, in the U.S. Senate nothing is done until it is done, so I don't want to anticipate that--but I think it is fair to make a few comments about the bill at this point, anticipating we will have a successful conclusion this afternoon. If we are able to pass a bill fixing No Child Left Behind this afternoon, it will be a remarkable accomplishment for a U.S. Senate filled with 100 experts on education. I said earlier this week that dealing with a piece of legislation about elementary and secondary education is a little bit like going to a football game at the University of Tennessee, where there are 100,000 people in the stands and every one of them is an expert on football, and they know exactly what the next play is to call. Consensus among experts is not easy, but consensus is necessary in the U.S. Senate if we are going to deal even with such a complex problem as this, and that is exactly what we have achieved. As Senator Murray said, we found a consensus first about the urgent need to fix No Child Left Behind, 7 years overdue. That is our collective thought in the U.S. Congress.…”