Political Quotes

“I come to the floor to talk about COVID in two ways. The Senator from Tennessee, who is presiding today, will appreciate this. She and I have a regular call with Governor Lee, our Governor, and we just finished part of it. Her staff was on part of that. He gave some very interesting information that I think would be important to all Senators and to our country, and that is the significant learning loss that occurs when children aren't in school. In Tennessee, Governor Lee and some national researchers have completed a study of the learning loss in the third grade for reading and math proficiency for children who were not in school from March through the summer. Now, you always have a learning loss in the summer, but for March through summer, this is what they found. Preliminary data shows an estimated 50-percent decrease in proficiency rates in third grade reading and a projected 65-percent decrease in proficiency in math. That, in the Governor's words, is a dramatic decrease. It shows that the vast majority of students learn in person, the Governor said, with their teacher, and he is working to get a safe environment so that they can get back to school. The good news on that is, according to the Governor, 1,800 schools in Tennessee are open, in person, and only 7 of those schools have any sort of closure incident today--in other words, one class or one school closed because of COVID.…”