Bill Clinton: “Well, I think the first thing I would say about that is that in the absence of security, not much learning is going to…”

“Well, I think the first thing I would say about that is that in the absence of security, not much learning is going to occur. You know that. We know that there are thousands of children who stay home from school every day because they are afraid of what might happen to them in school. We see constantly examples of violence both in school buildings and then in the near vicinity of schools. Now, what we tried to do with the safe and drug-free schools act, because there was violence in the schools and in the perimeter, is to provide some funds for things like security devices, metal detectors, things like that, but also more enforcement officers in the outside of school. Then I think you must have--the PTA, and all the other committed groups in the country that care about the schools, but especially the PTA, has to work with every school district to make sure that there really is a functioning security policy. You know, there are schools that are very safe environments in very high-crime areas in this country. So it's simply not true that there are no schools in high-crime areas that are safe. There are schools that are quite safe in very high-crime areas because of the security policies they have and because of the leadership and the discipline and the organization of resources that have been adopted and because they've gotten a lot of parental help often. And so my recommendation is that you identify the schools that you think have done the best job in the most difficult circumstances, figure out what they did, and make sure every PTA chapter in the country has access to that knowledge, and then if we can get these funds and help out there, that you spend them in a way that will maximize the security in the schools in your area. It's a huge deal, and there's no way--this is the kind of partnership we need. I mean, there's no way in the world the Federal Government can tell anybody how they should secure one, two, or three schools, because they all have different circumstances. [A participant asked what State and local school officials could do to help protect the school-to-work initiative from future budget cuts.]”