Political Quotes

“I would like to give a perspective of No Child Left Behind that is a little bit different perspective for some of the other States, those States that may not believe there is a significant advantage to them. I have the privilege of being from the State of Iowa, and we rank in the top three every year in ACT tests; and we have for years put out Iowa basic skills and Iowa tests of educational development, that analysis that we do of students every year, comparing them against their growth from year to year, in a number of different subjects and a composite score that we do, something that goes back to the time that I was at least in grade school, and that is some years ago, and before that actually, and those tests have been given around the world, places as far away as China. So the credibility that the Iowa public school system has worldwide is high, and our competitiveness in our graduates, particularly measured by ACT test scores and also the success of our young students as they go off and go on to higher education, is also high. Arguably, the public school education in K-12 in the State of Iowa ranks in the top three, maybe as the best in the country; and so because of that long-standing tradition to education that we have, we have those kinds of results and standards, and yet we are faced with a No Child Left Behind policy that is a one-size-fits-all.”