Jeff Bingaman: “this amendment tries to deal, at least in part--and clearly it is only in part--with a very serious problem that has…”

“this amendment tries to deal, at least in part--and clearly it is only in part--with a very serious problem that has been brought to our attention, tragically, in the last few days, and that is the problem of violence in our schools. What we have tried to do is take provisions I have been working on in the nature of a ``safe schools security act'' and put those in amendment form to add to this legislation pending here today. Obviously, there is no way to teach a student if a student feels threatened or if there is an unsafe condition in the school. Unfortunately, we have unsafe conditions and threatening conditions in too many of our schools today. The Department of Education recently released a study that tried to look at the incidence of school violence and school crime. The study shows that 10 percent of schools surveyed had at least one serious violent crime occur in that school during the 1996-97 school year.”