Political Quotes

“Mr. President, in the 1960s the Johnson administration led Congress to start allotting a small amount of money--of Federal funding from the Federal taxpayers to target schools and reach out to the poorest of the poor in America and try to help beat back poverty. Five decades later, we have an education policy in America that reaches out to every single school district in America--millions of kids--that continues to fail them, to fail their parents, and that still has not solved the poverty issue. What we have is an ever-increasing Federal bureaucracy that has reached well beyond what it was designed for in the 1960s and, I would assure you, reaches well beyond what it was originally designed for-- something that would help the poorest of the poor or take care of kids on military bases and those on Indian tribal lands. No Child Left Behind passed in 2001, authorizing education policy that was even more expansive. The goal was good--make sure that every child in America has the opportunity for success, that every teacher has teaching qualifications, and that every school has accountability. It was approved through 2008, and it still continues today. Math, reading, and science are now measured in adequate yearly progress for each school, and it has become the slow-rolling disaster. The problem was the source and the goal.…”