On the recordJanuary 11, 2022
I thank my dear friend from Pennsylvania for yielding me 2\1/2\ minutes to speak about something today that we need to shed light on, which is an issue impacting an entire generation of students. Children from preschool age through college have been barred from their classrooms for the better part of 2 years now. Many of us have stated from the start that shutting down schools would create more problems than it would solve, and now the data proves us right. Still, some teachers' unions refuse to work. They refuse to put the well-being of the students' futures first. Americans are sick and tired of the Federal Government moving the goalposts and changing the ``science'' to fit whatever narrative they want. The President of the United States repeatedly caved to the teachers' unions, ignoring the needs of our students to the detriment of our children across the country. Now that he has seen the polling on school closures, he says the schools should reopen, continuing to move the goalposts. Suicide and self-harm among students hit record highs while schools were closed. Mental health problems are on the rise among kids of all ages. Test scores are abysmal. All of these issues trace back to the closure of our schools. When schools remain closed, our children are harmed. Parents are having to take their children to work, to their jobs, because they have no way of having their children cared for during the day.…
