Political Quotes

“Mr. President, today I introduce with Senator LeMieux and Senator Brown of Ohio, the Teacher and Principal Improvement Act, to foster the development of highly skilled and effective educators. We are slated to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act--ESEA--this Congress for the first time since 2001. My top priority for reauthorization is to build the capacity of our Nation's schools to enhance the effectiveness of teachers, principals, school librarians, and school leaders. Decades of research have demonstrated that improving teacher and principal quality as well as greater family involvement are the keys to raising student achievement and turning around struggling schools. Studies have found that more than 50 percentile points of the difference in student academic performance is attributed to teacher quality. The world's top performing education systems invest heavily in supporting and developing teachers. Teachers in top-ranking countries such as Finland and Singapore get 100 hours of fully paid professional development training each year. It is clear that the United States must also increase its investments in our educators to stay academically competitive in an ever-expanding global economy. Unfortunately, every year across the country thousands of effective teachers leave the profession--many within their first years of teaching. A 2003 study by Richard Ingersoll found that one-third of all new teachers quit after three years.…”