Political Quotes

“What I would suggest that everybody in the country do is do what I just said a few minutes ago. Take some time to find out how much money is being spent at the local level and see if this $100 million program does any good, or if we should take the $100 million and give it to the classroom teacher who will actually meet their child every day and see if it will help produce a better result. Let me tell my colleagues politically where we are. The State has already voted on this. They decided not to give the Department of Education the ability to fashion the test. It passed in the Senate, but there is going to be a Washington-picked group that will design the test. One reason I think the Black Caucus and the Hispanic Caucus is against this is they do not want some elite group in Washington designing a test for their children, not knowing anything about their community, and creating standards that may not be appropriate for their community. If you give the power to test, you are eventually going to give the power to change curriculum. It has traditionally been in America a local function to test and prepare students to learn.”