Thomas Daschle: “I have been concerned over the last few days to hear growing attacks against the so-called e-rate--the program Congress…”

“I have been concerned over the last few days to hear growing attacks against the so-called e-rate--the program Congress created just 2 years ago to help schools, libraries and hospitals connect to the information superhighway. I am concerned because of the timing of these attacks. Only last month, the Senate approved a bill increasing immigration quotas for highly skilled workers from other countries. Why? Because there are not enough American workers with the technological skills to meet the needs of our economy. If that is not an acknowledgment that we need to do a better job of teaching technological skills in this country, frankly, I don't know what is. I supported raising the quotas for skilled workers, but that was a one-shot emergency response to a crisis. By the year 2000, 60 percent of all jobs in our country will require technological skills that only a fraction of Americans now have. In the longrun, the only way we can keep America's economy growing is by giving our own workers the skills to compete and win in a high-skills economy. That is why the sudden course of criticism of the e-rate is so alarming. Today, only 27 percent of the classrooms in America are connected to the Internet. In poor communities, rural and urban, only 14 percent of classrooms are linked to the Internet. If we don't take the opportunity now to address this problem, we simply will not have enough skilled workers to retain America's position as the world's strongest economy.”