Kay Bailey Hutchison: “I rise to speak again on the education bill that I hope will be before the Senate very shortly. We have been talking…”

“I rise to speak again on the education bill that I hope will be before the Senate very shortly. We have been talking about this bill off and on for 2 weeks. It is time for the Senate to get down to the real debate. Let us bring the bill forward, propose amendments, let everyone have their say, and send a bill to President Bush he can sign. We have the opportunity in this debate to change the course of public education in this country, and I believe it needs changing. We have seen year after year, in the last 25 years in this country, more spending going into public education from the Federal level but not improvements in the overall education of our children. I do not think throwing more money at education is the only answer. We are going to put more money into education, but we are going to do it in a reformed education system. In fact, we need to shake up the system. We have some very good public schools in our country, but we don't have a uniform standard of public schools where we can say all of them meet the test of giving every child the chance to reach his or her full potential with a public education. That should be the standard. We must be able to help each individual child learn in the best way that child possibly can, if that child is going to reach his or her full potential. That is exactly what we are trying to do with the bill we hope to bring up soon.”