Patty Murray: “Right now in classrooms across our country students are gathering. Right now teachers are beginning his or her lesson…”

“Right now in classrooms across our country students are gathering. Right now teachers are beginning his or her lesson, and those students in that classroom probably do not know the specifics of the debate that we are about to have. They probably are not familiar with the amendment I am about to offer. But I will promise you one thing. Those students will realize the impact of how the Senate votes on this class size amendment. Today, I am offering an amendment to continue the progress we have made over the last 3 years in making classrooms across the country less crowded and more productive. My amendment will ensure that we keep our commitment to help local school districts hire 100,000 new teachers so that students can get the time and the attention they need and deserve in our classrooms. We know that smaller classes help kids learn the basics with fewer discipline problems. Just this year we also learned that smaller classes resulted in better scores on standardized tests and a higher likelihood of taking college entrance exams and a lower teen pregnancy rate. As managers of the taxpayer dollars, we should invest in ideas that work. We know that smaller classes help our students learn. Unfortunately, the underlying bill combines funding for class size reduction and teacher quality into one pool. As a result, local school districts would have to choose, under this bill, between providing smaller classes or funding teacher quality.”