Patty Murray: “Education is absolutely the No. 1 priority for families across this country, but it is not just families. We go and talk…”

“Education is absolutely the No. 1 priority for families across this country, but it is not just families. We go and talk to businesses, and business people tell us we need to be able to hire students out of our schools with math and science and reading and English skills. Studies show--and I will be delighted, when we get to the debate on this, to go through the studies again--that reducing class size makes a difference in a child's ability to learn to write and to read, to do math and to do science, just the skills our businesses are looking for. They are looking to us to make a commitment on this. I commend my colleague from Oregon, as well, for his work on this. I know he is committed to this issue and has pledged his support as well. He knows, too, how important class size is. Let me end by reminding my colleagues this is a bipartisan effort. It was passed in a bipartisan way last October. There is no reason not to do this now.”