Conference Report on S. 1177, Student Success Act
Floor Speech
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Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this legislation. It has been 13 long years since ESEA was rewritten. As we have heard from prior speakers, there are many problems that have been identified with No Child Left Behind, which we have heard from across the board in terms of parents, educators, administrators, and in terms of the need to update and revise this legislation.
What we also know is that the American economy has changed over the last 13 years and so has the world economy. One of the biggest problems that employers have today is the lack of individuals with degrees in science, technology, engineering, and math, STEM technology.
The good news is that this bill upgrades the K-12 system to give kids the tools that they are going to need to succeed with these jobs, which now are growing three
times as fast as non-STEM jobs. The good news is it provides incomes twice as large as non-STEM jobs.
So what the bill does is it creates a STEM master teacher core, provides professional development training to STEM educators, greater access for thousands of school districts to Federal funding to support STEM programs, including partnerships with nonprofits.
It encourages alternative certification programs to allow more STEM teachers to come from industry and will retain and provide promising STEM teachers with differential pay. This is what our school systems need and this is what our kids need to have the tools to succeed in the future.
It is a great achievement that the chairman and the ranking member defied all the conventional wisdom to get this bill to move forward. It is almost like Pope Francis created some aura that you capitalized on. I mean that sincerely.
This is an incredible achievement to break through the barriers that have prevented us from coming together as an institution to really fix what in many respects is the most important issue, which is creating a future for the kids and our grandchildren.
I urge strong support of this legislation.
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