Scholarships for Opportunity and Results Reauthorization Act

Floor Speech

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I didn't really expect to be on the floor this afternoon managing this bill. Ironically, I was scheduled to host a briefing today for Members and staff on the constitutionality of the District of Columbia statehood bill, where I was going to show a 17-minute HBO ``Last Week Tonight'' clip from John Oliver that lampoons the Congress for denying District residents their voting rights, budget and legislative autonomy, and statehood.

Instead, here I am on the floor in a virtual reality show not speaking about the right to self-government, but fighting this latest attempt by the Republican Congress to impose its ideology on D.C. residents.

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Ms. NORTON. Yet, Mr. Chairman, I have sought a compromise that should be acceptable to Republicans, as it is to President Obama.

We support, and I repeat, we support allowing our current D.C. voucher students to remain in the program until graduation. That ensures D.C. would have voucher students for many years to come.

That is the kind of sensible compromise that Congress must get back to or be content with the label ``least productive Congress,'' as it has come to be known each year under this majority.

This bill goes beyond the compromise, we have offered, by seeking to admit new students as well. We are here so that Speaker John Boehner has a capstone to his own political career. The D.C. voucher program is his pet project, not D.C.'s. The Speaker has introduced only two bills this Congress: a bill on the Iran nuclear agreement and this bill.

Even if Members do not respect D.C.'s right to self-government, they should at least care whether the program improves achievement, which was the stated reason for vouchers in the first place. Far from helping students, however, the program has demonstrably failed.

According to the congressionally mandated evaluation of the program's effectiveness, this program, these vouchers, have failed to improve academic achievement, as measured by objective math and reading testing scores.

Most importantly, the program has not had significant impacts--that is also from the congressionally mandated evaluation--has not had ``significant impacts'' on the achievement of students whom the program was designed to most benefit: those who previously attended low-performing public schools.

The majority cites improved high school graduation rates. However, the evaluation did not examine dropout rates or the rigor of the schools' curriculum or graduation requirements.

The majority also cites high college attendance rates. However, the evaluation did not measure college attendance rates.

Even if the program were successful, Mr. Chairman, it would still not be needed, at least in the District of Columbia, which has perhaps the most robust public school choice program in the country. Almost 50 percent of our public school students attend charter schools, which the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools ranked as the strongest in the Nation. In addition, 75 percent of public school students in the District attend out-of-boundary schools. What D.C. has developed amounts to a model choice education program.

Moreover, the D.C. public schools have made some of the most impressive improvements in the country, by any measure, spurred by competition from the rapidly growing D.C. charter schools, not from the small number of voucher schools. In fact, a 2013 assessment of D.C. public schools indicated that the District had made the greatest improvement of any urban school district in the Nation.

D.C. charter schools have even higher educational achievement and attainment than D.C. public schools. D.C. charter schools outperform D.C. public schools across traditionally disadvantaged groups, including African Americans and low-income students, and have a higher percentage of such students, precisely the students the voucher program was ostensibly designed to serve.

Greater confidence in D.C.'s public schools is also clear. D.C. public school enrollment has increased for 7 consecutive years, right alongside the very large number of charter schools.

If Congress wants to support D.C. students, we ask that you support our home rule public choice, not impose yours. Any new funding for education in the District should reinforce the hard work of our city, our parents, and our residents, who have shown the Nation how to build a fully accountable public school choice program. D.C. residents, not unaccountable Members of Congress, know best what our children need and how to govern our own affairs.

During this debate, Mr. Chairman, we will consider an amendment I have offered to restore the scientific integrity of the program's evaluation, one like the evaluation Congress has always mandated, and another to crack down on so-called voucher mills.

Given that the Speaker's bill will surely pass, I want to work with Members who support vouchers to ensure that our voucher students attend high-quality schools, like our accredited Catholic and other parochial schools, not fly-by-night, often storefront schools in low-income neighborhoods that were opened only after the voucher program was created to get access to unrestricted Federal funds.

I appreciate that the majority indicated in committee and on the floor that they also want to prevent voucher mills. I look forward to continuing to work with them as this bill moves forward to protect our families from voucher mills.

Under the Home Rule Act of 1973, Congress gave the District authority to establish its own education system; and unlike some other local jurisdictions, D.C. has never created a voucher program. Instead, like many D.C. bills in Congress, this bill seeks to impose a program on the District that does not have national support.

Just think of it. Only 3 months ago, both the House and Senate defeated Republican national private voucher amendments on the floor. Members reject private school vouchers for their own constituents but want to impose them on mine. No wonder.

Since 1970, every single referendum to establish State-funded vouchers or tuition tax credits has failed, and by large margins. Now the majority wants to do to the District what it would not dare do at home. The recent vote to deny voucher funding on a national level shows where Republicans really stand.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I simply want to say, once again, that no child currently enrolled in the program under the compromise that I have offered would be stricken from the program and all current voucher students could stay until graduation. It is new students that we object to, given the evaluation that shows that the program had not met its goal, which was to improve reading and math scores. By contrast, we have had improvement in reading and math scores both in the D.C. public schools and the D.C. charter schools.

Also, Mr. Chairman, there is no waiting list for vouchers in the District of Columbia. However, there are long waiting lists for our charter schools, and now, even for some public schools.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from New Jersey (Mrs. Watson Coleman).

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chair, I want to remind the gentleman that the $100 million doesn't come out of the air, that this majority is cutting $2 billion from K-12. Most of our children are K-12. That money has to come from somewhere. We know it comes from education funds.

I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Takano).

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chair, I just want to tell the gentleman that the so-called immigrants that he speaks to who send their children to schools in Maryland and Virginia live in Maryland and Virginia. Eighty percent of the jobs in the District of Columbia go to people who live in the suburbs.

As to the schools in the District of Columbia, as I have indicated, there are waiting lines to get into almost all the charter schools, and the D.C. public schools have improved so much that some of them also have waiting lines.

I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings), our very distinguished ranking member.

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, this morning, a Member said that a letter had come from a member of the city council, Anita Bonds, asking that her name be removed from the letter sent by the council, the majority of the council, saying that they opposed reauthorization of this bill. That member has since called me. She writes:

``Dear Member of Congress,

``Due to some confusion about my position on the District of Columbia voucher bill (H.R. 10), I want to make my position clear. I oppose this bill, and I intend to remain a signatory of the letter previously acknowledged that seven of my colleagues on the D.C. Council and I sent to Chairman Jason Chaffetz dated October 8, 2015, in oppostion to the bill.''

Signed, Councilmember At-large, Anita Bonds.

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, once again, let's get this straight. The control study did not evaluate college attendance. It was not a part of the study. Now, it did evaluate graduation rates. Mr. Chairman, what it did not evaluate was dropout rates.

Private schools are notorious for sending back to the District of Columbia children who they think are not doing well or they are not acting as they think they should act. Unless we had those figures, we would have no idea what the graduation rates were, because the graduation rates are those who were left in the school and did not get sent back.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, Members can keep repeating all they want to figures that have come from the air. The only thing evaluated by the congressionally mandated evaluation was the test scores. Our public school students and our charter school students have to take these tests. These children took these tests.

Our public school students are doing better--not nearly as good as they should--and so are our charter schools. In fact, our charter schools are doing even better than our public school students, and these students didn't move at all. That is what the congressionally mandated study showed.

As to civil rights, these schools are exempted from many of the civil rights laws, and for that reason, the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the NAACP, and a number of organizations wrote opposing reauthorization of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I don't know about other Members' districts, but I challenge Members to meet what the District of Columbia has done to keep students from being trapped in bad schools.

In your districts, can 75 percent of the children choose to go to a better performing district? They can in mine.

In your district, are there 110 publicly accountable charter schools as an alternative to your own traditional public schools? There are in mine.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The Speaker has said that, without this program, these children would have been in bad neighborhood schools. Well, I think it must be noted that the District of Columbia has done more to make sure that those children are not trapped in such schools than any district I have yet read about or heard of.

I have noted that 75 percent--that means the overwhelming number--of children stuck in neighborhood schools that they believe are not good schools go to the other side of town, if necessary, to a better school. Far from being trapped, they are encouraged to choose a better school. And I have also cited the 110 charter schools that increase their choices.

And, Mr. Chairman, I want you to know that many of the voucher parents whom I have met with--after all, they are my constituents--have said to me that they tried to get into one of our charter schools, but the waiting lists were too long, which is why they went to the voucher schools.

Now, isn't it interesting that the voucher schools have no waiting list, but the D.C. charter schools and many of our public schools have waiting lists, so much so that D.C. has had to combine the public schools and the charter schools on one list in a lottery so that families can choose which school to go to.

How many Members on that side of the aisle have a lottery that lets the children, the parents, choose the best school for them to go to? Do not dare tell me that the District of Columbia leaves children trapped in failing schools. It has gone out of its way to do just the opposite.

And what does it get for it? The imposition by this body of yet another alternative. It is true that, a former mayor, who himself went to Catholic schools, said he was for vouchers. Well, Mr. Chairman, I ask you, then, since the District of Columbia has control of its own education apparatus, why hasn't the District of Columbia set up its own voucher schools? Some other districts have done that. Because the majority, they don't prefer vouchers, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, may I inquire how much time I have remaining?

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, there are many reasons why I oppose this bill. First, it has failed the goal that the Congress gave it. Bring these children's test scores up. The public schools have brought their test scores up. The public charter schools have done even better in bringing their test scores up. These children's test scores have not risen.

Moreover, I can't fail to note how recently the majority has cut K-12 by $2 billion while taking $100 million out of, obviously, education funds to fund a private school voucher bill.

Mr. Chairman, not everybody on my side of the aisle is for public charter schools, but I have supported public charter schools because my own constituents wanted and needed a way out of neighborhood schools very often.

Yet, even though I come to this floor with home rule choices, this body is insisting on its choices, knowing full well that nobody in the District of Columbia can vote against their choices.

And it says to the District of Columbia residents: No matter what you do, people, no matter how good your choices are, no matter how much you meet the standards we often talk about when it comes to choice, you, who have no vote on this floor, who will not vote on this bill when the bell rings in a few minutes, must do what we say.

That, my good friends, is not a chapter in democracy. It shows once again that Republican do whatever they care to do to the District of Columbia, even when they reject the same choice for their own constituents, and vote down for their constituents what they now impose on mine. Just a few months ago, the House and Senate voted down vouchers, but today--today--they will vote to impose these same vouchers on the District of Columbia.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I actually agree with the chairman, and the chairman has consulted with us on these changes, which are technical in nature.

I do not oppose this amendment. Indeed, I want to thank our chairman for working with us before this committee markup on this bill on some additional technical changes.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The Speaker's voucher bill is sure to pass, and I am sure it is offered with the best of intentions. Therefore, I want to work with him and with Members and with those in the Senate who support vouchers to provide much-needed oversight for the millions in Federal dollars in this bill. It is in that spirit that I offer a two-part amendment, and both parts are entirely consistent with the underlying bill.

The Government Accountability Office, the GAO, said in 2007 and again in 2013 that the voucher program lacks quality control, transparency, and information.

In response, the first part of my amendment restores the scientific integrity of the program's evaluation, copied from prior authorizations of this bill, and the second prohibits voucher mills, not our accredited Catholic schools, which are attended by most of our children, but their competition for vouchers--a small, but significant, number of private schools that would not exist but for this Federal funding.

First, my amendment restores the evaluation of the program's effectiveness that Congress has required since the program was created in 2004--and I am quoting from Congress--``to be conducted using the strongest possible research design.''

In contrast, this bill requires the evaluation to be conducted using ``an acceptable quasi-experimental research design that actually prohibits the more scientific randomized controlled trial Congress mandated in prior authorizations.''

Yet the congressionally mandated evaluation said that randomized controlled trials ``are especially important in the context of School Choice because families wanting to apply for a Choice program may have educational goals and aspirations that differ from the average family's.''

I appreciate that this bill requires for the first time that schools be accredited, but it gives unaccredited schools 5 years, along with the grace period of a year, to become accredited.

This time frame is so long that it would allow existing and new unaccredited schools to accept voucher students well into the decade. The 50 percent cap that my amendment proposes at least would ensure that voucher schools would ultimately be eliminated.

For example, the GAO found that six participating voucher schools had more than 80 percent of their enrollment from voucher students. A Washington Post investigation found one school where voucher students comprised 93 percent of the total.

The majority concedes that there is a need for the ongoing evaluation of the program's effectiveness by requiring a study of this bill, but after the mandated study showed that vouchers did not improve student achievement, the majority took care of that by watering down the mandated evaluation.

The second part of my amendment prohibits fly-by-night, often storefront school voucher bills by eliminating the percentage of voucher students in the school to 50 percent of the school's total enrollment. No current voucher student or sibling would be affected by the cap.

My amendment would disqualify so-called voucher mills, a small, but significant, number of schools that cannot survive without government funding, most of which sprang up in low-income neighborhoods after the program was created to get unrestricted Federal funds.

Why should the major recipients of voucher funds--our fully accredited Catholic schools or other parochial and private schools--have to share the available funding with voucher mills of low quality? The way to eliminate these unaccredited schools, which are unworthy of our students, is to require that their enrollment not consist primarily of voucher students.

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Ms. NORTON. The Federal vouchers give these schools the Federal Government's seal of approval. Considering that the purpose of the voucher program is to improve student achievement, voucher bills are inconsistent with the congressional intent and should not be enabled with Federal funds or get the Federal imprimatur.

I appreciate that the majority indicated in committee and also on this floor that they, too, oppose voucher mills and are willing to work with me on this issue. I hope to continue to work with the majority as the bill moves forward in order to eliminate voucher bills, which surely no Member supports.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

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