Issue Position: Education

Issue Position

What I believe:

-High-quality education (like health care) must be a right of all Americans, not a privilege.

-Chronic underinvestment in education seriously threatens America's future competitiveness and well-being.

-The single most important investment we can make is in the literacy, aptitude, productivity, and enlightenment of all Americans, young and old.

-We must strive to make college and higher education a possibility for all Americans who are eager to achieve that level of scholarship and post-secondary and training/re-training opportunities available to everyone.

-Teaching is among the noblest and most essential callings in society and should be rewarded accordingly.

-Massive inequality within our educational system effectively condemns Americans living in poor and under-served communities to economic hardship.

What I have done:

-Cosponsored the College Student Relief Act of 2007, which cuts from 6.8% to 3.4% the interest rate charged undergraduate student borrowers under the Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) and Direct Loan (DL) programs.

-Voted to override President Bush's veto of the American Competitiveness Scholarship Act, which would provide $10.2 billion in necessary funding for education in America.

-Convened a forum of public leaders, education experts, and hundreds of interested constituents -- including Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin, Georgia Perimeter College President Dr. Anthony Tricoli, and Clark Atlanta University President Dr. Walter Broadnax -- to discuss the importance of closing the educational achievement gap.

What I will do:

-Work to drive more funding to struggling public schools.

-Work to protect the futures of college students and other post-secondary students who have taken on debt to attend school.

-Support significant increases in funding for public education nationwide, including full funding of neglected No Child Left Behind mandates.

-Continue to insist that teaching is a vital profession and ought to be rewarded with dramatically higher pay; we must make teaching a career that will lure America's best and brightest.

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