Every Child Achieves Act

Floor Speech

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Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. President, I rise to speak in strong support of an amendment to this underlying bill that addresses resource equity in our Nation's schools. I am proud to have worked across party lines to join my colleagues in supporting this bipartisan amendment, particularly to have worked with Senators KIRK, REED of Rhode Island, and BROWN on this measure.

It is an improvement to the long-overdue reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act that we have been debating over the course of this week.

The Every Child Achieves Act importantly focuses on ensuring that those students most in need have access to a high-quality education. It continues to ensure that title I funds flow to school districts where Federal support can make the greatest impact and the most difference. It requires States to report key information that will help us identify disparities such as per-pupil expenditures, school discipline, and teacher and educator quality. But I believe we must further strengthen those reporting requirements in order to fully ensure that the range of critical school resources--from quality teachers, to rigorous course work, to well-conditioned and equipped school facilities--is being equitably distributed among school districts in a given State. And we must require States to demonstrate how they will act to address disparities among schools.

Despite the advances we have seen since President Johnson signed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act into law 50 years ago, significant gaps in achievement and opportunity still exist. The U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights recently published data from a comprehensive survey of schools across the Nation that illustrated the magnitude of the problem. For example, the report describes how Black, Latino, American Indian, and Native Alaskan students and English learners attend schools with higher concentrations of inexperienced teachers.

Furthermore, nationwide, one in five high schools lacks a school counselor, and between 10 and 25 percent of high schools across the Nation do not offer more than one of the core courses in the typical sequence of high school math and science.

In my home State of Wisconsin, higher poverty and higher minority school districts remain more likely to have inexperienced teachers. The Department of Education has data that shows that, for example, in Milwaukee, where there are the most high-poverty and high-minority schools in our State, 8 percent of teachers are in their first year of teaching and 19 percent of teachers lack State certification. The State average is 5.6 percent for first-year teachers and 0.3 percent for those who lack certification.

As with the Nation, achievement gaps follow these disparities. According to data from the National Center for Education Statistics, there are startling differences in student proficiency and graduation rates both in Wisconsin and nationally. For example, the average math proficiency in low-performing schools in my home State is 12 percent. The average in all other schools in the State is 51 percent. That is a huge gap; it is a 40-percent gap. There is also a 37-percent gap for reading and language arts proficiency and a 31-percent gap in graduation rates.

We cannot close those achievement gaps if we do not provide all students with equal access to core educational resources. That is why I am pleased to join Senators KIRK, REED, and BROWN in offering this opportunity dashboard of core resources amendment. This amendment requires each State to report what key educational resources are currently available in districts with the highest concentrations of minority students and students in poverty. Then it requires them to develop a plan to address the disparities that are shown to exist. It gives States flexibility to develop those plans and lay out a timetable with annual benchmarks for taking action, and it protects a parent's right to know about the critical educational resources that are available to his or her child.

As we work to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act in its 50th year, we have yet to see its promise of equal access to educational opportunity fulfilled for all of America's students. As we look to the next half-century of supporting public education, it is critical that we take steps to ensure that all children have access to the educational resources that will help them succeed, regardless of race, ethnicity, or family income.

I understand there may be a vote on this amendment early next week. I certainly hope so. I urge my colleagues to support this very important bipartisan effort.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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