Ted Kennedy

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. The school is going to make the decision. It is going to be as true as I am standing here, that if that child has special needs, there is no sense in applying; if that child has limited English, there is no sense in applying; if that child is a homeless child, there is no sense in applying. That is the record. That is why we should reject this amendment. Let's take scarce resources and invest them where they should be invested; and that is in tried and tested programs that will enhance the children's academic achievement in the public schools of this country.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, we thank all our Members. Now we have agreed to consider the Carper amendment. We have a time limit, I believe a 2-hour time limit, evenly divided, so we expect our next vote sometime around quarter of 6. Perhaps we will be able to yield back some time, but we are trying to move this along.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, would the Chair restate the request?

Mr. KENNEDY. Just for the purposes of this moment now.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, I yield myself such time as I might use on the amendment.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, the pending amendment addresses two important growing policy areas: Public school choice and public charter schools. First, the amendment provides grant support to States seeking intra- and inter-district public school choice plans. That is very important, given where we are in other provisions of the bill. Second, the pending amendment provides specific assistance to charter schools struggling with capital school construction needs. That is going to be very important, given the provisions of the bill that will require schools to restructure and reorganize if they fail to meet certain goals. I support public school choice. Our legislation already provides parents of children in low-performing schools the option to transfer to other public schools or charter schools. But public school choice programs bring added costs that come with, most significantly, added transportation needs. If we are truly to support public school choice, we should provide the districts aid for their increased transportation costs. I also support charter schools. Like public school choice which can encourage districtwide improvement, charter schools can provide more options to parents within the public school system. I think we should do more to support the charter schools in the area in which they have the greatest need--school construction. Charter schools do not have the same capital resources that regular public schools do. Charter schools cannot float tax-exempt bonds as public school districts can. Charter schools primarily have new building construction needs. Noncharter, public schools and public school districts, on the other hand, primarily have building repair needs. Just as there are charter schools with unique and urgent school repair and construction needs, there are also regular public schools with unique and urgent school repair and construction needs. We should also provide school construction assistance to both charter schools and regular public schools. That is the difficulty I find in the logic of my friends who opposed the Harkin proposal in terms of providing help to meet the construction needs in our public school system, a best estimate of over $130 billion in needs. We recognize the importance of having a facility that is going to be safe for children and that is also going to be responsive to the children's needs in terms of a modern classroom. I know Senator Harkin has made the case, and Senator Feinstein and others, of the importance of giving assistance to local communities. They are not required to take that help, but when you realize the age of many of our school facilities, particularly in many of the older cities of the country, as well as in many of the rural areas, you know there is an extraordinary need. What is so apparent is that children attending schools which are in dilapidated condition sends a very powerful message to the students. On the one hand, they go to modern supermarkets and modern malls and they see what investments in these kinds of facilities would mean. They are valued by their parents or their grownups. Then on the other hand, parents are sending children off to schools which are dilapidated, which are in need of repair, where in many instances the electrical systems aren't working or their air-conditioning is not working, the windows are not repaired. I am supporting this proposal, but it is important to wonder why we in the Senate, if we are going to provide this kind of help for the construction of charter schools, are not providing assistance to the public schools. I find it difficult to understand the response in this area by many of our colleagues on this side of the aisle, their traditional argument that this is a local responsibility. The fact is, we are trying to find ways of creating a climate where children can learn. If we are not going to provide the classroom situation for that learning process, we are not really meeting our responsibilities. I am supporting this program, but I do think the need for school renovation and modernization across the board is extraordinary. The National Center on Education Statistics reports that nationwide more than $127 billion is needed for public school construction, repair, and modernization. The American Society of Engineers reports that average school repair costs per child are $3,800. All of the reforms included in the BEST Act will be dramatically undermined if we continue to send children to dilapidated, overcrowded, out-of-date schools. When we send children to inadequate, crumbling schools, we send them the message that they don't matter. What does it say to a child when their classroom is a school bathroom, when windows are broken and roofs are leaking? We should support public school and public charter school construction needs. We need to keep in mind that 97 percent of all public school children go to noncharter schools. I continue to hold out hope that we will provide badly needed school construction assistance to regular public schools and public charter schools. Construction and modernization needs are great across the board. I urge my colleagues to support the pending amendment and hope we can continue to work in the future to support construction and modernization needs nationwide. There may be those who say we are not going to support it because we are not meeting our responsibility to public schools. There may be some of our colleagues who fall in that category. I would rather see us do what is right for children in meeting our responsibility on the public school choice provisions which are included and also with regard to charter schools. My great regret about this amendment is that it is leaving out 97 percent of the public schools that ought to get help. This amendment is a very modest amendment. It is a useful amendment. But for me it sort of fails to hit the mark in providing the assistance which is needed in the area of construction. I know we have to do the best we can. There was a broader kind of amendment that was not accepted in the Senate. The Senator from Delaware has come up with a proposal to at least provide some construction funding in areas where there is need. Hopefully, as this whole process moves ahead, we will find some opportunity to find a way of helping the other public schools in this country with their construction needs as well. This amendment is useful. I hope it reminds us of the fact that we are not meeting our responsibilities in construction and assistance to other public schools and that we will continue to work in that area to help the children of this country.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, I thank the Senator from Delaware. This amendment is related to other very important provisions in the legislation to ensure there is going to be sufficient funds available. Also in the legislation, there was going to be, with the reconstruction of these schools, the possibility of the development of these charter schools, and this will give additional flexibility to local communities to move in that direction. So I thank him for offering the amendment. I believe it reaches sort of the central core of what we are attempting to do. I think it is valuable and helpful. I wish it had been a little broader, but I thank the Senator very much for offering it and for working closely with us to move the process along. I am grateful to him. I am also grateful to my friend from New Hampshire, as always.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, today we are again in a position to clear amendments by consent. I ask, therefore, unanimous consent that it be in order for these amendments to be considered en bloc and that any modifications, where applicable, be agreed to, the amendments be agreed to en bloc, and the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table en bloc.

Mr. KENNEDY. We expect that momentarily Senator Cantwell will be here. We have worked out a rough program and schedule for the latter part of the afternoon and through the evening. We will be able to move along on that program, and we want to thank all of our colleagues for their cooperation. We have some of the important remaining amendments with which we have to deal, but we have been able to work out a process and a procedure to get time agreements on most of these. So Members will know when these amendments are going to come up. The leader had indicated that we would be voting through the afternoon and into the evening, and there is every expectation that we will continue to do so. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, it looks as if we will vote at 6:30.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I first thank Senator Feinstein for her amendment and urge the Senate adopt it. We have in the legislation what is called title V. That provides flexibility in the States and local communities--20 percent is retained to the State; 80 percent goes to the local communities. Half is distributed under a somewhat different formula from title I, but half goes into the title I formula, the other based on population. So there are funds that will be available. What this amendment is saying, as described by the Senator, is the resources can be used for the development of new schools. One of the things most of us think about when we think about new schools is a brand new school appearing on a bluff or on a hill or in a field. But what we are finding out now is that many new schools are being built inside of old schools. We have had good hearings on the results of this kind of experimentation, where they are taking schools that have large student populations and breaking them down and literally having two or three or four new schools in a very large school context. They are finding out the changing of the organization and changing of the structure and the administration and running of these institutions have had a very positive impact on the students themselves. So this amendment will provide some flexibility in this area of new schools. It will not only try to meet some of the needs for additional construction, which we have talked about earlier in the debate on the Carper amendment and earlier than that on the Harkin amendment, but it will also permit the use of these funds which otherwise would not have been permitted for the development of new schools in older school buildings. I think it is a useful addition. I know the initial amendment was a good deal more ambitious. I was prepared to support that enthusiastically. But I think this is an important addition, and I thank the Senator for bringing this matter to our attention. From my own judgment, this will be a very worthwhile utilization of the title I funding that I think should be supported. I notice the Senator from Nebraska asked for the yeas and nays. I believe, with my colleague, we are prepared to accept the Feinstein amendment, if we could voice vote that amendment.

Mr. KENNEDY. All right. Then I think the Senator reserves the remainder of her time.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I did not comment earlier on the Hagel amendment. I join in recommending support for the amendment. As one who was the chairman of the Committee on Indian Education just about 30 years ago and was mindful of the particular needs of Native Americans, as well as those in the densely populated military districts, I think the Senator has given us a good amendment to be able to express our priority by giving focus and attention to the heavily impacted Native Americans and military districts. I welcome the chance to support the amendment. I thank him for bringing it to our attention. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. I thank the Senator for that. Is the Senator also aware that opportunities for children who are limited English proficient, or for children who may have a learning disability, or for migrant children or homeless children--those opportunities will not be driven by parents. The choice of how to serve those children, if they are served, will be made by the school under a voucher program. So does the Senator agree with me that the idea of somehow providing millions of American parents the opportunity for their children to be moved into a different situation with this proposal is really a distortion? Critical decisions will be made by schools that may not be inclined to reach out to children who have some special situation, special needs.

Mr. KENNEDY. One of the most important aspects of accountability provided for in this bill is giving information to parents so that they will be able to follow the development of their children. We have a school in Massachusetts where part of the portfolio for school success is a measure of parental involvement. Very interesting. That sounds like something that is way out, but, by George, that school was able to get their parents involved. An essential element in this bill is the proposal to make sure that parents understand what is happening in their schools, and to be able to provide a comparison of their schools performance to other schools in the neighborhood. In this respect, and with school report cards, parents will be able to be effective, articulate spokespersons for their children's education. Will that be available under a voucher program?

Mr. KENNEDY. If the Senator will yield further, part of the very, I think, strong presentation that the President has made is that he wants to ensure that tests are not used in a punitive way, but as instruments to gauge student progress and inform instruction. I think the Senator was there when we listened to Secretary Paige--he emphasized the importance of finding out what children don't know so there can be assistance provided to children to help them succeed. I have some enormously interesting examples. In our own State, where the teachers find out the class doesn't know much about fractions, they deal with that by teaching other aspects of mathematics over the course of the year. They are making up for lost progress in the past, and ensuring that children move along and keep up with the current material. There is a reason for accountability. If students are not able to make progress, they receive supplementary services--the afterschool programs, the summer programs, or the tutorials--to provide them with the extra help they need. Now what is going to happen in voucher schools? Will those programs be available? How are we going to know whether these children are making progress?

Mr. KENNEDY. The Senator just made a comment that I think is particularly pertinent to this discussion on the question of accountability. Here in the legislation that we have before us--as we have debated over the past 7 or 8 weeks, much of that debate has been on accountability. But could the Senator indicate what her position is with regard to accountability for the schools where the children might be able to gain entry if they take these vouchers--what kind of accountability will be in place there? Are those schools included in this same kind of rigorous accountability, or will we be investing money in schools and not really know their impact on our children's future?

Mr. KENNEDY. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was agreed to.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I rise to say that I am looking forward to supporting the Landrieu amendment. It is an excellent amendment. It will, as she pointed out, give greater targeting of resources to the children who most need it. I am strongly in support of the Bond amendment. We are asking all of those colleagues who have amendments to bring these amendments up. We have been on this bill one way or the other for 7 weeks. Now the leader has indicated to me that we are going to stay until we finish this bill this week. Members must bring up their amendments. Otherwise, we will establish a time for the completion of the bill, and Members will have to come over and object and we will consider their amendments then. The leader has said we will stay this week until we finish. It is Monday now. I hope we can. It is a good bill. We want to consider other amendments that are necessary, but we insist now that Members come over and offer their amendments so we can complete consideration of the bill.

Mr. KENNEDY. I ask for the yeas and nays on both amendments, Mr. President.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask for 3 additional minutes: 1 minute for the Senator from Louisiana, I would like 1 minute, and 1 minute for the Senator from Tennessee.

Mr. KENNEDY. I yield 10 minutes.