Paul Wellstone

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I wonder whether my colleague--I think I have 2 minutes--will grant me 2 minutes. I won't need more than 4 minutes.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I tried to respond to what colleagues have said. I want to respond to one point my friend from Utah made. The question is whether the amendment carves out a serious loophole in the means test. The answer is no. The debtor can only get an exemption from this bill if the court finds that the debtor was forced to file because of medical debt. Again, I say to my colleague, I don't have any problem with rigorous standards, or even rigid standards, as long as you don't capture the wrong people. This legislation captures the wrong people. There ought to be some discretion in the system that says, yes, go after those people who are gaming the system--although I think we have very different views about what percentage they are. But for God's sake, when it is a family being put under, through no fault of their own, because of a major medical illness or injury and, therefore, medical bills, and the court finds that indeed the debtor was forced to file because of a major medical bill, that is where I would argue we ought to have an exemption for these families from any number of the different provisions in this bill that are meant to deal with people involved in gaming the system, which will make it so difficult. I have listed a lot of these provisions all day. Why would we not, if the purported purpose of this legislation, I say to two good Senators, is to go after people who are gaming the system, to go after some of the abuses, why would we not want to have this very simple exception for people who are filing for bankruptcy because of major medical expenses? That is all this does, as determined by the court. I yield the remainder of my time.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Are we going to alternate back and forth?

Mr. WELLSTONE. I ask unanimous consent I be allowed to follow Senator Kennedy on our side.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, first of all, let me say to my colleague from Wyoming--he chairs the committee with jurisdiction over workplace safety, and I am the ranking minority member--I appreciate him as a Senator. There is a different version of those hearings and a different version about what is the right thing for us to do. I would like to speak to that. Each year, there are 1.8 million workers who suffer from ergonomics disorders. Mr. President, 600,000 men and women have injuries so severe they are forced to take off work. Obviously, there is a problem. If it is your son or your daughter or your brother or your sister or your husband or your wife, it is very personal to you. I think this is a class issue. I said it yesterday on the floor of the Senate--and I have to say it again--I think precious few Senators really understand what these statistics mean in personal terms because, frankly, we are talking about a part of the population that is not well represented in the Congress, not well represented in the Senate. We are talking about working-class people. I do not think most Senators have loved ones who are doing this work, whether it is blue-collar work or white-collar work. As I say, 1.8 million workers every year suffer from work-related ergonomics disorders--many of them women. I must say, I think some of the discussion on the floor trivializes these injuries, trivializes this pain, and trivializes the need for protection for people. I do not know how many times I have heard from my colleagues that, of course, there should be ergonomics protection, that, of course, we should do something--but it is never this rule; it is never that rule; it is never the next rule. Frankly, there are interests that for 10 years have done everything they could to oppose any kind of rule providing people at the workplace with this protection. That is what this resolution is about. That is what this debate is about. Keta Ortiz is a sewing machine operator in New York City. She was 52 when her whole life came crashing down. She ended up with cramps in her hands so severe that when she woke up, they were frozen like claws. She had to soak her hands in hot water just to be able to move her fingers. This went on for 5 years. Terrified of losing her job, she suffered agony beyond measure, beyond any measure most Senators know. Finally, she had to give up her job. It took 2 years for her to get her first workers comp check. She lost hers and her family's health insurance, and she now tries to get by on $120 a week in workers comp payments. Shirley Mack from Spring Lake, NC, is a single parent with four children. Let's talk about people. You can put charts up, and you can make fun of rules, and you can trivialize what this is all about, but let's talk about people's lives. Shirley Mack has worked since she was 5 and tried very hard to stay off public assistance. Her job was splitting chicken breasts in a poultry plant, working 8 or 9 hours a day, 5 days a week. I doubt whether very many Senators have done that. I have not. Maybe some have, not too many, though. I am on safe ground, aren't I, colleagues, in saying that not too many Senators have ever done this kind of work? She says she was one of the faster workers but then her hands started hurting and going numb. To avoid losing her job, she continued working, but then her hand stopped working. Her finger locked. Her hand grew numb and cold, and her arm stopped working. After a few days in the plant of not being able to work, she was fired. I quote from her: Now I go to bed in pain and I wake up with pain. It hurts to hold my new grandson. I can't fix a big meal like I used to or hang clothes or do yard work at all. I can't go to the grocery store by myself anymore because I can't push the cart. I can only really use my left hand so lots of things like doing my hair and driving take longer and really hurt. . . . I didn't want to go on assistance, but I am now disabled. This carpal tunnel syndrome is very real. Some of us are being very generous with the suffering of others. That is what this rule was all about--lessening the suffering of a whole lot of people in the workforce of the United States of America. Now with this resolution, we are going to wipe out that rule, wipe out that protection. It is interesting: We are in this intense debate--or will be soon--on the education bill regarding accountability for our schools, but when it comes to worker safety, all of a sudden accountability and standards go out the window. My colleagues have been holding up the Federal Register. They have been talking about the rule. The rule is eight pages. The rule is eight pages. There is background; there is context; there are reasons for doing it. This is the rule, eight pages. This whole book is not the rule; it is a lot of good background information on the rule. I will discuss what this rule is about, 8 pages, 10 years in the making, starting with Elizabeth Dole, and now in 10 hours we are going to overturn it. By the way, for all my colleagues who say they are committed to doing something, they will do something, time is not neutral for these workers. These injuries are debilitating. It is a life of hell. It is a life of pain. Now in 10 hours we are going to overturn this rule. These standards, eight pages of a rule, represent a sound, reasonable, sensible approach. What does the rule basically say? After 10 years of diligent work, initiated by Elizabeth Dole when she was Secretary of Labor, right up to now, what do we have? We have state-of- the-art, flexible, commonsense rules for employers, helping them to deal with this vexing problem of ergonomic disorders. The requirements are not complicated: One, the standard simply calls for employers to provide employees with basic information about ergonomic disorders so that if you are working and you are experiencing these symptoms, you know what is happening to you before it is too late. Then the employer need not do anything more, that is it, unless a worker or an employee reports a disorder or a symptom which is a sign of the disorder. The worker says: I can barely move my wrist; my fingers are swelling; I am in pain. Then there is a problem. First the employer lets the workers know, gives them information so people can understand what might be happening to them. That is a terrible idea? Then if the employee should come to the employer and say, I have a problem, it is up to the employer to determine whether or not what has been reported is an ergonomic incident. There are clear criteria laid out. If that threshold is reached, then the employer is obliged to work with his or her employees to identify and analyze the hazards and develop a program to deal with those hazards. We would think, from hearing some of the Senators on the floor of the Senate, that OSHA has done a terrible thing by promulgating a rule, based on 10 years of work, to provide some protection for well over a million and a half workers every year who face these disabling injuries, 600,000 of whom are not even able to work part of the time because of these injuries. Are these rigid, onerous, arbitrary rules? No, they are not. A lot of smart businesspeople are already utilizing these standards. Tom Albin, who is an ergonomist at 3M in St. Paul, MN, had this to say about what 3M does in my State: Our experience has shown that incorporating good ergonomics into our manufacturing and administrative processes can be effective in reducing the number and severity of work-related musculoskeletal disorders, which not only benefits our employee, but also makes good business sense. Tom Albin is right; it is good business sense. 3M's evolving ergonomics process has been effective at reducing the impact of these disorders on our employees and our business. From 1993 to 1997 we have experienced a 50 percent reduction in ergonomics-related OSHA recordables and 70 percent reduction in ergonomics-related lost time OSHA recordables. In other words, paying attention to ergonomics makes good business sense. It is cost effective. Estimates are that the $4.5 billion annually it will take to implement these standards will result in $9.1 billion annually of savings which are recouped from the lost productivity, lost tax payments, administrative costs, and workers comp. You do the prevention. We have this rule. You have this standard. You prevent injuries. You have more productivity. Workers are not absent from work, and you have fewer workers comp claims. We have also lived to our values: We have provided protection for hard-working people. When my colleagues come to the floor and talk about this standard as if it is arbitrary and capricious, they leave out a little bit of the history of this. The fact is, many companies are saying, yes, we need to do this. Good businesspeople are saying, yes, we need to do this. It is preventative, and it saves money. The results are not surprising. The National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine report, which was requested by industry groups and opponents of these standards--I haven't heard any discussion about this--finds scientific support that, one, exposure to ergonomic hazards in the workplace causes ergonomic disorders; and, two, these injuries can be prevented. This is the report. If I were to list--and I don't have time because other colleagues will speak--the panel composition, it extends from internal medicine to nursing to physiology to biomechanics to human factors engineering, a most distinguished panel of men and women. The National Academy of Sciences found a strong and persistent pattern, both on the basis of epidemiological studies and biomechanical studies, that indeed there was a huge problem in the workplace. Repetitive stress injuries are for real. People are disabled. They also found that in fact if we want, we can take action to reduce this pain and agony. We could change the design of tools and work stations, rotate jobs, lift tables, have vibration-dampening seating devices. There are a whole set of ergonomic principles which can be used to reduce exposure to risk factors and, as a result, mean less pain for many women and men in the workforce. I have not heard my colleagues talk about this study. I know sometimes facts are stubborn things. I know sometimes we don't want to know what we don't want to know. The NAS report goes on to affirm the basic elements of the OSHA standard: management, leadership, employee participation, job hazard analysis and control, training, and medical management. So my second point is that the case for these standards is strong and unassailable. My last point has to do with the rush to judgment that we are witnessing today: Ten years of work, countless studies, untold time and effort overturned after 10 hours of debate. This resolution of disapproval wasn't sent to committee, and this, despite the fact that we have a new study hundreds of pages long, commissioned by the opponents of this rule that supports the essential elements of what OSHA ordered. This is the problem my colleagues have. They are doing the bidding of some very greedy folks who say they don't want to have to spend any more money. How generous we are with the suffering of others. So we had 10 years of study and the opponents wanted the National Academy of Sciences to give us their best judgment. Well, they ended up supporting basically the rules that OSHA ordered, which was what the opponents were opposed to. So now Senators don't have the study; they don't have the research; they don't have the evidence. But I will tell you what they do have. This is what they do have. They could come to the floor of the Senate. The administration could do the same thing. The administration could stay OSHA's rule. The administration could reopen the rulemaking process, call for further studies; they could let the court processes unwind. Instead, this effort is to kill the rule. This is scorched earth policy to prevent OSHA from ever issuing a rule in ``substantially the same form, unless specifically authorized by a subsequent act of the Congress.'' That is what this is all about. Let me be clear about this. My colleagues are not interested in making any kind of accommodation. That is not what this is about. They are not interested in saying, yes, there are some parts in this rule we don't like; let's see if we can fix them. What they want to do is avoid accountability for worker safety. That is what this is all about--that we will avoid accountability. That is what is so egregious. That is what is so egregious about what is happening. I finish this way. This is one interesting and telling week for-- sometimes you speak on the floor of the Senate and you somehow hope you get the attention of people, and you almost hope people listen and you can connect with the people in the country to somehow follow debate, or they hear one thing you say. I certainly wish to say this: For working people, for people who are not the heavy hitters, not the big players, not the investors, don't have all of the economic clout, don't lobby here every day in Washington, who are doing the work, who are faced with these kinds of injuries and this kind of pain, these kinds of disabilities, men and women--but probably the majority are women--this is not a good week for them because this resolution overturns 10 years of hard, diligent work to finally write a rule that will give working men and women some protection in the workplace. And then if you can't work because you are disabled by this injury--remember, a lot of people have no other choice. A lot of people work at these jobs because they have no other choice. They don't work at these jobs for the fun of it. We have options. We can go to other work. They don't. And then what we are going to do, starting tomorrow, assuming this resolution passes, is we are also going to say to the same people, now we have overturned the rule, now we have moved away from protection-- although Senators are saying, of course, we are concerned. Your concern doesn't mean much because time is not neutral, and for a whole lot of folks the injuries are now. I keep hearing we are for another rule, another time, another place; but every time big economic interests say, oh, no, we can't afford it. My colleague from Wyoming, whom I respect, talked about nursing homes. I hope that the choice is not between nursing homes or hospitals saying, look, in order for us to be able to make it economically--I agree they have gotten the short end of the stick when it comes to reimbursement. We have our health care providers saying the only way they can survive economically is for the workforce to work jobs that are unsafe and continue to suffer and struggle with disabling injuries. That should not be the tradeoff. Does anybody wonder why we have a 40-percent turnover in nursing homes every year? Part of it is the low wages and part of it is outrageous working conditions, taking care of our mothers and fathers who built the country on their backs. One would think we would do well for parents and grandparents and for the human service workers who take care of them. We don't do well for the men and women who take care of our parents and our grandparents in nursing homes or in home health care when we do not take action to protect them and make sure they are safe. I can only say that the supreme irony of this week is that now that we take away the protection, if you are disabled and you can no longer work, then what we are going to do, starting tomorrow, is pass the bankruptcy bill that is going to make it impossible for most people in the country to any longer file chapter 7 and rebuild their lives. Incredibly harsh. Great for the credit card companies. It doesn't hold them accountable for their predatory policies, for pumping these credit cards on our children and grandchildren. But, boy, when it comes to families that find themselves in terrible economic circumstances because of a major medical bill, or because of the loss of a job, or because of a divorce, it is going to be practically impossible for people to rebuild their lives. So I say that working families get the shaft on the floor of the Senate this week and next week as well. I say that is a shame. But I say that I believe in the intelligence of people, and my guess is that citizens in the country will figure this out and they will have a pretty good sense of who gets represented well here and who is left out. I will finish with this sentence. I think, unfortunately, that even though I don't believe it is intended, because Senators on the other side of this debate are good people--we just disagree--I think the effect of this resolution overturning 10 years of work, overturning this rule, so important to protecting men and women in the workplace-- the effect is to make many working Americans, men and women, expendable. We are making them expendable. We are saying to many working class people in the country that you are expendable Americans. I am in profound opposition to that statement. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, I had a chance to debate this resolution earlier today. But after hearing my colleagues throughout the day, I want to respond one more time. While I am on the floor, I want to thank Senator Kennedy for his great leadership on this resolution, and, for that matter, for always being there for working people in the country. In my hand are reports from a lot of different businesses in Minnesota--I mentioned three of them earlier--that have an ergonomics standard, a very successful standard. Interestingly enough, that is exactly what this OSHA rule is patterned after--best practices by the private sector. I also hold in my hand this report by the National Academy of Sciences which is titled ``Musculoskeletal Disorders.'' Again, this is precisely what many of the critics of this rule wanted. They wanted the Academy to do a study. The Academy did a study and they found out some enormous problems in the workplace. The Academy also found out there were, indeed, practices that could be put in effect that could make a huge difference in terms of lessening the injuries, lessening the disability, lessening the pain. Interestingly enough, again, this OSHA rule is really a reflection of this Academy study. I think I have decided, after listening to this debate, that for some of my colleagues--who are friends; but this is a policy disagreement-- it never will be time for this kind of protection for our workforce, for the many men and women in our workforce. There are more women than men in the workplace. I cannot believe that so many of my colleagues have been so exercised throughout the day that OSHA, an agency that has the mission of looking out for the health and safety of workers in the workplace, would promulgate a rule dealing with really one of the most serious problems in the workplace today--repetitive stress injury. I cannot believe the shock that I hear from Senators who are in favor of this resolution, that OSHA, of all of the agencies, should promulgate a rule which deals with repetitive stress injury and would provide protection to men and women at the workplace. This is the mission of OSHA. This is a rule that has been 10 years in the making--going all the way back to Elizabeth Dole and up to now. I really think this debate is about another issue, which I want to raise in the few minutes I have remaining. I am trying to understand the intensity of the opposition, since many of the arguments I have heard made, I do not think fit with a lot of the facts, fit with 10 years of work. I am trying to figure out why the rush to judgment. Why are my colleagues so determined to overturn this rule which provides protection for people? And here is what I have decided. I think in many ways this opposition is opposition to the mission of OSHA. This legislation was not without controversy. And really, when we started talking about occupational health and safety, it was a bit like environmental protection. In fact, these are environmental issues. This is the environment at the workplace. What we said, when we created OSHA some 30 years ago, was that the private sector is what makes the economy go. And the private sector can make a profit; and that can be good, up to the point where you are putting people at the workplace--or for that matter, the water, or the air, or the land--in jeopardy. Then what we said was, commercial logic stops, and public interest logic starts. That is what is upsetting many of my colleagues. What we have here is a rule that is all about public interest. What we have is a rule that says it is important for the private sector to be as successful as possible; but there comes a point when hard-working people are injured at the workplace--quite often disabled, quite often in pain, quite often in pain for the rest of their lives, and never able to work again--when we get to that point, the commercial logic stops and the public interest logic starts. Of course, unfortunately, because I worry about the result tonight, for many working people, many ordinary citizens do not own the capital; they do not own the big companies. They just work hard. They work at these jobs. Do you know what else. People know they are going to be in trouble. They know what the repetitive stress is doing to them. They know what the effect is on their lower back from the lifting. They know it. They know they are going to be in trouble. They know they could be disabled. But this is a class issue. These men and women do not have the options that Senators have, and, frankly, most of our families have, and most of our friends have, which is to easily go to other work. They do not have that option. So these ordinary citizens--which I do not mean in a pejorative sense but in a positive way--look to us. They look to Government. They look to Government to be on their side. I think it is a tragedy that this resolution could very well pass tonight. I think it is unconscionable that this resolution could very well pass tonight. I believe, once again, the message of passing this resolution tonight is to say to many citizens in our country, who are not the big players and the heavy hitters--and they are not powerful, and they are not high income, and they do not have a lot of lobbyists-- I think the message to them is: You are expendable. We have heard about the cost--$100 billion. I am trying to figure out from where in the world that comes. That is a theoretical estimate, as far as I can tell, looking at the figures and trying to figure out how anyone arrived at that. I do know that OSHA says it is $4.5 billion, but that is offset by savings. I have heard other Senators talk about savings--savings in that now people can work; savings in that people do not have to go for workers comp; savings in that people will be more productive. Do you know what I think is the greatest savings of all? The greatest savings of all, which apparently does not get figured into any of the dollars, is when you can have women and men who can work to support their families, work without being injured, without being in pain, without being disabled, being able to live their lives, being able to support their families. That is what this rule is about. Don't trivialize this question. That is what this rule is about. I hope my colleagues will vote against this resolution.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, today I am reintroducing a bill I introduced last year that addresses high stakes testing: the practice of using a test as the sole determinant of whether a student will be graduated, promoted or placed in different ability groupings. I am increasingly concerned that high stakes tests are being grossly abused in the name of greater accountability, and almost always to the serious detriment of our children. Testing is necessary and beneficial. We should require it. But, allowing the continued misuse of high-stakes tests is, in itself, a gross failure of imagination, a failure both of educators and of policymakers, who persistently refuse to provide the educational resources necessary to guarantee an equally rich educational experience for all our children. That all citizens will be given an equal start through a sound education is one of the most basic, promised rights of our democracy. Our chronic refusal as a nation to guarantee that right for all children, including poor children, is a national disgrace. This legislation would stem the growing trend of misusing high stakes tests. The legislation would require that states and districts use multiple indicators of student achievement in addition to standardized tests if they are going to use tests as part of a high stakes decision. The legislation would also require that if tests are used, they must be valid and reliable for the purposes for which they are used; must measure what the student was taught; and must provide appropriate accommodations for students with limited English proficiency and disabilities. It is important to note that the American Psychological Association, the group entrusted with developing the standards for educational testing, has endorsed this legislation. Like many Americans who care deeply that our students are assessed appropriately, they feel that it is crucial for us to stem a tide that it becoming increasingly problematic. I would like to explain exactly why this bill would be so important and why I seek your support for it. I am struck by National Education Association President Bob Chase's comparison of this trend toward high stakes testing to the movie, ``Field of Dreams.'' In my view, it is as though people are saying, ``If we test them, they will perform.'' In too many places, testing, which is a critical part of systemic educational accountability, has ceased its purpose of measuring educational and school improvement and has become synonymous with it. Making students accountable for test scores works well on a bumper sticker, and it allows many politicians to look good by saying that they will not tolerate failure. But it represents a hollow promise. Far from improving education, high stakes testing marks a major retreat from fairness, from accuracy, from quality and from equity. When used correctly, standardized tests are critical for diagnosing inequality and for identifying where we need improvement. They enable us to measure achievement across groups of students so that we can help ensure that states and districts are held accountable for improving the achievement of all students regardless of race, income, gender, limited English proficiency or disability. Tests are a critical tool, but they are not a panacea. The abuse of tests for high stakes purposes has subverted the benefits tests can bring. Using a single standardized test as the sole determinant for promotion, tracking, ability grouping and graduation is not fair and has not fostered greater equality or opportunity for students. First, standardized tests can not sufficiently validly or reliably assess what students know to make high stakes decisions about them. The 1999 National Research Council report, ``High Stakes,'' concludes that ``no single test score can be considered a definitive measure of a student's knowledge,'' and that ``an educational decision that will have a major impact on a test taker should not be made solely or automatically on the basis of a single test score.'' The ``Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing,'' 1999 Edition, which has served as the standard for test developers and users for decades, asserts that: ``In educational settings, a decision or a characterization that will have a major impact on a student should not be made on the basis of a single test score.'' Even test publishers, including Harcourt Brace, CTB McGraw Hill, Riverside and ETS, consistently warn against this practice. For example, Riverside Publishing asserts in the ``Interpretive Guide for School Administrators'' for the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, ``Many of the common misuses, of standardized tests, stem from depending on a single test score to make a decision about a student or class of students.'' CTB McGraw Hill writes that ``A variety of tests, or multiple measures, is necessary to tell educators what students know and can do . . . the multiple measures approach to assessment is the keystone to valid, reliable, fair information about student achievement.'' There are many reasons tests cannot be relied upon as the sole determinant in making high stakes decisions about students. The National Research Council describes how these tests can be unreliable. The Council concludes that ``a student's test score can be expected to vary across different versions of a test, . . . as a function of the particular sample questions asked and/or transitory factors, such as the student's health on the day of the test. Thus, no single test score can be considered a definitive measure of a student's knowledge.'' The research of David Rogosa at Stanford University shows how test scores are not valid, in isolation, to make judgements about individual achievement. His study of California's Stanford 9 National Percentile Rank Scores for individual students showed that the chances that a student whose true score is in the 50th percentile will receive a reported score that is within 5 percentage points of his true score are only 30 percent in reading and 42 percent on ninth grade math tests. Rogosa also showed that on the Stanford 9 test ``the chances, . . . that two students with identical ``real achievement'' will score more than 10 percentile points apart on the same test'' is 57 percent for 9th graders and 42 percent on the fourth grade reading test. This margin of error shows why it would not be fair to use a cut-score in making a high stakes decision about a child. Robert Rayborn, who directs Harcourt's Stanford 9 program in California reenforced these findings when asked about the Stanford 9. He said, ``They should never make high-stakes individual decisions with a single measure of any kind,'' including the Stanford 9. Politicians and policy makers who continue to push for high stakes tests and educators who continue to use them in the face of this knowledge have closed their eyes to clearly set professional and scientific standards. They demand responsibility and high standards of students and schools while they let themselves get away with defying the most basic standards of the education profession. It would be irresponsible if a parent or a teacher used a manufactured product on children in a way that the manufacturer says is unsafe. Why do we then honor and declare ``accountable" policy makers and politicians who use tests on children in a way that the test manufacturers have said is effectively unsafe? Many of my colleagues will remember how 8,600 students in New York City were mistakenly held in summer school because their tests were graded incorrectly or how 54 students in Minnesota were denied their diplomas because of a test scoring error. When we talk about responsibility, what could be more irresponsible than using an invalid or unreliable measure as the sole determinant of something so important as high school graduation or in-school promotion? It has been clearly established through research that high stakes tests for individual students, when used in isolation, are fatally flawed. I would, however, also like to address a general issue that this bill does not address directly, but that I think is really what all of this is about in the end. The trend towards high stakes testing represents a harsh agenda that holds children responsible for our own failure to invest in their future and in their achievement. I firmly believe that it is grossly unfair, for example, to hold back a student based on a standardized test if that student has not had the tools required to learn the material covered on the test. When we impose high stakes tests on an educational system where there are, as Jonathan Kozol says, ``savage inequalities,'' and then we do nothing to address the underlying causes of those inequalities, we set up children to fail. People talk about using tests to motivate students to do well and using tests to ensure that we close the achievement gap. This kind of talk is unfair because it tells only part of the story. We cannot close the achievement gap until we close the gap in investment between poor and rich schools no matter how ``motivated'' some students are. We know what these key investments are: quality teaching, parental involvement, and early childhood education, to name just a few. But instead of doing what we know will work, and instead of taking responsibility as policy makers to invest in improving students' lives, we place the responsibility squarely on children. It is simply negligent to force children to pass a test and expect that the poorest children, who face every disadvantage, will be able to do as well as those who have every advantage. When we do this, we hold children responsible for our own inaction and unwillingness to live up to our own promises and our own obligations. We confuse their failure with our own. This is a harsh agenda indeed, for America's children. All of us in politics like to get our picture taken with children. We never miss a ``photo op.'' We all like to say that ``children are our future.'' We are all for children until it comes time to make the investment. Too often, despite the talk, when it comes to making the investment in the lives of our children, we come up a dollar short. Noted civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer used to say, ``I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.'' Well I'm sick and tired of symbolic politics. When we say we are for children, we ought to be committed to invest in the health, skills and intellect of our children. We are not going to achieve our goals on a tin cup budget. Unless we make a real commitment and fully fund key programs like Head Start, Title I and IDEA, and unless we put our money where our mouth is, children will continue to fail. We must never stop demanding that children do their best. We must never stop holding schools accountable. Measures of student performance can include standardized tests, but only when coupled with other measures of achievement, more substantive education reforms and a much fuller, sustained investment in schools.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, today I am reintroducing a bill I introduced last year that addresses high stakes testing: the practice of using a test as the sole determinant of whether a student will be graduated, promoted or placed in different ability groupings. I am increasingly concerned that high stakes tests are being grossly abused in the name of greater accountability, and almost always to the serious detriment of our children. Testing is necessary and beneficial. We should require it. But, allowing the continued misuse of high-stakes tests is, in itself, a gross failure of imagination, a failure both of educators and of policymakers, who persistently refuse to provide the educational resources necessary to guarantee an equally rich educational experience for all our children. That all citizens will be given an equal start through a sound education is one of the most basic, promised rights of our democracy. Our chronic refusal as a nation to guarantee that right for all children, including poor children, is a national disgrace. This legislation would stem the growing trend of misusing high stakes tests. The legislation would require that states and districts use multiple indicators of student achievement in addition to standardized tests if they are going to use tests as part of a high stakes decision. The legislation would also require that if tests are used, they must be valid and reliable for the purposes for which they are used; must measure what the student was taught; and must provide appropriate accommodations for students with limited English proficiency and disabilities. It is important to note that the American Psychological Association, the group entrusted with developing the standards for educational testing, has endorsed this legislation. Like many Americans who care deeply that our students are assessed appropriately, they feel that it is crucial for us to stem a tide that it becoming increasingly problematic. I would like to explain exactly why this bill would be so important and why I seek your support for it. I am struck by National Education Association President Bob Chase's comparison of this trend toward high stakes testing to the movie, ``Field of Dreams.'' In my view, it is as though people are saying, ``If we test them, they will perform.'' In too many places, testing, which is a critical part of systemic educational accountability, has ceased its purpose of measuring educational and school improvement and has become synonymous with it. Making students accountable for test scores works well on a bumper sticker, and it allows many politicians to look good by saying that they will not tolerate failure. But it represents a hollow promise. Far from improving education, high stakes testing marks a major retreat from fairness, from accuracy, from quality and from equity. When used correctly, standardized tests are critical for diagnosing inequality and for identifying where we need improvement. They enable us to measure achievement across groups of students so that we can help ensure that states and districts are held accountable for improving the achievement of all students regardless of race, income, gender, limited English proficiency or disability. Tests are a critical tool, but they are not a panacea. The abuse of tests for high stakes purposes has subverted the benefits tests can bring. Using a single standardized test as the sole determinant for promotion, tracking, ability grouping and graduation is not fair and has not fostered greater equality or opportunity for students. First, standardized tests can not sufficiently validly or reliably assess what students know to make high stakes decisions about them. The 1999 National Research Council report, ``High Stakes,'' concludes that ``no single test score can be considered a definitive measure of a student's knowledge,'' and that ``an educational decision that will have a major impact on a test taker should not be made solely or automatically on the basis of a single test score.'' The ``Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing,'' 1999 Edition, which has served as the standard for test developers and users for decades, asserts that: ``In educational settings, a decision or a characterization that will have a major impact on a student should not be made on the basis of a single test score.'' Even test publishers, including Harcourt Brace, CTB McGraw Hill, Riverside and ETS, consistently warn against this practice. For example, Riverside Publishing asserts in the ``Interpretive Guide for School Administrators'' for the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, ``Many of the common misuses, of standardized tests, stem from depending on a single test score to make a decision about a student or class of students.'' CTB McGraw Hill writes that ``A variety of tests, or multiple measures, is necessary to tell educators what students know and can do . . . the multiple measures approach to assessment is the keystone to valid, reliable, fair information about student achievement.'' There are many reasons tests cannot be relied upon as the sole determinant in making high stakes decisions about students. The National Research Council describes how these tests can be unreliable. The Council concludes that ``a student's test score can be expected to vary across different versions of a test, . . . as a function of the particular sample questions asked and/or transitory factors, such as the student's health on the day of the test. Thus, no single test score can be considered a definitive measure of a student's knowledge.'' The research of David Rogosa at Stanford University shows how test scores are not valid, in isolation, to make judgements about individual achievement. His study of California's Stanford 9 National Percentile Rank Scores for individual students showed that the chances that a student whose true score is in the 50th percentile will receive a reported score that is within 5 percentage points of his true score are only 30 percent in reading and 42 percent on ninth grade math tests. Rogosa also showed that on the Stanford 9 test ``the chances, . . . that two students with identical ``real achievement'' will score more than 10 percentile points apart on the same test'' is 57 percent for 9th graders and 42 percent on the fourth grade reading test. This margin of error shows why it would not be fair to use a cut-score in making a high stakes decision about a child. Robert Rayborn, who directs Harcourt's Stanford 9 program in California reenforced these findings when asked about the Stanford 9. He said, ``They should never make high-stakes individual decisions with a single measure of any kind,'' including the Stanford 9. Politicians and policy makers who continue to push for high stakes tests and educators who continue to use them in the face of this knowledge have closed their eyes to clearly set professional and scientific standards. They demand responsibility and high standards of students and schools while they let themselves get away with defying the most basic standards of the education profession. It would be irresponsible if a parent or a teacher used a manufactured product on children in a way that the manufacturer says is unsafe. Why do we then honor and declare ``accountable" policy makers and politicians who use tests on children in a way that the test manufacturers have said is effectively unsafe? Many of my colleagues will remember how 8,600 students in New York City were mistakenly held in summer school because their tests were graded incorrectly or how 54 students in Minnesota were denied their diplomas because of a test scoring error. When we talk about responsibility, what could be more irresponsible than using an invalid or unreliable measure as the sole determinant of something so important as high school graduation or in-school promotion? It has been clearly established through research that high stakes tests for individual students, when used in isolation, are fatally flawed. I would, however, also like to address a general issue that this bill does not address directly, but that I think is really what all of this is about in the end. The trend towards high stakes testing represents a harsh agenda that holds children responsible for our own failure to invest in their future and in their achievement. I firmly believe that it is grossly unfair, for example, to hold back a student based on a standardized test if that student has not had the tools required to learn the material covered on the test. When we impose high stakes tests on an educational system where there are, as Jonathan Kozol says, ``savage inequalities,'' and then we do nothing to address the underlying causes of those inequalities, we set up children to fail. People talk about using tests to motivate students to do well and using tests to ensure that we close the achievement gap. This kind of talk is unfair because it tells only part of the story. We cannot close the achievement gap until we close the gap in investment between poor and rich schools no matter how ``motivated'' some students are. We know what these key investments are: quality teaching, parental involvement, and early childhood education, to name just a few. But instead of doing what we know will work, and instead of taking responsibility as policy makers to invest in improving students' lives, we place the responsibility squarely on children. It is simply negligent to force children to pass a test and expect that the poorest children, who face every disadvantage, will be able to do as well as those who have every advantage. When we do this, we hold children responsible for our own inaction and unwillingness to live up to our own promises and our own obligations. We confuse their failure with our own. This is a harsh agenda indeed, for America's children. All of us in politics like to get our picture taken with children. We never miss a ``photo op.'' We all like to say that ``children are our future.'' We are all for children until it comes time to make the investment. Too often, despite the talk, when it comes to making the investment in the lives of our children, we come up a dollar short. Noted civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer used to say, ``I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.'' Well I'm sick and tired of symbolic politics. When we say we are for children, we ought to be committed to invest in the health, skills and intellect of our children. We are not going to achieve our goals on a tin cup budget. Unless we make a real commitment and fully fund key programs like Head Start, Title I and IDEA, and unless we put our money where our mouth is, children will continue to fail. We must never stop demanding that children do their best. We must never stop holding schools accountable. Measures of student performance can include standardized tests, but only when coupled with other measures of achievement, more substantive education reforms and a much fuller, sustained investment in schools.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, first of all, I haven't had a chance to review Senator Collins' legislation, but I will tell you that anything and everything that we can do that really nurtures and encourages small business we should do. The small businesspeople are a lot like family farmers. Everybody loves them in the abstract, but when it comes to access to capital and to the opportunities for them to grow, I think we can do much better. I will tell you that in Minnesota--and I am sure it is the case in Maine--people are always more comfortable when the actual capital decisions are made by people who live in the community. They own the businesses there. I would put my emphasis on education and entrepreneurship at the community level. I thank my colleague for her work. I am going to be quite brief because I have a feeling that over the next couple of weeks I won't be brief at all. This is going to be quite a week for working families, working people, in Minnesota and around the country. We start out tomorrow with a bang. We are going to have a resolution on the floor of the Senate that would summarily and permanently overturn OSHA standards that were designed to protect workers from serious and debilitating ergonomic injuries. We are talking about repetitive stress injuries and about 1.8 million workers who suffer from these disorders, 600,000 injuries so severe that people are forced to take off from work. The terms of these injuries, such as carpal tunnel syndrome, tendonitis, and back injuries, sound familiar. I will give you one example, although there are many, and then I will make my larger point. Kita Ortiz, a sewing machine operator in New York City, was 52 when her whole life came crashing down on her. She ended up with cramps in her hands so severe that she woke up with them frozen like claws. She had to soak her hands in hot water just to be able to move her fingers. This went on for 5 years. Terrified of losing her job, she suffered through agony beyond anything that any Senator can imagine. Finally, she had to give up her job. It took 2 years to get her first workers comp check. She lost her and her family's health insurance, and she tries to get by now on $120 a week on workers comp payments. I will tell you something. This resolution is all about overturning our accountability as legislators, as Senators, to working people in this country, our accountability for their safety. I would bet that of the 1.6 million, 1.8 million workers who suffer from these injuries, well over 50 percent are women. I will just tell you that I believe part of the reason that Kita Ortiz is not so prominent in this effort is because to many people these workers and these injuries are just out of site, out of mind. But this is the most serious health and safety problem in the workplace. We had OSHA spend 10 years to promulgate this rule and now we have this rush to judgment, where we are going to have 10 hours of debate, no amendments permissible--10 hours of debate to overturn a rule that was 10 years in the making based upon the heartfelt testimony of men and women who have gone through this living hell of repetitive stress injury. Why the rush to judgment? Some Senators can be very generous with the suffering of others. It is so interesting to me that we are going to pass a resolution that is going to not just say to OSHA there are problems, fix them, but basically its scorched earth approach on the floor of the Senate--10 hours, limited debate, no amendments, and basically OSHA's hands are tied for the future. We have to come back and go through a process all over again. By the way, time is not neutral for a whole lot of people who suffer these injuries. I don't think most of them are our sons and daughters, to be blunt about it. This is a class thing. I don't know whether others want to say it on the floor, but it should be said. I will say it a lot over tomorrow. These aren't really our sons and daughters. These aren't our brothers and sisters, our husbands and wives. For most of us, I don't think these are people we know very well. These are working class people. It is interesting to me that we are so willing to have standards for schools, but we don't want to have standards for workplace safety. It is going to be interesting to see how colleagues vote on this. I think this Federal testing that President Bush is talking about is probably the largest intrusion of the Federal Government on State and local school districts we have seen for a long time, which basically says, hey, for any of you who receive any title I money, you will do annual testing from third grade on--I think all the way to eighth grade. You do it. That is what we are telling them. We are not clear exactly whether or not or how this gets funded. We are certainly not going to give the schools and teachers and the children the tools to be able to do well, but we are going to pound our chests and talk about how low-income children, and children in inner- city schools, and in schools that don't have good lab facilities and don't have the technology, and children who didn't come to kindergarten ready to learn, and kids who come to school hungry, and kids who live in a family that moves two, three times a year because of the lack of affordable housing, and we are set up for failure. We are willing to jam those tests down the throats of States and school districts, big Federal intrusion in education. So we are going to have the standards for schools, but we are not going to have the standards for workplace safety. Tomorrow we are going to abolish standards for workplace safety. At least that is the effort. I hope it is not successful. This is quite a week for working families. We start out going after the ergonomics rule, which is so important to people who have gone through such a living hell with such pain from repetitive stress injury. It is a horrible injury. And you have some parts of the business community broadly defined--not all, thank goodness--coming in and saying we cannot afford it. It is terrible. How generous again some people are with other people's suffering. If it was you or if it was your loved one who was struggling, who was basically disabled for life, who was in unbelievable pain, you would want to see some kind of standard put into effect. That is what this debate is going to be about. This is a class issue. That is what this is about, make no bones about it, and the question is, Where do working people fit into the deliberations of the Senate? We will see. Then we go from there to the bankruptcy bill. I ask unanimous consent to print in the Record a letter from a variety of women's and children's organizations--American Association of University Women, Children's Defense Fund, Center for Law and Social Policy, National Center for Youth Law, National Organization of Women Legal Defense and Education Fund, National Women's Law Center, YWCA of the United States--that are in opposition to the bankruptcy bill.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, my colleague, Senator Sessions, was saying: What this bill says is if these men owe child support to their former wives, they are going to have to pay; therefore, the whole bill is a good bill for women and children. All these organizations are opposed to it, and they are opposed to it for good reason. First of all, what my colleague and friend from Alabama did not tell us was, yes, these men are going to have to pay child support to women. It also says he is going to have to pay the credit card companies and other people who are all making claim on what little he has left. That is not the main reason these major women's and children's organizations, civil rights organizations, consumer organizations, and labor organizations are opposed to this bill. The main reason is that it is going to be very difficult now for women and for other families who find themselves in difficult economic circumstances, through no fault of their own--50 percent of the bankruptcy cases in this country are because of a major medical bill. It is going to make it impossible for them to file for chapter 7 and rebuild their lives. That is what is so harsh about this piece of legislation. I will not go into the details today because there is going to be a lot of opportunity for debate. I will make two very quick points. One is, the first effort in the 107th Congress--and I hope people get a good look at this--is a resolution to overturn a rule 10 years in the making, a rule that is important to protecting people at the workplace. Then the first major piece of legislation we get in the 107th Congress is an unjust and unbalanced bankruptcy bill which is great for the big banks and the credit card companies and says nothing about their predatory lending practices. It requires no balance and no accountability on their part and says nothing about the way in which they continually push their credit cards on our children. This legislation basically tears up the major safety net for middle- class--not just low-income--families to protect families from being put totally under and in economic bondage for the rest of their lives. That is what this bill does by setting up an onerous means test that will make it impossible for families to rebuild their lives. I think my colleagues want to bring this up because they want to point to the differences between President George W. Bush and President Clinton because President Clinton vetoed this bill. I hope we can stop this bill, and, believe me, I will have many amendments and we will have much debate. If, in fact, my colleagues want to point out the difference, I am glad to do so. I have been plenty critical of President Clinton in the last several weeks--there has been much to be critical of--but I want to point out to President Clinton: It is an honor to defend you on your veto of this bill. President Clinton stood up for consumers. He stood up for low- and moderate-income families without a lot of clout in America; he stood up for working people; he stood up for civil rights; he stood up for communities of color. He basically stood up for them and ignored all of the lobbying, the political and economic clout of this financial services industry. I will have a lot to say in this debate about their contributions and their role. He did the right thing. I am pleased to talk about the differences. This bill comes to the floor negotiated by a relatively small number of Members. Until this year, this bankruptcy bill has never been on the floor of the Senate in an amendable fashion. I need to make that point tonight because we are going to go on this bill probably Wednesday afternoon. The third point I want to make is, until the hearing was held by the Judiciary Committee on February 8, there had been no hearings on this legislation. In fact, the Senate has not conducted its own hearing on bankruptcy since 1998. Here is my point: The first time in amendable form, harsh and unbalanced, unjust, and the financial services industry trying to jam this through. I see no reason why we should not have extended debate on the Senate floor. Believe me, coming on the heels of this effort to undo 10 years of work on an ergonomics standard to protect people in the workplace, I, as a Senator from Minnesota, will be more than ready to have amendments and have debate. One of the amendments on which I look forward to a vote will basically say: Before you say to people it is going to be impossible for you to file for chapter 7 and rebuild your lives, before you basically put people economically under for the rest of their lives with this very harsh and one-sided piece of legislation, at least in the case where people have had to file for bankruptcy because of a major medical bill, do not present them with this harsh means test. At least give people who went under because of a medical bill the opportunity to file chapter 7 the way they could before. We will have a vote on that and a vote on many other amendments as well. That debate will start I suppose Wednesday afternoon. What a week--it is not just this week; the debate will go on to next week. We have 2 weeks coming up that I think represent what the majority party is about, and I am sorry to say, because I like the Presiding Officer so much and it is not a personal argument, it is an institutional argument. I really believe this President and the majority party are going to do a great job representing the wealthy in America, a great job representing the financial services industry, a great job representing the insurance industry, a great job representing the oil companies, a great job representing the well-heeled, the well- financed, and the economically powerful. The question most ordinary citizens in the country are asking is: Who will represent us? My hope is that the Democratic Party will do so. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair. (The remarks of Mr. Wellstone and Mr. Dayton pertaining to the introduction of S. 422 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Reserving the right to object, and I shall not, I first thank Senator Reid and the majority leader for their good-faith discussion. I say to the majority leader, it is my understanding--and it is his word, which, to me, is enough--that the agreement we have, which is fine with me now, is that we will get started early next week, Monday afternoon, and that the majority leader is absolutely committed and intends for their to be full debate; Senators can bring substantive amendments out, and we will have a debate. That is what this agreement is about. We will move forward and we will have plenty of opportunity for important debate on this piece of legislation. Am I correct that we will have the right to introduce amendments and have votes?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I do not object. I thank the majority leader.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I send a bill to the desk. This is a bill Senator Dayton and I are introducing today, and we are joined by Senators Levin and Stabenow. This legislation is a huge priority for Senator Dayton, and it is a huge priority for me. This is not abstract legislation. This is all about people whom we love and in whom we believe. This is about taconite. This is northeast Minnesota, the Iron Rangers. This is about our State. Senator Dayton and I are going to divide our time equally. I will follow Senator Dayton. Sometimes when we introduce legislation, it stays on the calendar, and other times we introduce legislation because we are determined in every way possible to look for ways to pass it, to work with the Department of Labor administratively on trade adjustment assistance. We are going to devote all of our efforts jointly to pass legislation and get some relief, some assistance for people who are going through such difficult times. I think our colleagues will support us in this effort. I yield the floor to Senator Dayton.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that some letters from steelworkers and their families--without using last names, Barry, David, Lisa, Cliff, Joanne, and Lenore--be printed in the Record, along with a letter of support from John Swift, who is a commissioner of IRRRB, Jerry Fallos, USWA, which has just been ravaged by the LTV shutdown, Vince Lacer, who is mayor of the city of Aurora, and Richard Rojeski, USWA Local 2705, Chisholm, MN, along with letters from Louis Jondreau, Cleveland Cliffs Union Coordinator, and other letters of support from other steelworker local presidents throughout the range, along with a letter from David Foster, who is director of Steelworker District 11.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I thank Senator Dayton. This Taconite Workers Relief Act that we are introducing is also being introduced in the House of Representatives today by Congressman Oberstar. This legislation has two central objectives. The first is to make sure the taconite workers in the Iron Range in Minnesota, and taconite- producing regions in Michigan, are eligible for trade adjustment assistance. The second provision says that the taconite industry and its workers should be fully brought under trade laws that, if enforced, provide some protection for our working families: section 201 cases, antidumping cases, and countervailing duty cases. I would like to take those one at a time. On trade adjustment assistance, I could not be more in agreement with my colleague, Senator Dayton, from Minnesota. The argument that has been made is that our taconite workers are not in competition with slab steel or semifinished steel and that could not be further from the truth in this highly integrated steel industry. We want to make sure we get this trade adjustment assistance to people, and the sooner the better. This is a matter of lifeline support. This is a matter of enabling a worker or workers to go to school, to get additional training, to have some support, to be able to keep their families going. It is unconscionable--I think Senators, Democrats and Republicans, will agree--that taconite workers now are not getting this protection. We will make the direct appeal to Secretary of Labor Chao, who seems to me to be a very good person--agree or disagree on policies--because I still think, Senator Dayton, that the Department of Labor can administratively provide this support. It has been done before. We hope it can be done again. We will make the direct appeal. We will work very hard at this administratively. But if we cannot do it that way, we will come out on the floor of the Senate with an amendment, with a separate bill--however we best do it-- to make sure we can get this trade adjustment assistance for taconite workers in Minnesota and in Michigan as well. The other part of it deals with the whole question of trade laws and making sure for taconite workers--and, for that matter, steelworkers in general, because they are not, Senator Dayton, getting the protection they deserve right now--that we really apply section 201 and really look at the whole problem of other countries illegally dumping steel and semifinished steel on our market way below the cost of production; and our taking action. What is Government for, if not to be on the side of hard-working people. I say to my colleagues, you will not find a stronger work ethic or a group of citizens who work harder than those on the Iron Range. You cannot if you go anywhere in the country. The taconite workers fit everything we say on the floor of the Senate about what we think is important about America. They are people who work, work under tough conditions, are absolutely committed to supporting their families, and through no fault of their own they are out of work. So I say to Senator Dayton, and I would like to go back and forth with him in discussion in the time we have, I would say this is a short-run solution and then we will be trying to get to the bottom of this. In the short run, we want to make sure the assistance is there for the taconite workers. This is about survival. This is about supporting people who desperately need the help. The other thing we want to do is get it right on trade on the Iron Range in Minnesota, and I am sure the same is true for Michigan. Frankly, I think about steelworkers and think about auto workers and I think about industrial workers all across our country. Our workers are not asking for any kind of isolationist policy. Our workers are more than willing to compete in an international economy. But we want trade laws that give us a level playing field. When you have a situation where you have really what amounts to illegal dumping of cheap semifinished steel or steel on the market or when you have children working under deplorable working conditions, with nothing done about that, we have to figure out a way that this new global economy works for working people--works for working people in Brazil, works for working people in Russia, works for working people in South Korea, but also works for working people in the Iron Range of Minnesota and all across our country. We are committed to both fronts. I say to Senator Dayton, initially we want to get this assistance to people right away, immediately. Then we want to get colleagues engaged in this debate on trade policy which is so important when it comes to what crucially affects the lives of people. I ask my colleague from Minnesota, if I can, whether he would be willing to reflect with me on the floor of the Senate on some of the meetings he has had in the range, just some of the conversations with people and what this all means to Iron Rangers in personal terms. What has been your experience meeting with steelworkers and others? I ask my colleague that question.

Mr. WELLSTONE. I say to my colleague, he is absolutely right. There have been a number of meetings I have been at and I know the same applies to Senator Dayton. I can remember one. It was right before Christmas. It was a meeting in Aurora. There were a lot of people there, a lot of the steelworkers, taconite workers, and also some of their families. I was asking people, besides legislation, what else can be done? This is the first time this has ever happened in the Iron Range, at least in the 20 or 25 years I have been up there. Senator Dayton, this one fairly young worker stood up and he said: We need help for Christmas presents. I never heard that before. When people were working, they made good wages and had health care benefits. Now they are worried about presents. On the other issue that we are going to come up with, I don't know what the position of the administration will be. I think the Clinton administration was not strong enough at all. I am very skeptical about where the Bush administration is going to go, but we are going to push very hard, and where we can cooperate with them, we will do so; no question about it. One of the terrible issues when we get to the bankruptcy bill soon is that for younger workers, next to losing their jobs, the next worst thing is health care. You are losing your job, but then you are scared to death about what is going to happen to health care coverage with your children. For the younger workers who have been laid off in the case of the LTV mine shutting down, in a few months, they lose their health benefits; for the older workers who have worked a little longer, 1 year. Maybe the Senator would want to respond to this. Then there are the retirees. What I heard from the retirees was they are terrified LTV will file for chapter 7 and walk away from any health care. A lot of those retirees--too many I think--are struggling with cancer. Did the Senator find that people were talking about health care as well when he met with them, and does he think that is yet another issue we ought to focus on?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I look forward to working with my colleague, Senator Dayton, on this. I think two Senators from the same State who care deeply about people who are really hurting and who love northeastern Minnesota are going to give this every bit of effort. I am really looking forward to working with the Senator on this. I so much want to help people. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, if there is one thing we all can agree on in education, it is that quality teachers are absolutely critical to how well children learn. Yet, the nation confronts one of the worst teacher shortages in history. With expanding enrollment, decreasing class size and one third of the nation's teachers nearing retirement age, public schools will need to hire as many as 2.2 million teachers over the next decade. The need is greatest in specific subject areas such as mathematics, science, special education and bilingual education, all important subjects if the nation is to have an educated work force to keep it competitive in the world marketplace. Teacher shortages are also greatest in specific geographical areas such as the inner city and rural areas. Ironically, it is the most educationally and socio-economically disadvantaged students that are under-served. If there is one action we can take that is guaranteed to help struggling schools and children, it is to provide states and school districts the means to ensure that there is a highly qualified teacher in every class room. My bill, Teacher Corps, which I am proud to introduce today with my colleagues, Senators Kennedy and Schumer, who for so long have fought to bring the best possible educational opportunities to all of America's children, is designed to do just that. Its components are based on a definite need and sound research concerning effective mechanisms for meeting that need. Teacher Corps would fund collaboratives between state education agencies, local education agencies and institutions of higher education. The collaboratives would recruit top ranked college students and qualified mid career individuals, who have not yet been trained as teachers, to teach in the nation's poorest schools in the areas of greatest need--both geographically and academically. Districts and universities would work together to recruit only candidates who have an academic major or extensive and substantive professional experience in the subject in which they will teach. The collaboratives would provide recruits a tuition free alternative route to certification which includes intensive study and a teaching internship. The internship would include mentoring, co-teaching and advanced course work in pedagogy, state standards, technology and other areas. After the internship period, the collaboratives would offer individualized follow up training and mentoring in the first two years of full time teaching. Corps members that become certified will be given priority in hiring within that district in exchange for a commitment to teach in low income schools for 3 years. A good teacher can mean the world to any child whether it is through caring or through providing children with the skills they need to open their own doors to the future. Every time I enter schools in Minnesota, I am in awe of teachers' work. When a skilled, energetic teacher creates an invigorating learning environment for his or her students it is truly a magical thing. In my travels to schools around Minnesota and the country I see a great deal of that magic happening. That is why it is so tragic to think that there are so many children that do not have access to qualified teachers, at the same time that many people interested in teaching are either not entering the profession or are not staying there once they have qualified. Teacher Corps will help meet the growing need for teachers in low income urban and rural schools, and in high need subject areas such as math, science, bilingual and special education. It will do so because Teacher Corps is rooted in three fundamental parts. Recruitment, retention and innovative, flexible, high quality training programs for college graduates and mid-career professionals who want to teach in high need areas. The first principle is recruitment. As I mentioned before, we may need to hire as many as 2.2 million new teachers in the next decade to ensure that there are enough teachers in our schools. But, overall quantity is not the only issue. Quality and shortages in specific geographic and curriculum areas are equally critical. While there are teacher surpluses in some areas, certain states and cities are facing acute teacher shortages. In California, 1 out of every 10 teachers lacks proper credentials. Fifty-eight percent of new hires in Los Angeles are not certified. There are also crucial shortages in some subject areas such as math, science, bilingual and special education. In my home state of Minnesota, 90 percent of principals report a serious shortage of strong candidates in at least one curriculum area. Fifty-four percent of the mathematics teachers in the state of Idaho and 48 percent of the science teachers in Florida and Tennessee did not major in the subject of their primary assignment. The report recently released by the Commission chaired by our former colleague John Glenn highlights this problem in the area of math and science teaching. The Glenn Commission--in its report ominously, but accurately, titled ``Before It's Too Late''--called on all the decision-makers in our country to establish an ongoing system to improve the quality of mathematics and science teaching in our elementary and secondary schools and to improve the quality of those teachers' preparation for the classroom. Teacher Corps would meet this need because it would recruit and train thousands of high quality teachers into the field to meet the specific teaching needs of local school districts. It would recruit and train top college students and mid-career professionals from around the country, who increasingly want to enter the teaching profession. More college students want to enter teaching today than have wanted to join the profession in the past 30 years. In the surveys of incoming college students that UCLA conducts each fall, in recent years over 10 percent of all freshman consistently have said they want to teach in elementary and secondary schools. Second, the design of the program ensures that the needs of local school districts will be considered so that only those candidates who meet the specific needs of that district will be recruited and trained. If, for example, there is a shortage of special education, bilingual, math and science teachers in a particular district, Teacher Corps would train people with only those skills. In setting up collaboratives in this way, teacher corps helps avoid the overproduction of candidates in areas where they are not needed. Finally, Teacher Corps gives priority to high-need rural, inner suburban and urban districts to ensure that new teachers will enter where they are needed most. However, it does not help to recruit teachers into high-need schools and train them if we cannot retain them in the profession. Teaching is one of the hardest, most important jobs there is. We ask teachers to prepare our children for adulthood. We ask them to educate our children so that they may be productive members of society. We entrust them with our children's minds and with their future. It is a disgrace how little support we give them in return. It is no surprise that one of the major causes of our teacher shortage is that teachers decide to change professions before retirement. Seventy-three percent of Minnesota teachers who leave the profession, leave for reasons other than retirement. In urban schools, 50 percent of teachers leave the field within five years of when they start teaching. To retain high quality teachers in the profession, we must give teachers the support they deserve. Teachers, like doctors, need mentoring and support during the first years of their professional life. Teacher Corps offers new teachers the training, mentoring and support they need to meet the profession's many challenges. It includes methods of support that have proven effective in ensuring that teachers stay in schools. The key elements for effective teacher retention were laid out by the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future in 1996. Effective programs organize professional development around standards for teachers and students; provide a year long, pre-service internship; include mentoring and strong evaluation of teacher skills; offer stable, high quality professional development. Each of these criteria are included in the Teacher Corps program. Further, Teacher Corps supports people who choose teaching by paying for their training. Through this financial and professional support, Teacher Corps will go a long way toward keeping recruits in teaching. But, it is still not enough to recruit and retain teachers. Quality must be of primary importance. Research shows that the most important predictor of student success is not income, but the quality of the teacher. Despite this need, studies show that as the proportion of students of color and students from low-income families increases in schools, the test scores of teachers decline. This is wrong. We are denying children from low income areas, children from racial minorities, children with limited English proficiency, access to what we know works. Several studies have shown that if poor and minority students are taught by high quality teachers at the same rate as other students, a large part of the gap between poor and minority students and their more affluent white counterparts would disappear. For example, one Alabama study shows that an increase of one standard deviation in teacher test scores leads to a two-third reduction in the gap between black/white tests scores. We cannot turn our back on this knowledge. We must act on it. We must give low income, minority and limited English proficiency children the same opportunities that all children have and we must do it now. The very essence of Teacher Corps is to funnel high quality teachers where they are needed most. Teacher Corps would help ensure quality by using a selective, competitive recruitment process. It would provide high quality training, professional development, mentoring and evaluations of corps member performance, all of which have been proven to increase the quality of the teaching force and the achievement of the students they teach. Further, by creating strong connections between universities and districts and by implementing effective professional development projects within districts, we are setting up powerful structures to benefit all teachers and students. We have an opportunity to do what we know works to help children who need our help most. Good teachers have an extraordinary impact on children's lives and learning. We need to be sure that all children have access to such teachers and all children have the opportunity to learn so that all children may take advantage of the many opportunities this country provides.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President: I rise today to introduce legislation that will go a long way to increase the accountability of our schools and to help parents become more involved in their children's education. We all know that families are crucial to improving our nation's schools. To ensure that schools and students meet challenging educational goals, families must be involved. Parents must insist that their children get the best education. They must understand, shape and support the reforms in their schools; and, they must work with schools to help all children meet their goals. We know that when families are fully engaged in the educational process, students have: higher grades and test scores; better attendance and more homework done; fewer placements in special education; more positive attitudes and behavior; higher graduation rates; and greater enrollment in post-secondary education. For school reforms to help all children, we must move to ensure that all parents are involved in their children's education. For many parents, this is not an easy task. Parents, particularly those who have limited English proficiency, those who are homeless, or those who have a troubled history with the school system, often need outside help to get the information, support, and training they need to help their children navigate through the school system. Parent involvement is more important now than ever before. As we move in the direction of increased accountability, high stakes testing and expanded public school choice, it is critical that parents know everything that is required of them and their children. They need to be sure that they have access to every aspect of their child's schooling, or their child could easily be left behind. Current provisions in Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act provide for excellent and important ways for parents to get involved in their children's education. However, in some cases, parent involvement of the type envisioned by Title I remains a distant goal. Many Title I schools, though not all, have failed to fully bring parents into the development of parent involvement policies, school- parent compacts, and into planning and improvement for the school as provided for in Title I. Therefore, it is essential for families to have an independent source of information and support that they understand and trust so that they can participate in an informed and effective manner and help move the schools toward the goal of full parental participation. To achieve this critical end, this legislation would provide competitive grants to community-based organizations to establish Local Family Information Centers. These centers, made up of community members as well as professionals from the Title I schools in the area, should have a track record of effective outreach and work with low income communities. They, in consultation with the school district, would develop a plan to provide parents with the full support that they need to be partners in their children's education. For example, they would help parents understand standards, tests, and accountability systems; support activities that are likely to improve student achievement in Title I schools; understand and analyze data that schools, districts, and states must provide under reporting requirements of ESEA and other laws; understand and participate in the implementation of parent involvement requirements of ESEA, including; understand school choice options; and, communicate effectively with school personnel. This legislation is essential because it would reach and assist parents most isolated from participation by poverty, race, limited English proficiency and other factors. It is essential because ultimately, it should be parents that are the greatest lever for strong accountability in schools. It is essential because of what we know about how children learn--that children who are the farthest behind make the greatest gains when their parents are part of their school life. Many schools do a very good job of involving parents in education reform. This bill does nothing but ensure that parents have the option of an independent voice in districts where schools do not do such a good job. If we are to educate our children, we must also educate and empower their parents. This legislation provides one necessary means to do so.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I send a bill to the desk. This is a bill Senator Dayton and I are introducing today, and we are joined by Senators Levin and Stabenow. This legislation is a huge priority for Senator Dayton, and it is a huge priority for me. This is not abstract legislation. This is all about people whom we love and in whom we believe. This is about taconite. This is northeast Minnesota, the Iron Rangers. This is about our State. Senator Dayton and I are going to divide our time equally. I will follow Senator Dayton. Sometimes when we introduce legislation, it stays on the calendar, and other times we introduce legislation because we are determined in every way possible to look for ways to pass it, to work with the Department of Labor administratively on trade adjustment assistance. We are going to devote all of our efforts jointly to pass legislation and get some relief, some assistance for people who are going through such difficult times. I think our colleagues will support us in this effort. I yield the floor to Senator Dayton.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that some letters from steelworkers and their families--without using last names, Barry, David, Lisa, Cliff, Joanne, and Lenore--be printed in the Record, along with a letter of support from John Swift, who is a commissioner of IRRRB, Jerry Fallos, USWA, which has just been ravaged by the LTV shutdown, Vince Lacer, who is mayor of the city of Aurora, and Richard Rojeski, USWA Local 2705, Chisholm, MN, along with letters from Louis Jondreau, Cleveland Cliffs Union Coordinator, and other letters of support from other steelworker local presidents throughout the range, along with a letter from David Foster, who is director of Steelworker District 11.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I thank Senator Dayton. This Taconite Workers Relief Act that we are introducing is also being introduced in the House of Representatives today by Congressman Oberstar. This legislation has two central objectives. The first is to make sure the taconite workers in the Iron Range in Minnesota, and taconite- producing regions in Michigan, are eligible for trade adjustment assistance. The second provision says that the taconite industry and its workers should be fully brought under trade laws that, if enforced, provide some protection for our working families: section 201 cases, antidumping cases, and countervailing duty cases. I would like to take those one at a time. On trade adjustment assistance, I could not be more in agreement with my colleague, Senator Dayton, from Minnesota. The argument that has been made is that our taconite workers are not in competition with slab steel or semifinished steel and that could not be further from the truth in this highly integrated steel industry. We want to make sure we get this trade adjustment assistance to people, and the sooner the better. This is a matter of lifeline support. This is a matter of enabling a worker or workers to go to school, to get additional training, to have some support, to be able to keep their families going. It is unconscionable--I think Senators, Democrats and Republicans, will agree--that taconite workers now are not getting this protection. We will make the direct appeal to Secretary of Labor Chao, who seems to me to be a very good person--agree or disagree on policies--because I still think, Senator Dayton, that the Department of Labor can administratively provide this support. It has been done before. We hope it can be done again. We will make the direct appeal. We will work very hard at this administratively. But if we cannot do it that way, we will come out on the floor of the Senate with an amendment, with a separate bill--however we best do it-- to make sure we can get this trade adjustment assistance for taconite workers in Minnesota and in Michigan as well. The other part of it deals with the whole question of trade laws and making sure for taconite workers--and, for that matter, steelworkers in general, because they are not, Senator Dayton, getting the protection they deserve right now--that we really apply section 201 and really look at the whole problem of other countries illegally dumping steel and semifinished steel on our market way below the cost of production; and our taking action. What is Government for, if not to be on the side of hard-working people. I say to my colleagues, you will not find a stronger work ethic or a group of citizens who work harder than those on the Iron Range. You cannot if you go anywhere in the country. The taconite workers fit everything we say on the floor of the Senate about what we think is important about America. They are people who work, work under tough conditions, are absolutely committed to supporting their families, and through no fault of their own they are out of work. So I say to Senator Dayton, and I would like to go back and forth with him in discussion in the time we have, I would say this is a short-run solution and then we will be trying to get to the bottom of this. In the short run, we want to make sure the assistance is there for the taconite workers. This is about survival. This is about supporting people who desperately need the help. The other thing we want to do is get it right on trade on the Iron Range in Minnesota, and I am sure the same is true for Michigan. Frankly, I think about steelworkers and think about auto workers and I think about industrial workers all across our country. Our workers are not asking for any kind of isolationist policy. Our workers are more than willing to compete in an international economy. But we want trade laws that give us a level playing field. When you have a situation where you have really what amounts to illegal dumping of cheap semifinished steel or steel on the market or when you have children working under deplorable working conditions, with nothing done about that, we have to figure out a way that this new global economy works for working people--works for working people in Brazil, works for working people in Russia, works for working people in South Korea, but also works for working people in the Iron Range of Minnesota and all across our country. We are committed to both fronts. I say to Senator Dayton, initially we want to get this assistance to people right away, immediately. Then we want to get colleagues engaged in this debate on trade policy which is so important when it comes to what crucially affects the lives of people. I ask my colleague from Minnesota, if I can, whether he would be willing to reflect with me on the floor of the Senate on some of the meetings he has had in the range, just some of the conversations with people and what this all means to Iron Rangers in personal terms. What has been your experience meeting with steelworkers and others? I ask my colleague that question.