Yesterday, at the White House, flogging No Child Left Behind reauthorization while supposedly honoring this year’s Presidential Scholars (yes, the same group of brave high school students who scout told us had publicly chastized the Chimp for his multiple war crimes).
What You Ought To Expect
If you believe a child can learn to read, then you ought to expect a child to read. That’s what you ought to expect.
Yeah, Presidential Scholars Hate Tests
I’m sure some of your classmates would say you don’t like to take a test.
Your School Isn’t Doing As Good As Your School
It’s amazing what happens when you hold people to account. It certainly gets a parent’s attention when they find out that their child’s school isn’t doing as good as the neighborhood’s school is, for example, or school next door.
Just Like Iraq
No Child Left Behind is working. In other words, we’re making good progress.
You Can’t?
You can’t stand in front of the taxpayers and say, your money is being well spent because we’re measuring; we know, we’re measuring.
What Accountability Is
Now, thanks to No Child Left Behind, there is accountability that’s important to be able to report progress to the American people.
Right and Wrong
We had an achievement gap in our country and that’s not right to have an achievement gap in America.
What The Achievement Gap Is Becoming
And this achievement gap is becoming closed thanks to hard work by teachers, but also thanks to the fact that we’re measuring and correcting problems early, before they’re too late.
Prefers A Flat One
Whether we like or not, we’re in a global world.
Rigor Are Applied
We want to make sure that same rigor that we’ve applied in the elementary and middle schools are applied to our high schools.
Never Heard Of Advanced Placement
We want to make sure that we expand advance placement.
Requires Us
Because in order for us to make sure the best jobs are in America requires us having mathematicians and scientists and engineers and physicists. And the best way to stimulate that interest is from people who actually know what they’re talking about.
When Other Words Meets People Say
In other words, people say, well, you can’t be for No Child Left Behind, it’s the federal government telling you what to do
What It Said, Basically
It basically said to low-income parents that here’s some money to help you send your child to a private school or a parochial school, your choice.
I Believe I Think
In other words, it said, if you’re tired of being in a system that simply hasn’t met expectations, that there ought to be something different, and that I believe that — I think it’s the role of government to help low-income parents have different options.
What Some Members And Senators Have Got
I know some members and senators have got concerns about the law, and we’re more than willing to talk about flexibility.
The Principle Of Saying
You cannot compromise away the principle of saying, we expect good results, and we’re going to measure to determine whether or not we’ve achieved those results.
The Big Embrace
And when you’ve achieved the results that we, a society, expect, we’ll give you the big embrace.
Margaret Spellings Fucks Like A Rabbit
I want to thank Margaret for working hard with members of Congress. She’s engaged, as you know — she’s probably wearing you out, Buck. And Dale. But that’s good.
What We Have Got
We’ve got kids standing up here who not only are scholars, but have volunteered to help a neighbor in need. We’ve got people volunteering to help protect this country. And the thing we’ve got to do as policymakers is to make sure that we continue to advance America by giving people the tools necessary to realize the great promise of America.