The Democrats on education
On Sept. 12, Slate, Yahoo!, and the Huffington Post will host the first-ever online-only presidential candidate mashup. Armed with reader's questions, Charlie Rose is asking the top Democratic presidential candidates about their views on health care, Iraq, education, and other issues...
Here, Slate is offering background information on education, one of the three issues selected by readers for the Slate/Yahoo!/Huffington Post candidate mashup.
Sen. Joe Biden
South Carolina Debate, April 26, 2007
Change the fundamental way we educate our children. There's two things everyone knows: The smaller the class size, the better the outcome; and the better the teacher, the better the outcome. ...We should remind everybody that the day before a black child, a minority child, steps into the classroom, half the achievement gap already exists. ...[No Child Left Behind] was a mistake...You need better teachers. You need smaller classrooms. You need to start kids earlier. It's all basic.
South Carolina Debate, April 26, 2007
Change the fundamental way we educate our children. There's two things everyone knows: The smaller the class size, the better the outcome; and the better the teacher, the better the outcome. ...We should remind everybody that the day before a black child, a minority child, steps into the classroom, half the achievement gap already exists. ...[No Child Left Behind] was a mistake...You need better teachers. You need smaller classrooms. You need to start kids earlier. It's all basic.
Sen. Hillary Clinton
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
I really believe that it takes a village to raise a child and the American village has failed our children....I have fought for more than 35 years for early childhood education, for more mentoring, for more parent education programs, to get our children off to a good start. ...to try to raise the standards particularly for the poorest of our children, and most especially for minority children. ...But I also believe we cannot separate the education part from the economic part. There is still discrimination in the workplace.
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
I really believe that it takes a village to raise a child and the American village has failed our children....I have fought for more than 35 years for early childhood education, for more mentoring, for more parent education programs, to get our children off to a good start. ...to try to raise the standards particularly for the poorest of our children, and most especially for minority children. ...But I also believe we cannot separate the education part from the economic part. There is still discrimination in the workplace.
Sen. Chris Dodd
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
...To say today that you're going to exclude race as a means of allowing for the diversity in our communities is a major step backwards. And as president of the United States, I would use whatever tool is available to me to see to it that we reverse this decision today...There's nothing that will be a higher priority to me as president of the United States than to see to it that America's children, from the earliest days of their arrival, certainly through the upper education branches of our educational system, have the equal opportunity....getting the No Child Left Behind law right is where we ought to focus our attention here so that we have resources coming back to our states. You measure growth in a child. You invest in failing schools. But I would not scrap it entirely. Accountability is very important in this country. We ought not to abandon that idea.
Sen. John Edwards
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
I think it's true that we need to pay teachers better. I think we ought to actually provide incentive pay to get our best teachers in the inner-city schools and into poor rural areas where they're needed the most. ...We need to significantly raise the minimum wage. We need to strengthen the right to organize. And we need to help low-income families save so they're not prey to predatory lenders that are taking advantage of them today.
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
I think it's true that we need to pay teachers better. I think we ought to actually provide incentive pay to get our best teachers in the inner-city schools and into poor rural areas where they're needed the most. ...We need to significantly raise the minimum wage. We need to strengthen the right to organize. And we need to help low-income families save so they're not prey to predatory lenders that are taking advantage of them today.
Sen. Mike Gravel
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
...21 million Americans could have a four-year college scholarship for the money we've squandered in Iraq, 7.6 million teachers could have been hired last year if we weren't squandering this money. Now, how do you think we got into this problem? The people on this stage, like the rest of us, are all guilty and very guilty, and we should recognize that, because there is linkage! ...I'd recommend that we need a little bit of competition in our system of education.Rep. Dennis Kucinich
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
We need to have a policy in education which first of all is guided by certain fundamental rights. Jesse Jackson Jr. has a bill that makes having an equal opportunity for education a matter of a constitutional privilege. And with this Supreme Court ruling, it is imperative that we have a constitutional amendment guaranteeing educational opportunity equality. ...universal free kindergarten. Every child age 3, 4, and 5 should have access to full, quality day care. Eliminate those disparities that we see early on in school. Eliminate No Child Left Behind...
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
We need to have a policy in education which first of all is guided by certain fundamental rights. Jesse Jackson Jr. has a bill that makes having an equal opportunity for education a matter of a constitutional privilege. And with this Supreme Court ruling, it is imperative that we have a constitutional amendment guaranteeing educational opportunity equality. ...universal free kindergarten. Every child age 3, 4, and 5 should have access to full, quality day care. Eliminate those disparities that we see early on in school. Eliminate No Child Left Behind...
Sen. Barack Obama
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
Early childhood education. John [Edwards]'s exactly right, it starts from birth. And where we can get parenting counselors to go in and work with at-risk parents, it makes an enormous difference. ...We're going to lose a million teachers over the next decade because the baby-boom generation is retiring. And so it's absolutely critical for us to give them the incentives and the tools and the training that they need not only to become excellent teachers but to become excellent teachers where they're most needed. ...When you've got a bill called No Child Left Behind, you can't leave the money behind for No Child Left Behind. And unfortunately, that's what's been done...
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
Early childhood education. John [Edwards]'s exactly right, it starts from birth. And where we can get parenting counselors to go in and work with at-risk parents, it makes an enormous difference. ...We're going to lose a million teachers over the next decade because the baby-boom generation is retiring. And so it's absolutely critical for us to give them the incentives and the tools and the training that they need not only to become excellent teachers but to become excellent teachers where they're most needed. ...When you've got a bill called No Child Left Behind, you can't leave the money behind for No Child Left Behind. And unfortunately, that's what's been done...
Gov. Bill Richardson
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
Washington, D.C., Debate, June 28, 2007
...I want to just state that for the record, I am for a minimum wage for teachers. The key to a good education is to pay our teachers and have accountability. ...we have to make sure that we deal with this achievement gap. ...That has to be combatted with at-risk programs, with programs that deal with more parental involvement. We have to start early, universal preschool. We have to have healthy breakfast for every child. And finally, we have to find a way to give every American access to a college education. ...I would scrap it [No Child Left Behind]. It doesn't work. ...It is not just an unfunded mandate, but the one-size-fits-all doesn't work.
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