THE PRESIDENT: Thank you for that warm
welcome. It's nice to be here at the home of the Screaming
Eagles. (Applause.) They tell me you've got a
good football team. (Applause.) And a good High
Pom Squad. (Applause.)
But I'm really not interested in talking about
athletics. (Applause.) I'm here because of the
achievements, the academic achievements of the students, the quality of
the teaching and the involvement of the
parents. (Applause.) I'm here because this is one
of America's finest public schools. (Applause.)
I believe strongly in the hope and promise of the public school
system all across America. And I know how important it is to
thank our teachers; to thank those who come to your classrooms every
day; to wish them the best; and to herald such a noble and important
profession for the future of our country. I'm here to talk
about teaching and its responsibilities and how our country can do a
better job of supporting America's teachers. I know -- look,
I am sure a lot of you are out there saying, the guy is still talking
about teaching. I really get tired of seeing my teacher --
(laughter) -- particularly at test
time. (Laughter.) Trust me, you're going to miss
your teachers. They're an important part of your
life. And they're an important part of our country's
future. (Applause.)
I just had a meeting with a group of teachers from all over the
area, and I want to thank them for being there to share some thoughts
about how to make sure the school systems work as good as they possibly
can. I want to thank Jeff, your school's principal, for,
gosh, opening up this huge facility and inviting so many people
here. I want to thank the Superintendent of Schools, Bill
Gaslin. I want to thank my friend, Mark Yudof, from the
University of Minnesota, who understands that --
(applause.) About seven people appreciate you,
Mark. (Laughter and applause.)
I want to thank -- the reason Mark -- I want to herald Mark is that
he understands that in order for a teacher to be able to teach, the
teacher colleges have got to teach a curriculum that actually works in
the classroom. And I appreciate his leadership.
I want to thank members of the U.S. congressional
delegation: Gutknecht and Kennedy and Ramstad, for being
here, as well. Thank you all for
coming. (Applause.) I want to thank my friend,
Norm Coleman, former Mayor of St. Paul,
Minnesota. (Applause.) Mary Kiffmeyer, the
Secretary of State, is here, as well; thank you,
Mary. (Applause.) And Christine Jax, the
Education Commissioner of Minnesota is here, too. Thank you
all for coming. (Applause.)
Before I talk about the importance of education and teaching, I do
want to talk to the students about my desire to defend freedom, to try
to put some context to what's taking place overseas into your life.
You know, I'm sure it must have been troubling for high school
seniors to turn on their TV -- or high school juniors or sophomores,
for that matter -- to see America under attack. When we grew
up, the baby boomers and everybody else, we never really thought we'd
be attacked. I mean, the last thing that I entered my mind
when I was getting out of high school in 1964 is that an enemy would
attack America. And, yet, here you are graduating from high
school, the first high school class to ever have seen the 48 contiguous
states attacked by an enemy.
And you're probably wondering, why would somebody hit
us? And it's because we love freedom. There are
people in the world who cannot stand a free society. There
are people who do not believe that you should be able to worship
freely. There are people who do not believe you should be
able to speak freely. There are people who do not believe
that young women should be educated. And when they find a
nation that's willing to defend freedom, they try to attack it.
And when they attacked us, they thought we were soft and
materialistic. They thought our nation had no fiber and no
courage. They fell prey to images of a selfish American, a
selfish America. And, my, did they make a huge
mistake. (Applause.) Because this nation will
defend ourselves and freedom at any price. It is too
precious a gift -- it is too precious a gift for future generations to
give up to terrorists.
You know, I laid out an initiative that said you're either with us
or you're against us; wither you stand with America to defend freedom,
so that you can grow up, and your children can grow up, in a society,
in a civilized world that values individual freedoms. And
most nations of the world chose to be with us. And for that,
our nation is grateful.
I also said that if you harbor a terrorist, if you feed a
terrorist, if you try to encourage a terrorist, you're just as guilty
as those who murdered thousands of innocent Americans. And
the Taliban has found out exactly what we meant. (Applause.)
I am so proud of our United States military. Many of you
who have got relatives in the military, you need to tell them how proud
I am of their service and of their sacrifice and of their
dedication. (Applause.)
We went into Afghanistan not as conquerors, but as
liberators. It's hard for you to believe, I'm certain, that
Afghanistan, when it was taken over by the Taliban -- a government that
sponsored terrorism, that allowed al Qaeda killers to hide and train in
their country -- would not allow young girls to go to
school. It's hard for any American to understand how
barbaric this regime was. We didn't go in as conquerors, we
went in as liberators. And now women and children are free
from the clutches of these barbaric people. (Applause.)
People say, well, how long is this going to last? And
the answer is, for however long it takes to make sure America is
secure. (Applause.) People say, well, the hard
part is over with. And my answer is, no, it's
not. We're just beginning -- as we learned recently that
there's an al Qaeda, a group of al Qaeda killers in a mountainous
region in Afghanistan and when we find them bunched up and we find
where they are, you can rest assured the United States and our
coalition are going to hunt 'em down; that these are people that if we
allow to go free, could easily come back and harm the American
citizens.
And so we sent teams in and there is some serious combat as I
speak, and lives are lost. And we send our prayers and tears
to those whose families have lost life. But I want to assure
the students who are here and the loved ones of those military,
defending freedom is a noble cause and it is a just
cause. And so long as I am the President of the United
States, I will pursue those who want to hurt America and who want to
take away our freedoms. (Applause.)
I'm confident that over time, we'll prevail. I'm
confident that this mighty nation has got the patience and the
determination and the will to succeed. And when we do, the
world will be better off.
And I'm confident that we can do what we need to do here at home to
make sure every child is educated. It is so important that
we achieve that objective. I was fortunate enough to be the
President at a time when the people in Congress realized that -- maybe
with a little bit of my persuasion -- that we needed to reform our
school system. And I signed an historic reform
bill. It was one of those wonderful moments in Washington
where a group of us put aside our party politics -- said, it's okay to
be a Republican, it's okay to be a Democrat, but what's most important
is to function on what's best for America. And we got a bill
done. (Applause.)
It's a good piece of education reform that says that in America, we
believe in educating every child -- each and every
child. (Applause.) And that we must bring high
hopes and high standards to every school and every neighborhood all
across America. (Applause.)
As a result of this bill, parents will know whether their child or
their child's school is succeeding in meeting that ambitious
goal. Because schools will have to test and publish the
results. From now on, teaching reading will be the first
priority of every elementary school in America.
My friend, Phyllis Hunter put it best: the new civil
right in America is teaching every single child to
read. (Applause.) And from now on, schools in low
income neighborhoods will have the same high expectations as everybody
else. (Applause.)
These reforms were passed in Washington, but the success of the
reform will ultimately come down to the teacher in the
classroom. There are of really great teachers in
America. I know you've got a lot of really great teachers
here. (Applause.) But we want to make sure there
is a great teacher in every classroom.
And it starts by making sure that teachers coming out of teacher
schools know how to teach the subjects that they're going to take into
the classroom. Interestingly enough, now, about 35 states
require new teachers to take an exit exam -- an entrance exam into the
teaching profession to make sure that they can pass the test in the
subject they teach.
Sometimes, the standard is so low that all you have to do is answer
half the questions and you're in. That doesn't make sense to
me. And, you know, it doesn't make sense to good
teachers. Teachers want their profession to have the highest
of high standards. And so in order to make sure every school
has got a teacher, we're going to work with the states to make sure
that the exit exams -- those exams for teachers being, going into the
teaching ranks, exiting college, have high standards, that they can
pass a test in the subject they're going to teach and that every
teacher be licensed or certified.
Every public school teacher in America must demonstrate competence
in his or her field of instruction. If we want to have a
teaching profession that is held in high regard, we must have
confidence in the teacher colleges and those coming into the teacher
ranks that they can do the job expected of them. We owe it
to the parents. And, most of all, we owe it to the
students.
We also understand what a good teacher can accomplish in a young
life. Our new economy demands higher and higher skills and
good teachers provide those skills. But it's only one part
of the teacher's job. Just as life is more than a race to
the riches -- and life should be more than a race to the riches --
education is more than a search for skills. Look, you
probably have already forgotten the isosceles triangle or
photosynthesis. (Laughter.) But hopefully you
did learn how to try hard and how to work hard, and how to take pride
in your work, exactly what your teachers are teaching you.
You learn to study, and you learn to communicate. And
you learn to appreciate the living truth of history and
literature. A good teacher instills a sense of your own
possibilities, along with your willingness to respect other
people. We ask a lot of our teachers. We expect
them to teach knowledge and skills. We expect them to
welcome measurement and accountability. We expect them to
have sound character. And we expect them to teach by
example.
And the teachers have a right to expect certain things in
return. They have a right to expect every child will come to
school ready to learn, and that good manners and respect for teachers
will be taught at home. (Applause.) And that's
the responsibility of moms and dads. After all, a parent is
a child's first teacher. And when the children show up for
school, they should already know the basics of good manners and good
discipline.
Teachers are also entitled to expect some things from
government. As we raise the expectations of our schools, we
must give our schools the tools to succeed. As we ask more
of our teachers, we must take their side. We must be their
allies. And all of us, all around America, must give them
the support they need to do their jobs. (Applause.)
My administration is supporting teachers and getting the training
they need to raise educational standards. We have
appropriated nearly $3 billion made available to states to recruit, to
prepare and to train teachers. That is more than a 35
percent increase over last year's budget. (Applause.)
This is the greatest federal commitment to quality teachers and
principals. And it's important and it's necessary if we're
going to achieve the reforms inherent in the no child left behind
bill. Much of the training will focus on specific needs,
like special education and math and science instruction, and early
reading.
The truth of the matter is, if we don't teach the children to read,
they're not going to understand math and science. We have
got to make sure our elementary school teachers have the skills and
tools necessary to teach every child in America how to
read. (Applause.) And that means starting in
pre-school. And that means making sure that the pre-school
teachers know what works.
And that's why I heralded Mark Yudof. Listen, reading is
a science. Mark said, well, explain what you mean by reading
is a science. That means teach what works. We
know what works. Some reading programs sound good, but they
don't work. Let's use curriculum that actually
works. Phonics works and it needs to be an integral part of
the reading curriculum all around America. (Applause.)
And so one of the things we're doing is setting up a clearing house
of the most recent and reliable information on what works so that
districts and teachers can access information and, if need be, change
curriculum so that standards are met and no children are simply
shuffled through the school system because they may seem to be hard to
educate. (Applause.)
So there's money in the budget for training, retention and
recruitment. And we'll also support teachers by welcoming
more talent and experience into the ranks. Over the next
decade, school districts will need to hire 2.2 million
teachers. And we must recruit new teachers. And
we must remind people, if you're looking for something to do that will
have an incredible impact on people's lives, think about, when you go
to college, getting a teacher's certificate. Think about
going into the classroom. It is such a noble and important
profession.
But there are also other ways to attract. For example,
I'm a strong supporter, as is the administration, for a program called
Teach for America, which recruits and trains outstanding college
graduates to teach for at least two years in our neediest public
schools. We're increasing funding for a program called
Transition for Teaching, a program that puts professionals, like
lawyers and accountants and scientists, into public school classrooms,
and give them the teacher training they need.
I'm also committed to expanding a great program called Troops to
Teachers, which encourages military personnel, upon retirement, to get
into the classroom, to bring the skills they have learned in the
defense of the United States to the children of the United
States. These are programs all aimed at recruiting people,
encouraging people, and giving people the skills necessary to enjoy one
of life's most noble professions, teaching
children. (Applause.)
My administration will support teachers who are committed to
educating disadvantaged students. Education -- education is
the surest way out of
poverty. (Applause.) Children who live in
low-income neighborhoods can succeed, absolutely. But they
need people willing to teach them. Many schools in high
poverty areas are having trouble finding -- filling the teacher
vacancies. So we'll help them by expanding student loan
forgiveness for teachers willing to teach math, science and special
education in these schools for at least five years.
Right now our government forgives up to $5,000 in student
loans. If someone is willing to teach math, science or
special ed in a school that is having trouble recruiting teachers, then
we ought to forgive up to $17,500 in student
loans. (Applause.)
I just met with Patrick Pelini. He's an English teacher
at Patrick Henry High School, in Minneapolis. Here's what he
said. He said that low-income students are hungry to be
taught. He said that mentoring and teaching students in his
school has been a tremendously gratifying experience for
Patrick. Let me tell you something, this guy is
committed. He is a solid citizen of your
state. He is focused and dedicated on making sure every
child gets educated. If he had any student loans, they ought
to be forgiven.
But the next Patricks ought to have their student loans forgiven,
so that they end up teaching in these schools where it's having trouble
recruiting teachers. It makes sense, it's good public
policy, and if we want to make sure no child is left behind, let's
encourage really bright, smart people to head into those
schools. (Applause.)
We will support our teachers by allowing them to enforce discipline
in the classrooms. (Applause.) So behave
yourself. (Laughter.)
Albert Shanker said this. He was a great advocate for
teachers. He said, the amount of disruption in our schools
is much larger than it needs to be because it's
tolerated. He knew that learning only takes place in an
atmosphere of order. And for the sake of the teachers, we
must make sure they're in charge of their classrooms. And we
took a huge step in that direction in the new bill I signed.
And it's because of this -- many teachers are wary of imposing
discipline, because they might be sued. Somebody might file
a lawsuit against them. Well, because of what we call the
Teacher Protection law, teachers and principals and other school
professionals can take reasonable actions to maintain order and
discipline in the classroom without the fear of being hauled into
court. (Applause.)
We are taking frivolous lawsuits out of the learning process, and
empowering teachers to be able to maintain order in their
classrooms. America is going to be a lot better off for this
law I signed. And so will the teaching
profession. (Applause.)
One of the interesting initiatives that I hope Congress passes is
this one: Committed teachers often times have to buy
supplies for their students out of their own pocket. The
average across the nation is $400 per teacher. And yet they
cannot deduct that from their income taxes. Look, if a
business person can take somebody out to lunch and deduct it, teachers
ought to be allowed to deduct the supplies they purchase for their
classrooms. (Applause.)
And finally, I understand that all wisdom isn't in Washington,
D.C. As a matter of fact -- there is some wisdom
there. (Laughter.) But if you're interested in
quality education, if you really want to make a huge difference in
making sure the public schools meet the high standards and high
objectives, you've got to trust the local people to make the right
decisions for the schools. You've got to trust the parents
and teachers and principals and school board members, in order to chart
the path for excellence. (Applause.)
And part of that means giving school districts and states the
flexibility to spend federal money on what they need the
most. Some districts will provide incentives for new
teachers. If you're having trouble attracting a teacher, you
can use your federal monies to attract teachers. Some will
want to spend more money on teacher development. Many
districts may want to use it to increase teacher
pay. Flexibility with federal money will help local folks
meet the needs in order to chart the path for excellence, so every
child learns. (Applause.)
And so, in Washington, we're working to enhance the professionalism
of the teacher ranks, and in reminding America what a noble profession
teaching is. We talk about teacher training and teacher
recruitment and teacher authority and local control of schools.
I want the teachers here to know how much I respect what you do,
and how I appreciate the effort and care and compassion you show on a
daily basis. (Applause.) One of the young
teachers in there said, you know, I decided that I wanted to teach
instead of trying to get rich. That attitude is a fabulous
attitude for America. It's really what I think is going to
come out of this attack by the evil people. I think we're
all beginning to take a hard look at the value of life, why we're here
on the face of the Earth.
You know, today we've got a guy named Will Gove with
us. Will is right
here. (Applause.) Let me tell you something about
Will. Can I say your
age? Eighty-three. (Applause.) World
War II vet -- (applause) -- social
entrepreneur. Here's a guy -- I think he said he could sit
around a 19th hole drinking martinis if he wanted
to. (Laughter.) Was it martinis or
beer? Anyway, instead he builds soccer
fields. Instead, he reads newspaper articles so that blind
folks can get the news. Instead, he is a
mentor. Instead, this guy is a soldier in the army of
compassion, which exists all across America. (Applause.)
Will, I want to thank you for your example, for your living example
of someone who puts his heart and soul into making our community a
better place; someone who understands that you ought to love somebody
just like you want to be loved yourself; that a complete life is one
that is much greater than simple materialism.
The enemy hit us; they thought we were a materialistic
society. But they didn't know we were made up of
Wills. They didn't know, truly, what the fabric of our
country was made out of.
You know, one of the things that I hear a lot of youngsters asking
is, what can I do in the war against terror? What can I do
to be a part of my nation's efforts to defend freedom? Well,
let me tell you what you can do. You can make somebody's
life better off. You can walk into a shut-in's house on a
daily basis and say, what can I do to help you. You can
mentor a child. You can go to your church or your synagogue
or your mosque, and you can put together a food drive. You
can make somebody's life better.
In order to stand up in the face of evil, you can do something
good. It's the millions of acts of kindness and decency and
compassion that define America, and stand strong in the face of
evil. (Applause.)
USAfreedomcorps.gov is a place where you can go if you're
interested in serving somebody greater than yourself, a cause greater
than yourself, to help somebody in need. If you want to
figure out some way to enrich your life, think about being a
teacher. Or think about following the example of
Will. If you anything to do something, think about my
friend, Mary Copeland, who runs a prayer service, who understands the
importance of faith in people's lives. With faith in
people's lives, you can kick drugs and alcohol, and you can realize a
better tomorrow. (Applause.)
What I'm saying to the students is, you're fortunate to live in a
great nation -- a nation not defined by its government, but a nation
defined by values that we hold dear, and a nation defined by the hearts
and souls of decent and loving and caring people.
I'm proud of our country. I'm optimistic of our
future. And I'm honored to be the President of the greatest
nation on the face of the Earth. God bless you
all. Thank you all very much. (Applause.)