President Delivers Remarks to Catholic Educational Association
Remarks by the President to the National Catholic Educational Association
The East Room
2:10 P.M. EST
THE PRESIDENT: Welcome. Thanks for coming; please be seated.
Thanks for coming. (Laughter.) Welcome to the people's house. We're
glad you're here.
The last 100 years, the leadership of the National Catholic
Education Association has been vital in advancing the work of Catholic
schools around the nation, and therefore has been vital to the hopeful
future of America. I'm honored to join you for celebrating your 100th
anniversary. And this is a fitting place to celebrate the
anniversary.
Catholic schools carry out a great mission, to serve God by
building knowledge and character of our young people. It's a noble
calling. It's an important part of the fabric of America. By teaching
the Word of God, you prepare your students to follow a path of virtue
and compassion and sacrifice for the rest of their lives. And by
insisting on high standards for academic achievement, Catholic schools
are a model for all schools around our country. (Applause.)
I was hoping to run into a fellow Texan today. (Laughter and
applause.) His Excellency Gregory Aymond is the Bishop from Austin,
Texas. (Laughter.) He is -- I'm glad there's only a handful of Texans
here. (Laughter.)
The Bishop is the board chair of the National Catholic Education
Association, and I want to thank you for joining us. (Applause.)
I appreciate Michael Guerra. Michael Guerra is the president of
the National Catholic Education Association. Michael, thank you. And
thank you for all the board members who graciously had a picture taken
in the Blue Room with me. I appreciate you doing that.
His Excellency John Cummings, who is the Bishop Emeritus of
Oakland, California, is with us. His Excellency, thank you for being
here, sir.
I appreciate Carl Anderson, the Supreme Knight of the Knights of
Columbus, and Dorian for joining is today.
I'm sorry my neighbor, His Eminence Theodore Cardinal McCarrick, is
not with us, a decent man. (Laughter.) I really, really am proud to
call him friend. He's a really good guy, as we say in Texas.
I appreciate you all coming, I really do. Thanks for being here.
Catholic educators share the basic conviction that every child can
learn, and every child can learn to lead a life of service. That's a
pretty good mission statement, isn't it? Let us teach every child to
read and write and add and subtract and, as we do so, let us teach
every child to serve a cause greater than self. The whole nation
benefits because of the good scholars and good citizens who graduate
from Catholic schools. That is a fact. (Applause.)
Through your faith in every child -- and I emphasize "every child"
-- Catholic schools have overcome challenges and experienced remarkable
results. It is well known that Catholic schools operate on small
budgets. (Laughter.) The per-pupil cost in a Catholic school
classroom is substantially below the per-pupil costs of many other
schools -- public or private.
And, yet, the results are astonishing: 2.6 million students who
attend Catholic schools will graduate -- that's 99 percent -- and
almost all go to college. Even though the per-pupil expenditure per
classroom is low, the results are extremely high. And it says
something is going right -- (laughter) -- starting with the fact that
Catholic schools have high expectations. You challenge what I call the
soft bigotry of low expectations. You believe in the worth of every
person and every child. You believe that inherent in every child is
the capacity to learn. And you refuse to quit on any child.
(Applause.)
The Catholic schools understand that love and discipline go
hand-in-hand. The Catholic schools are willing to change curriculum if
it doesn't work. The Catholic schools sometimes meet longer hours than
some would expect is the norm. Take LaSalle Academy, a Catholic school
in Philadelphia. Students attend classes from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.,
and the school year is several weeks longer than average. Whatever it
takes to make sure no child is left behind, the Catholic schools do.
In addition to learning to read and write, students take courses in
computers and music and art. At David McDonough, the principal of the
school said this, "We bombard them" -- that would be his students --
(laughter) -- "We bombard them with love, attention, and work -- and
they thrive."
An important part of the Catholic education is the commitment to
serving what our society calls the disadvantaged student, regardless of
religious affiliation. I appreciate that a lot. These are the
students who sometimes in the public school system are deemed to be
uneducable, and, therefore, are just moved through the system. The
Catholic schools have done our country a great service by a special
outreach to minority children, who make up 26 percent of the enrollment
of our Catholic schools. This is a great service to those children and
their parents and our country.
Catholic schools have a proven record of bringing out the best in
every child, regardless of their background. And every school in
America should live up to that standard. We want our public schools to
live up to the standard you have set in Catholic schools.
I signed what's called the No Child Left Behind Act. It is the
most historic education reform in a generation. It actually passed
with bipartisan support, which is unusual for Washington these days.
(Laughter.) Let me tell you a little bit about the philosophy behind
the law, and I think you'll find it to be reminiscent.
First, the law assumes that every child can learn, and therefore
expects every child to learn. We've increased federal spending and
now, for the -- at the federal level, primarily for Title I students,
many of whom would be -- go to your schools, if they went to the --
would be eligible for this program if they went to public schools, many
of your students would be eligible for this program. But in return we
now expect results. See, we believe every child can learn and,
therefore, we're saying to states, you must measure to show us whether
a child has learned to read and write and add and subtract. And if
not, let's solve the problem early, before it's too late.
In other words, we've introduced accountability into the system for
the first time, insisted upon accountability. And then said, let's
have enough money available to correct problems. And so now the states
must test regularly, every year. And if the curriculum isn't working,
you change it. And if it is working, there will be plenty of praise.
If the math programs aren't working, change them. Because we now
expect results. Because like the Catholic schools, we believe in the
worth of every child. We're challenging the soft bigotry of low
expectations by raising the standard and refusing to accept the status
quo when our children are not learning.
We've also done something different as well. We've insisted that
these schools post results. It's an interesting phenomena to see a
parent react when the expectation isn't met for a public school. In
other words, everything may be fine, and all of a sudden the test
scores are revealed and, oops, my school is not doing like I thought it
was doing and, therefore, I, a parent, should become more involved in
my child's school when I see failure.
But even beyond that, we've begun introducing to the system for the
first time at the federal law the capacity to take federal money and
spend that money in the private sector to get special tutorials. In
other words, if a child is trapped in a school which is failing and
won't change, after a reasonable period of time, there is some money
that follows the child and the child can take that money, the parent
can take that money and get his or her child additional tutoring -- at
a public facility, private charity or at a Catholic school.
And so all of a sudden the No Child Left Behind Act not only
demands accountability, but we've also started to empower parents to
make additional choices for their child when the child is trapped into
a school that won't change. And that includes, by the way, not only
private tutoring but also additional public school, a different -- in
other words, what we're trying to do is introduce parental involvement
through accountability standards.
Parents, I believe -- and I believe we ought to expand this
opportunity further, which we're trying to do here in Washington, D.C.
And I want to describe to you right quick what this administration has
done, where you can help a little bit in perhaps influencing the
process, to begin what I think is a major reform.
As you know, the government is responsible for much of the
education in Washington, D.C. And so working with people in Congress
we decided to expand on the spirit of the No Child Left Behind Act and
introduce school choice here in Washington. Under this program the
federal government would provide what's called scholarships to low
income families with children in under-performing schools -- these
families whose children clearly need better choices; if you're going to
an under-performing school, you need a better choice -- would receive a
scholarship of up to $7,500, federal money, to help meet the cost of
tuition at any school of the parents' choice, a private school or a
Catholic school, for that matter.
I suspect that this program would have a lot of takers when we can
get it funded, because I think some parents, any parent, regardless of
his or her income status, wants the best for their child. And when
they begin to feel like the school isn't meeting the child's needs,
it's just natural that they be looking for an alternative. The
Catholic school system here in D.C. provides a really good
alternative. And the federal government is now willing to help fund
that alternative.
The good news is education is a priority in D.C. The mayor, a good
fellow and a strong leader, recognizes the advantages of having a
school choice program. Mayor Tony Williams is a strong supporter of
the initiative we put forth on Capitol Hill. The House passed a bill
that provides $14 million for this $7,500 per child scholarship
program. It is a part of the Senate omnibus bill -- that's what we
call it, an omnibus bill -- that has yet to be passed. The omnibus
bill contains a lot of other parts of the appropriations process. The
Senate is getting ready to come back into town. For the sake of
educational excellence and for the sake of trusting parents to make the
right decision for their children -- for the sake, really, of helping
to begin a change in education around the country, for the sake of
helping the Catholic schools in the D.C. area fulfill their mission,
meet their obligation and to continue doing the excellent work they're
doing, the Senate needs to pass this bill and make school choice in
Washington, D.C., a reality. (Applause.)
I want to build on this vital reform. I'm going to ask Congress to
provide $50 million new dollars in this year's budget for what we call
a national choice incentive fund. The program would award federal
grants to communities and organizations that help students, especially
those from low income families and those trapped in under-performing
schools, to find a better education; become seed money for additional
programs like the D.C. choice program I just described to you.
The initiative has a simple goal, yet it's a profound goal, to help
more parents to send their children to the school that is best for
them, no matter what kind of school it is. When parents have more
control over their children's education, children have a better chance
to learn, schools have a better incentive to improve.
Much of what is behind the No Child Left Behind Act, the spirit and
the philosophy of the No Child Left Behind Act came from the examples
set by the Catholic schools. It's a sense of what is possible. It is
a sense that everybody has worth, that each soul matters. And,
therefore, we will not accept systems that just shuffle people
through.
Everyone involved in the National Catholic Education Association
can look back with pride over 100 years of excellence. And that's what
we're here to celebrate today, 100 years of excellence. You are
serving God by serving our children. You are making America a stronger
and more compassionate country, one child at a time. Congratulations
and thank you. (Applause.)