Student Success Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. ROKITA. Madam Chair, I thank the gentleman from Indiana, my good friend, for his leadership on this issue and the gentleman on the other side of the aisle. I appreciate it very much.

I rise in strong support of this amendment. I think it is a great example of the kind of use that we intended with this language to begin with.

The Federal Government spends tens of billions of dollars on education annually. If you ask the average Hoosier or any American, they think Washington does a pretty poor job of spending those dollars efficiently, as was just demonstrated.

Instead of business as usual, we should look for new and innovative ways to achieve results, which is exactly the concept behind the gentleman's Pay for Success initiatives. These initiatives provide flexibility for the public and private sectors to partner together around common goals. This model ensures value for taxpayer dollars.

As a cosponsor of the underlying bill, along with Chairman Kline and certain members of the Education and the Workforce Committee, we would urge all our colleagues, both Republican and Democrat, to support this amendment.

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Mr. ROKITA. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for this amendment.

Early childhood care and education, as we all can appreciate, is critical to both children and working parents. This amendment would allow schools and Head Start centers, if they so choose, Mr. Chairman, as the gentlewoman described, would allow them, if they so choose, to coordinate and provide important services to low-income children.

It will also ensure parents have a clear understanding of the services being offered. I think this amendment is a step forward for the existing partnerships between the Head Start program and local education agencies.

Like the amendment that was discussed before, I think this amendment is deserving of our support on both sides of the aisle.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. ROKITA. Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend, the gentleman from Tennessee, for this amendment.

This amendment will allow teachers and other school professionals, if they so choose, at the State and local level--and that is the key here throughout our bill--to receive training and to better address problems that may arise at their schools. I agree, conflict resolution is an important tool to help keep students and faculty safe and focused on education rather than the problems.

This is a good amendment, as it improves the underlying bill, and I thank the gentleman again for offering it. I urge my colleagues to support it.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. ROKITA. I thank my colleagues, Ms. Wilson and Mr. Duffy, for this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, it looks like this amendment promotes transparency for parents and students, and that is a great thing, and that is one of the chief purposes of our bill. We have all heard the concerns about testing from our constituents, neighbors, and colleagues alike. One way to address that is to ensure parents are aware of what tests their children will have to take. This narrowly tailored amendment ensures parents have that ability to request this information from their children's school.

This is a good amendment, as it improves the underlying bill, and I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support it.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. ROKITA. I thank my colleagues Mr. Polis and Mr. Messer for continuing to raise this issue. I am in complete agreement with it as are certain Members and a good deal of the committee--really, of this Chamber as a whole.

Mr. Chairman, this amendment highlights the important role charter schools play in our education system. Parents are clamoring for more options for their children, and charter schools help fit that need.

I visit charter schools all over Indiana and more and more throughout the Nation. It is clear that, while charter schools might not be the answer for everyone--that is, some parents love their traditional public schools, some want to have their children homeschooled, and others believe a private school is the right choice--the key here is choice.

Many parents would not have an option at all without charter schools, as the gentleman describes. Charter schools are a great thing, and I appreciate this amendment's adding a sense of Congress on the importance of charter schools.

Again, I thank the gentleman for offering this amendment. I think it is a great amendment, and I encourage my colleagues to support it and the underlying bill.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. ROKITA. I want to thank my friend and colleague for this amendment, and I appreciate being able to join with him on it and on continuing our work on the charter school initiatives.

Mr. Chairman, this amendment supports the sharing of best practices between charter schools and traditional public schools. Again, I think that is a good thing. We have seen the successful charter school-traditional public school collaborations, like in Ohio between breakthrough schools and the Cleveland Metropolitan School District, and we know that working together helps each of them excel.

It is the old adage of iron sharpening iron, and that is reflected here in this good amendment. Put simply, Mr. Chairman, many of us believe other charter schools and traditional public schools can benefit from these partnerships as well.

This is a great amendment, and it improves the underlying bill. I thank the gentleman for offering it, and I urge my colleagues to support it.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. ROKITA. I thank the gentlewoman for this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, family engagement centers are available to help parents understand and engage in their children's education. As a part of that mission, the centers help parents learn basic skills, like literacy. In today's world, financial literacy is an important issue for parents to be able to understand and support their children's education.

I want to be clear that this language is part of a grant application and requirement. In that regard, it is not part of a testing standard or a teacher training standard. With that, I urge my colleagues to support this amendment and the underlying bill.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. ROKITA. Mr. Chair, I thank Mr. Costello for yielding. I want to congratulate him on already being an effective Member of Congress. I also want to thank Representative Bonamici for her continued work on this amendment and seeing it through; also, Representative Carlos Curbelo, a member of our committee, for his effectiveness to date. It has been a great partnership all the way around.

I want to associate myself with Mr. Curbelo's remarks and also simply add that this amendment helps States examine all of the assessments given to students, helps improve how student assessments are used, and possibly limits how many are given.

This is a commonsense amendment, and I am happy to support it and urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to do so as well.

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Mr. ROKITA. Again, I thank Mr. Polis for this amendment. The amendment simply clarifies that States may use, again, at their choosing, their funds under the local academic flexible grant to create or distribute open source education resources. This is a good thing. This grant is designed to be used to support the activities the State and local school districts believe are important to their students. If open source material is what is best for them, they should be able to use the funding to support that activity. This is in line with the spirit and themes found throughout the Student Success Act.

Again, I thank the gentleman for his leadership in offering it. I urge my colleagues to support it, and the underlying bill.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. ROKITA. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for offering this amendment. This adds an allowable use of funds for what we are calling the local academic flexible grant to support projects that focus on school and student safety.

The local academic flexible grant, again, is the product of us eliminating over 65 programs in current law and delivering the funds that supported those programs back to the States and, with the States' blessing, even further back to local school districts and so forth.

We know all too well that bad things can happen in schools. This amendment will clarify that school districts can use this funding--again, not being mandated by the Federal Government--but through this grant can use the funding to support programs aimed at making schools safer. This is in all our interests.

I thank the gentlewoman for offering this amendment and urge my colleagues to support it and the underlying bill.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. ROKITA. Mr. Chair, I appreciate the gentlewoman's concern and the purpose of this amendment; however, it must be opposed.

Comprehensive literacy and reading programs and their connection to college and career success are obviously vitally important.

Since State and local educational officials understand the importance of reading proficiency, including the benefits of teaching comprehension, vocabulary, and other skills, I am confident that these officials will see the benefits of programs like this and choose to use their local academic flexible grant under this bill to fund programs like this.

The block grant is designed to be flexible, thereby allowing local education officials to use the funds in a way that most benefits their students. We do not want to start rebuilding the silos that we have just knocked down with this bill language.

I believe this amendment, unfortunately, would do that very thing by requiring this instruction instead of letting State and local school districts, teachers, parents, local taxpayers, and school officials decide what is best for their students.

I agree, again, with the importance of this issue, but oppose the amendment as the underlying bill already provides States and school districts funding flexibility to set their own priorities, not letting Washington do it.

I encourage my colleagues, on that basis then, to oppose this amendment but still support the underlying bill.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

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