releases: https://franken.senate.gov/?p=press_release&&id=3809
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| https://franken.senate.gov/?p=press_release&&id=3809 | In First of Final Senate Speeches, Sen. Franken Reflects on Working to Improve Education for Minnesotans and All Americans | 2017-12-20 | 2017 | 2017-12 | Democrat | House | MN | Al Franken | F000457 | franken.senate.gov | legacy | Today, U.S. Senator Al Franken delivered the first of what will be a series of final speeches delivered on the Senate floor before his resignation. In the speech, Sen. Franken, a member of the Senate Education Committee, looked back on the years he's spent fighting to better the nation's education system, and urged his colleagues to defend and continue the progress he has made. You can watch video of his speech by clickinghere. "...We still have people on both sides of the aisle here in the Senate who care passionately about education, and who are willing to do the hard work of bipartisan legislating in order to improve our schools and keep that promise of opportunity for the next generation. "But if the last eight and a half years have taught me that progress on education is possible, even in a divided Washington, this past year has taught me that further progress isn't inevitable, and that the progress we've already made may not be safe. "It will be up to my colleagues not just to address the policy challenges posed by an education system that faces a big transition and a budget that forces hard choices, but the political challenges of the moment. It is my hope and prayer that they will be up to the task. Our children's future depends on it." You can read Sen. Franken's remarks, as prepared for delivery,hereor below. Floor Statement Reflecting on Working to Improve Education for Minnesotans and All Americans Senator Al Franken (As prepared for delivery) M. President: Unlike most of my colleagues, the time I've spent here in the Senate represents the sum total of my experience in elected office. For most of my life, I approached politics and public policy from a very different perspective. I tried to be an educated citizen who understood how the issues being debated here in Washington affected me, and my family, and my neighbors. I tried to be an advocate for the values I believed in: honesty in public discourse, for sure, but also fairness, and justice, and the idea that, in America, we're all in this together. And I tried to be an activist, putting my voice and my energy behind candidates and causes I cared about. When I leave the Senate in a few weeks, I'll continue trying to be an educated citizen, and an advocate, and an activist. But over the last eight and a half years, as I've had the privilege of serving the people of Minnesota, I've also gained a new perspective on the issues we face and the way we here in Washington make decisions. And before I go, I want to spend some time sharing some of what I've learned, in a series of speeches focusing on some of the challenges I came to Washington to address . . .challenges that my colleagues will continue to wrestle with ... challenges that will determine not just what kind of political landscape we leave for the next generation of Senators, but what kind of country we leave for the next generation of Americans. Today, I want to start by talking about education. Even at a time when our politics is more polarized, and more poisonous, than it's ever been, you would think that education is one place where Democrats and Republicans could come together to make progress. After all, while we do have some significant differences on the details of education policy, nobody disagrees about the importance of getting it right. We all agree that education, from pre-K through college and beyond, is essential in providing our economy with a skilled workforce that is ready to innovate and lead us into the future. Ever since I've been here, employers in Minnesota have stressed to me that they need employees with critical thinking and problem-solving skills, teamwork and creativity - tools that we need our children to be developing long before they enter the workforce. And I'm pretty sure that's what my colleagues hear from employers in their states, too. And, of course, education isn't just about our economy. It's about the most basic responsibility we have as human beings. Many of us who serve here in the Senate have children or grandchildren, and we would do anything to be able to promise them that, when they grow up, they'll be able to follow their dreams, to take a risk on themselves, to achieve more than we ever could. Many of us remember just how hard our own parents worked to keep that promise to us. And all of us, Democrat and Republican alike, want to be able to make that promise not just to our own children, but to every child in America - no matter where they grow up, or what their family life is like, or what obstacles they might encounter along the way. We all want a country where every child - every child - has the opportunity to fulfill his or her God-given potential. And we all understand that whether we can provide every child with a great education is the most basic measure of whether we're keeping that promise. Fortunately, the HELP Committee, which I've had the honor of serving on since I first arrived in the Senate, has been led by public servants who share those values, and a common commitment to delivering on that promise. Under Chairman Harkin, and now under Chairman Alexander and Ranking Member Murray, the HELP Committee has often been an example of how Democrats and Republicans can work together to make progress. When I first got here, the debate was focused on No Child Left Behind, which Congress had passed and President Bush had signed into law in 2002. Democrats and Republicans had worked together on that bill because they all believed that it was important that our schools be held accountable for the results they achieved on behalf of students. But by 2009, it had become clear that No Child Left Behind simply wasn't getting the job done. A couple weeks after getting to the Senate, I held a roundtable with principals at a school that had been turned around in a poor neighborhood in St. Paul. One of the other principals told me he referred to NCLB tests as "autopsies." I knew exactly what he meant. The kids took the test in late April. The results didn't come in till late June or later - too late to let the results inform teachers' instruction of each child. In Minnesota, therefore, most school districts added computer adaptive tests in addition to the required state NCLB test. Computer adaptive. Computer: so the teachers could see the results right away. Adaptive: so that if a kid was getting all the answers right, the questions would get harder - and if a student was getting them all wrong, they'd get easier. That way, instead of just measuring whether or not a student was appropriately "proficient" in reading and math, educators could find out exactly what grade level each student was at in those subjects. NCLB, on the other hand, didn't allow states to test outside of grade level. So, schools and teachers were judged simply by whether a sufficient percentage of their students met this arbitrary standard. This came to be known as "measuring for proficiency," and it created what teachers in Minnesota described to me as a "race to the middle." It made them focus on the kids just above and just below proficiency. And they could ignore the kids at the top because they knew those kids would never fall below proficiency. And they could ignore the kids at the bottom, because no matter what they did those kids would never reach proficiency by the end of the year. Think about a fifth-grade teacher who takes a kid from a second-grade reading level to a fourth-grade reading level over the course of a school year. Measuring by proficiency, that teacher is a goat, because she has failed to produce a fifth-grade reader. But we know that teacher is really a hero for helping a child grow by two grade levels in a single school year. Teachers, principals, superintendents, school board members, and parents all argued that it was time to stop measuring for proficiency and start measuring for growth instead. This quickly became a central focus of the debate over how to reform No Child Left Behind, and it remains a pivotal debate when it comes to the future of our education system. Which is why it was so shocking when President Trump picked a Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, who turned out to have no idea what the "growth vs. proficiency" debate was even about. It would be as if our children's future relied on the outcome of a football game, and the President nominated a head coach who didn't even know how many yards it took to get a first down. It was a deeply upsetting moment, not just because of what it revealed about Mrs. DeVos or the President who had picked her to be in charge of our nation's education system, but because these are the kinds of problems we should be able to solve. There's nothing ideological about the debate. It's simply a matter of coming together and working in good faith to make things work better. A functioning democracy should be able to get stuff like this right. And, sometimes, we have. For example, in the bipartisan Every Students Succeeds Act, we were able to address some of the excessive testing that was burdening educators and students alike. Under the new law, schools would still have to test every year between third and eighth grade and once in high school. But each state would control the consequences of the test results, and that would almost certainly mean fewer high stakes tests. Less drilling. More time to teach and to learn. Meanwhile, the law included important priorities like strengthening STEM education, expanding student mental health services, increasing access to courses that help high school students earn college credit, and preparing and recruiting more and better principals to lead schools. These were all things I fought to include in the final law. It also included a long-overdue investment in early childhood education. But not enough. We know from study after study that a quality early childhood education returns between $7 and $16 dollars for every dollar invested. And that's because children who get a quality early childhood education are less likely to be referred to special ed. or less likely to be held back a grade. They have better health outcomes. Girls are less likely to get pregnant in adolescence. They are more likely to graduate high school, go to college, and get a good job and pay taxes. And they are less likely to go to prison. If we really wanted to address future deficits, we would be pouring money into training early childhood educators. Instead, in his budget to Congress, the Trump administration proposed major cuts to early childhood programs. And we could easily put more money into these programs, if we weren't giving enormous tax cuts to the wealthy and to powerful corporations. We also need to make sure that, as our kids get older, they can rely on quality after-school programs. Last spring, I visited Roosevelt High School in Minneapolis. During my tour of the school's afterschool program, I saw students rehearsing for a production of The Addams Family. I saw students getting critical academic support like tutoring and college prep. In fact, Roosevelt's successful afterschool program contributed to their graduation rate going from less than 50 percent to over 70 percent in just three years. That's pretty incredible, and that's why I fought to renew the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program in the reform of No Child Left Behind. If we all agree that education should be a priority, we should be willing to put our money where our mouths are and fund these programs. I'm proud that, over the course of my time here, we've had a bipartisan commitment to doing just that. We've made progress - not enough by any means, but progress. Again, however, that progress is at risk under this administration. That afterschool program was zeroed out in its proposed budget. And, what's more, this administration seems to be outright hostile to the idea that we have a responsibility to provide children with a quality public education. I am proud of the work we have done to support and improve our public schools. But, the Department of Education is now led by a Secretary with a long history of actively undermining public education. Secretary DeVos and her family have spent millions of dollars advocating for an ideology that would steal funds from public schools in order to fund private and religious education. Now let's take a moment to talk about what that means. Secretary DeVos ran a political action committee called All Children Matter, which spent millions in campaign contributions to promote the use of taxpayer dollars for school vouchers. The argument was that these vouchers would allow low-income students to leave the public school system and attend the private schools of their families' choice. Secretary DeVos has been pushing to expand vouchers for years, even though the research clearly shows that voucher programs don't work. In fact, the academic outcomes for students who used vouchers to attend private schools is just abysmal. A New York Times article from February of this year reported on three different studies of large state voucher programs in Indiana, Louisiana, and Ohio. Each study found that vouchers negatively impact results in both reading and math. In fact, in Louisiana's voucher program, public elementary school students who started at the 50th percentile in math and then used a voucher to transfer to a private school dropped to the 26th percentile in a single year. Harvard education professor Martin West said this negative effect was "as large as any I've seen in the literature." And he was talking about all literature, the entire history of American education research. Secretary DeVos is a serious threat to our public school system, and a threat to the quality of education in this country overall. I've pushed as hard as I could to protect our students from what this administration has been trying to do. I've sent the Secretary over a dozen letters this year on protecting students from harassment, helping defrauded students, and holding for-profit schools accountable. It is my hope that my colleagues will continue to be vigilant in overseeing the Department of Education and in making sure our public education system is not dismantled. Our public education system was designed to give all kids a real chance in life. But teachers and administrators often lack the resources they need to give kids the opportunities they deserve. Every year I push appropriators to increase funding for a number of critical education programs like early childhood, STEM, and professional development for teachers and I hope my colleagues will continue that fight to increase resources for these programs. Improving our education system isn't just about funding and accountability. If we want to keep the promise of opportunity to every child, we have to recognize that some kids face obstacles that others do not- and that we have to do more to make sure that they aren't left behind. For example: Kids who grow up poor are far more likely to suffer what are called "adverse childhood experiences": not just the stress of living in poverty itself, but exposure to domestic violence, abuse or neglect, drug and alcohol abuse, the incarceration of a parent, the death of a sibling - all of which affect brain chemistry and the ability to learn. If we want to improve education, we need to do a better job of helping these kids overcome these trauma - and a better job of addressing economic inequality so that fewer have to deal with trauma in the first place. And this is another reason we need more high quality early childhood programs and more training for child care providers, so they can better support kids who experience trauma. Here's another example: foster kids. It's not uncommon for foster children to have ten, eleven, twelve sets of foster parents during their childhood. This wreaks havoc on their education and sometimes foster kids fall through the cracks. If a child's new foster parents live in a different school district, the foster child is yanked out of school and sent to one in the new school district. Kayla VanDyke, an impressive high school senior from Minnesota who had been in seven foster homes, testified to the HELP Committee that she had missed fourth grade entirely. For foster kids, school is often the one constant in their lives. Maybe they have a teacher they really like. Or an extracurricular activity that means everything to them. Or maybe, maybe they have these things called friends. And that's why I wrote a provision in the Every Student Succeeds Act, to require school districts to work with child welfare agencies to make sure that foster children who are changing homes are not forced to change schools. I like to think that somewhere there's a foster child running cross-country, or developing a passion for history because of a great teacher, or doing homework with a good friend, because of the legislation I worked on - legislation that passed with a strong bipartisan majority. Here's yet another example: Kids in Indian country. When I first came to the Senate I asked for a seat on the Indian Affairs Committee, and serving on that committee you are confronted with the tragic disparities from which native people in our country suffer. One of them is the huge disparity in educational resources for native kids compared with their peers. That inequity in education plays out in many ways, but you can literally see it in the school buildings some native kids are forced to learn in. Indian school buildings are often unsafe, harmful to the health of children and teachers, and are ultimately a barrier to the education of students. So going back to early 2009, I've been fighting for funding to fix the Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig High School in northern Minnesota. When I first visited the school, I saw exposed wiring, mold, roof leaks, rodents, uneven floors, poor lighting, and sewer problems. I learned that students had faced these horrendous conditions in their classrooms for years-it was deplorable, and a terrible place to learn. So I worked for the better part of a decade to rebuild that school. I sent my colleagues a series of powerful editorials about the conditions at the school that were written by the Minneapolis Star Tribune. I raised this issue at what seems like countless Indian Affairs hearings. After a lot of hard work from the community, the tribe, and the Obama Administration, we were able to secure the funding to rebuild this school. I'm thrilled that so many bright young students in Leech Lake will be able to feel safe and comfortable in a brand new school which will be opening this coming March. But this is one school, one reservation, and there are hundreds of schools like the Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig high school that are not suitable for learning and we need to do so much more for our native kids. In Indian Country we know that historical trauma has a huge impact on our children. We have seen the ripple effects of intergenerational trauma, and know that it can lead to other types of trauma experienced in childhood. That's why when we look at adverse childhood experiences, particularly within the native community, we can't dismiss their effects on kids' ability to learn. Kids in Indian country are woefully underserved when it comes to housing and economic opportunity. A report by Wilder Research states that this can "threaten their educational success, health and mental health, and personal development." I'm pleased that Senator Heitkamp has been focused on addressing this issue. And one more example. LGBT students deserve to learn in an environment free from discrimination, and they deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. But, far too often, LGBT kids endure harassment and discrimination. More than 30 percent of LGBT kids report missing a day of school in the previous month because they felt unsafe. You can't learn when you dread going to school and when that happens, those students are deprived of an equal education. In America, we have passed laws that guard against harassment in our schools on the basis of race, national origin, sex, and disability. But LGBT students continue to face bullying and intimidation without recourse. I have a bill called the Student Non-Discrimination Act that would merely provide LGBT kids the same legal remedies available to other kids under our federal civil rights laws. It says that schools would have to listen when a parent says "my child isn't safe;" and the school has to do something about it. It would ensure that LGBT kids have the same protections as every other child. I worked very hard to get this provision into the final law, and I was greatly disappointed that it wasn't included even though it got 52 votes on the Senate floor. It is our responsibility not just as senators, but as adults, to protect children and to help them flourish. And I sincerely hope every one of my colleagues will take up this fight and work to get this across the finish line. The last thing I want to mention on the subject of education is this. For a long time, we thought about learning as something that started when you went to kindergarten and continued until you got your high school diploma and either went off to college or went off to work. We now know that education is a lifelong pursuit. But we also know that we need to do far more to make it possible for it to continue long after 12th grade. College used to be an affordable and accessible step into the middle class for so many Americans. I always think of my wife, Franni and her family. You see, when Franni was 17 months old, her dad - a decorated World War II veteran- died in a car accident. But they made it and all four girls went to college on combinations of Pell Grants and scholarships. But you see, back then, a Pell Grant covered about 80 percent of the cost of a public college education. Today, it's less than 35 percent. So today, kids have to work while they're going to school. That's not new. But when I've done roundtables at colleges across Minnesota, many of them tell me that they're working full-time - in addition to going to school full-time. Which seems like it might make it harder to focus on your studies. Or to stay awake. That's why I've been working to bring down the cost of college, increase financial aid to students and make textbooks cheaper. We need to help millions of Americans refinance their student loan debt at lower interest rates. And we need to help low and middle income students go to college debt free. This is something we could easily be doing if we weren't giving tax cuts to the super wealthy and to powerful corporations. It is important to remember too that young people don't necessarily need to start at a four-year college to become successful in life or build a secure middle class lifestyle. In many career and technical programs, students complete their education while they are employed in good paying jobs with benefits, that promise a secure career. We need to overcome the assumption that career and technical schools are a ceiling to future success. They are a ladder to careers with good wages and benefits that can support a comfortable lifestyle. And there is a high demand for these workers now. That's because we have what's called a "skills gap" in this country. Every Senator has it in their states. It is one of the things I hear about frequently when I travel around Minnesota and especially when I talk to businesses. I hear about job positions employers can't fill, because they can't find qualified workers. At the same time, I hear from students who are anxious to start a career but lack specific technical skills. To remain competitive in today's global economy, we need a better trained workforce. That's why I introduced the Community College to Career Fund Act. The grants would help create public-private partnerships that support learn and earn on-the-job training programs. And employers would develop a workforce with the specific skills they need to grow their businesses. Everybody wins. Here's how it works - you go to get a credential, that credential would get you a job, then the employer would pay for you to continue your education as you continue to work and make a living. I've seen this time and time again and it works. We also need to reauthorize the Perkins Career and Technical Education law which includes support for public/private partnership training programs in K-12. So I think some of the things we need to do to make college more affordable and accessible and valuable for students are pretty clear. But let's be honest, the Trump Administration, after nearly a year in office, has been going in a very different direction and has been working against the best interest of college students. One of the most unfortunate aspects of this is that predatory, for-profit colleges have been able to get even more of a foothold in our higher education system since Secretary DeVos took over. The good news when it comes to education is that America still has teachers and principals and superintendents who work hard every day to take responsibility for every student under their care and deliver on the promise of a great education. We still have parents and neighbors and coaches who look out for our children's well-being, and who work to equip them with the skills they need to succeed in school and beyond. And, as anyone who's spent any time in a school lately can tell you, our kids themselves still have some pretty impressive potential. What's more, we still have people on both sides of the aisle here in the Senate who care passionately about education, and who are willing to do the hard work of bipartisan legislating in order to improve our schools and keep that promise of opportunity for the next generation. But if the last eight and a half years have taught me that progress on education is possible, even in a divided Washington, this past year has taught me that further progress isn't inevitable, and that the progress we've already made may not be safe. It will be up to my colleagues not just to address the policy challenges posed by an education system that faces a big transition and a budget that forces hard choices, but the political challenges of the moment. It is my hope and prayer that they will be up to the task. Our children's future depends on it. Thank you. ### | 1 | 2026-03-30T12:14:52Z | 2026-03-30T12:14:52Z |