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Ken Bentsen on Education
Former Democratic Representative (TX-25)
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Voted YES on requiring states to test students.
No Child Left Behind Act of 2001: Vote to pass a bill that would authorize $22.8 billion in education funding, a 29 percent increase from fiscal 2001. The bill would require states to test students to track progress.
Reference: Bill sponsored by Boehner R-OH;
Bill HR 1
; vote number 2001-145
on May 23, 2001
Voted NO on allowing vouchers in DC schools.
Vote to create a non-profit corporation to administer federally-funded vouchers for low-income children in the District of Columbia.
Reference: Amendment introduced by Armey, R-TX;
Bill HR 4380
; vote number 1998-411
on Aug 6, 1998
Voted NO on vouchers for private & parochial schools.
Vote to pass a bill to allow states to use certain federal funds designated for elementary and secondary education to provide scholarships, or vouchers, to low-income families to send their children to private schools, including religious schools.
Reference: Bill sponsored by Riggs, R-CA;
Bill HR 2746
; vote number 1997-569
on Nov 4, 1997
Three R’s: $35B for Reinvestment,Reinvention,Responsibility.
Bentsen sponsored the Senate New Democrat Coalition Press Release:
The Public Education Reinvestment, Reinvention and Responsibility Act (Three R's) [is] the common ground from which bipartisan compromise on education reform will be successfully achieved. The Three R’s would provide public schools with significantly increased funding and flexibility, increasing federal investment in education by $35 billion over the next 5 years, and targeting most of those new dollars toward closing the persistent achievement gap between poor and more affluent students. State & local officials would be given broader latitude to decide how to allocate federal funding in order to meet the specific needs of their communities. In return, states would be required to set standards for raising academic achievement, and improve the quality of their teachers.
The “Three R’s” bill is based on the policy recommendations by the Progressive Policy Institute:- Streamline our national education priorities into five goal-oriented titles, focused on:
- closing the
achievement gap between poor and more affluent children;
- helping to improve teacher quality;
- helping immigrant students master English and meet high standards in all subjects;
- promoting public school choice; and
- stimulating innovative local initiatives
- Create a tough new accountability system that pegs program funding to academic performance standards set by the states, and require “report cards” so that parents know how their school is performing;
- Reward states that exceed their standards with more flexibility and bonus funding, and for the first time ever, sanction those states that chronically fail to show improvements, by cutting administrative funds;
- Increase funding for disadvantaged students by 50%;
- Increase funding for teacher and principal professional development by more than 100%;
- Increase funding for immigrant students by $1 billion annually to improve English proficiency;
- Continue to reduce class size in the early grades.
Source: Senate New Democrat Coalition Press Release 01-SNDC5 on Jan 23, 2001