Bob Dole 1996 On the Issues
Where Bob Dole Stands on K-12 Education
Americans Are Spending More on Education and Getting Less
Bob Dole is a strong believer in America's public education system. He,
his wife and his daughter were educated in public schools. But today, too
many public schools have been taken over by an education monopoly that
fails to give our children the skills they need to compete in our global
economy.
Two out of every three 17-year-olds do not know that World War II was
fought sometime between 1900 and 1950, according to a study by the
National Assessment of Educational Progress. The study also reports that
20 percent of high school seniors are functionally illiterate.
Just throwing money at the problem is not the answer. In the past 30
years, per-pupil spending on education has doubled, yet average SAT scores
have dropped over 50 points.
Bob Dole Will Empower Low- and Middle-Income Parents With School
Choice
As President, Bob Dole will create Opportunity Scholarships for Children,
a federal, state and local effort to give four million low- and
middle-income families the ability to select the best schools for their
children.
- Opportunity
Scholarships for Children will be funded annually with $2.5 billion in
federal funds. Four-year competitive grants will be awarded to children
from low- and middle-income families in up to 15 states, including the
District of Columbia. States will match the federal contribution.
- Opportunity
Scholarships will be at least $1,000 for kindergarten and grade school
students and at least $1,500 for high school students. These
scholarships could be larger with the added support from non-federal
sources.
- Families can use these
scholarships to send their children to any lawfully operating school --
public, private or religious -- that chooses to participate. Scholarship
funds will be used to pay tuition, school fees and other reasonable
expenses.
- This program will help
fund scholarships for more than four million children -- nearly 10
percent of all children in elementary and secondary schools.
- This new $2.5
billion federal commitment to America's children is budget neutral and
will not increase the federal deficit. The funding offsets include
reducing the Department of Education overhead, bureaucracy and wasteful
spending.
Bill Clinton Fights for His Political
Supporters -- Not Our Children
Bill Clinton's opposes school choice because he puts the interests of
the educational establishment -- and of his party's political
contributors -- above the interests of our children. Clinton has
continually fought school choice because he and his Democratic
colleagues received $2.2 million from the movement's biggest opponent --
the National Education Association (NEA) -- during the 1992 campaign.
That is 17 times more money than they gave to Republicans.
In an address to the NEA before the election, Bill Clinton said that if
he became President, "you will be my partners. I won't [make] education
decisions that you're not a part of making. I won't forget the people
that brought me to the White House."
Since then, Bill Clinton has done everything in his power to kill the
school choice movement. Even when Bob Dole tried to pass a modest
school-choice bill for the District of Columbia to help low-income
families send their children to decent schools, Bill Clinton opposed it.
Meanwhile, he sends his daughter to one of the most expensive private
schools in Washington.
Bill Clinton is on the side of education's providers -- the teacher's
unions, the bureaucrats and everyone else who wants to fight for the
status quo. Bob Dole is on the side of education consumers -- the
parents and the children.
A Better America
In Bob Dole's America, low- and middle-income parents will be given a
real choice in education so that all American children have an equal
opportunity to achieve their dreams.
Source: Bob Dole 1996 Official Campaign Web Site |
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