June 21, 2002

We are here, on the first day of summer, to discuss the critical issue of how summer school helps our neediest children to reach their potential, and the impact on those children of budget cuts that will slash their summer school opportunities.

Without summer activities to keep their reading and math skills sharp, students start school in the fall about a month behind where they finished in the spring - that's the "summer slide."

The summer slide in math is about the same for low-income students as for others, but it is steeper in reading for low-income students, because they don't have the same access to books and reading opportunities as students from better-off families.

As we will hear from one of our witnesses, some researchers have concluded that if you combine the achievement gap that exists when low-income children start kindergarten with the cumulative effect of the summer slide over the years, you'll account for virtually all of the achievement gap at the end of high school.

Congress and the President spent virtually all of last year writing the bipartisan No Child Left Behind Act, which holds schools accountable for closing that gap and for all students performing at a high level. Senator Gregg and I, in particular, worked together to reauthorize the 21st Century Community Learning Centers.

But, more than schools need to be accountable. We and the President need to be accountable, too.

Promising to leave no child behind means that we have to provide the resources so that all children, at all ages, get the support they need to reach their potential - winter, spring, summer, and fall.

Unfortunately, because of the economy, states and cities around the country are cutting billions of dollars from education, including summer school.

Washington, D.C. has eliminated 12,000 slots. Hillsborough County, Florida, which includes Tampa, has cut out summer school altogether, and Portland, Oregon has eliminated summer school for elementary school students. These are just a few examples.

But, only one month after signing the No Child Left Behind Act, with schools around the country in dire financial straits, the President proposed to cut funding for education reforms, including freezing funding for 21st Century Community Learning Centers, which would mean that 30,000 fewer students would benefit from the program, and serving only 40 percent of low-income students under Title I.

That's not the kind of accountability our children need and deserve.

The President has said from the beginning that education is his top domestic priority, and I applaud him for that. But, while talk is cheap, quality education is not.

Providing enough resources for education shouldn't be a choice.

We don't - and we shouldn't - say that "We'd like to do more about national security, but times are tough." And we can't accept that argument for education, either.

Unfortunately, the priorities in the President's budget are geared more toward tax cuts for the top 1 percent of taxpayers than toward helping children and families in need.

We must provide schools with the resources they need to meet the goals that we set in last year's reforms, including improving the quality and accessibility of summer school, so that children can benefit from educational activities year-round.

We must do more to improve the quality and accessibility of early childhood education, so that low-income children reach kindergarten more ready to learn.

And we must do more to improve family literacy and public libraries, so that low-income children's homes and neighborhoods become more conducive to learning. Senator Reed, especially, has been a leader in improving our libraries.

Finally, on top of everything else, summer school serves non-academic purposes as well. It gives children a safe, productive alternative to the streets. A gang counselor said recently that this summer's cuts are going to make recruiting easier for gangs because thousands of students will have no place to go when the school-year ends.

Summer school cuts also will cause trouble for low-income working parents. A Washington, D.C. Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner said that in part because of the cuts, many of her constituents who don't have adequate child-care arrangements will risk losing their jobs, their ability to keep food on the table, and even their homes.

These may not be the primary purposes of summer school, but if we don't make sure that students have summer opportunities, we're going to have to deal with the serious consequences, academic and otherwise.

So, I thank our witnesses for coming today, and I look forward to their testimony.

Multimedia:
View photos from the hearing