Milwaukee, Wisconsin — I wanted to come here to thank you and the Alliance for your leadership and commitment to choice. And I wanted to talk about the future. Our work is just beginning. We must overcome traditions that continue to overlook, segregate, and cast aside African American, Hispanic, special needs, and low-income children. There is a great divide in American education, an achievement gap that is an emerging educational apartheid. We need your continued commitment and leadership to close the gap, and to elevate all students to a world-class education.

Choice is one important, profound tool for improving American education, to make it more inclusive, fair, and just. We must continue to present choice as a credible and successful possibility for educational reform because we know it works. There is considerable evidence that opportunity scholarships can make a positive difference. Competition changed the educational environment here in Milwaukee, as you know. We must make that evidence part of the national debate, and help policy-makers, parents, and teachers to obtain a clear, credible, and fair picture of choice.

Like you, I understand the frustration when things don't go as fast as we hope. The pace of educational reform remains slow now, after the formal end of segregation and the hope of Brown v. Board of Education 50 years ago. Many people remain indifferent and unmoved by the growing disparities in American education. The problems are still there to see: lack of educational achievement, the denial of educational opportunities, and the economic consequences that follow.

We must directly address the reasons for economic, political, and cultural alienation. We must heal division, not accept it. We must grow together as a nation, not grow separately. And we must become inclusive for all people, not just because it is the basis of our constitution, but because it is the right thing to do.

The best way to do all that—the single best way—is to make our schools more successful and equitable. It is to give our schools the resources they need, to demand that they educate all of our children, to place qualified teachers in every classroom, and to allow parents more educational options.

Of course, there are those who want us to remain passive, to accept the present educational system, and stay quiet. They want us to ignore the divisions that perpetuate racism and poverty, conveniently forget the future damage of a poor education, and remain silent as generation after generation of students are passed on and then passed out.

But we have found our voice. The Alliance is leading a chorus for reform. We will join together to call for reform, to overcome the special interests, customary traditions, and personal perks that sacrifice our children to mediocrity. We will fight for a quality education for all American children. This country was founded on democracy and choice. It is appropriate to give it to parents and their children.

I read with some interest a column by William Raspberry on Monday, March 1st, in the Washington Post. He spoke of how the Virginia State Legislature fought against Brown v. Board of Education and how one local entity, Prince Edward County, closed down their schools for five years rather than accept the end of segregation. Raspberry wrote of one student, John Hurt, who was seven years old when his school closed. Upon reopening five years later, he was older, but still had the reading skills of a first grader. He never caught up. Mr. Hurt said, "If they had cut off my leg, I could have learned to walk with just one. But to take my education—I can't even think about what I might have been if they hadn't done that."

That's right. A poor education robs you of your future—robs you of your imagination, your dreams, your hopes, and your pride. Poor education steals your life, replacing it with a shadow. That is why I was stunned when some members of Congress and some special interest groups vowed to do everything possible to stop the implementation of the D.C. Choice Program. They want to continue the education monopoly. They continue to fight against the very remedies, such as vouchers and charter schools, that are designed to move the "one-size-fits-all" public school system toward a system in which each child has an opportunity to succeed.

Their objections have been heard. It is now time to give way, to give more opportunity to those who need it.

When we last spoke together, an opportunity scholarship program in the District of Columbia was a dream, a possibility, a prayer. Now it is a reality and we must make it work.

Passage of D.C. Choice is a defining moment in American education, a milestone achievement. It is a recognition that old practices are not appropriate for many educational settings. It is a statement that students must not be chained to broken schools and unsatisfactory learning environments. It is a concession that opportunity scholarships may be the vehicle to best correct certain deficiencies in our elementary and secondary educational systems. And it is a hopeful step into the future, casting aside doubt and indecision to boldly adopt a new, progressive program for educational reform.

Specifically, one month and nine days ago, Congress passed the 2004 budget. Included was a $14 million effort known as the "D.C. Choice Incentive Program." As part of a larger appropriation to D.C. schools, which included additional funds for public and charter schools, D.C. Choice is a five-year, federally funded program to provide up to 1700 low-income students in the District with grants of up to $7,500 each to attend the school of their choice, be it private or religious. While there are opportunity scholarship programs already in states such as Florida, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Colorado, D.C.'s program is the first that would be federally funded. It is also the first that would be overseen by the United States Department of Education in partnership with the District of Columbia.

As you know, D.C. Major Tony Williams and I will jointly run the program. We have already signed a Memorandum of Understanding to that effect. The agreement outlines the selection mechanism for the independent body that will actually award the opportunity scholarships. We have invited applications through a notice in the Federal Register—we have already received one and hope to receive more before the competition closes today, March 5th. The notice set out the funding criteria, priorities, and procedures for selection, consistent with the congressional legislation.

Students participating in the program will no longer be chained to schools that do not meet their needs. It replaces rigid requirements that deny choice with real alternatives. No longer will politics and bureaucracy conspire to force students to stay in schools that are broken. Students who are under-educated no longer have to waste their time and youth in a school that does not work. Rather, with choice, participating students receive the education, freedom, respect, and regard they deserve. Parents receive fulfillment of the government's promise to educate. Taxpayers receive a better return for their investment.

We want D.C. Choice to be a model program for the nation. Of course, by themselves, opportunity scholarships will not solve every problem facing D.C. schools. The scholarships must be part of a larger set of reforms and adjustments. But this program will be in the spotlight. When we show it can work here, in this particular set of circumstances, opportunity scholarships may be considered a more viable and attractive option for other school districts.

The urgent need for educational reform exists in every community. This is just the beginning. We can't just sit and wait five years to see what happens here. Each community must feel a sense of urgency, candidly assess its needs, and find the best solutions for each individual situation.

The President and I are prepared to help other school districts explore the potential of opportunity scholarships. The President's 2005 budget includes an estimated $50 million for a "Choice Incentive Fund." The fund is designed to ensure parents have more choices for their children. The Fund will provide competitive awards to states, school districts and community-based non-profit organizations with a proven record of securing educational opportunities for children.

We must also make better use of the supplemental services funds under No Child Left Behind. These funds can help to quickly address the achievement gap, if they are used extensively and appropriately. I am hopeful that you will fully embrace these funds and encourage their use.

In my view, opportunity scholarships provide a workable, hopeful alternative to open private schools to low-income and minority students. For each of these students, this is educational emancipation. Opportunity scholarships can be the road to quality education and all that it means—personal growth, economic success, and a greater range of employment alternatives. For the students who get these scholarships, they have been handed the chance to overcome circumstance and situation. And by giving them this chance, one ripple effect may be improvement of American education. In answer to the despair voiced by so many, we will have found a solution that is inclusive, fair, respectful, and unifying.

We know what is at stake: the lives and the futures of children, who want to read, learn, study, grow, and live.

I see our work together as part of a long struggle for emancipation. I will end my remarks with those of a D.C. schoolteacher. The daughter of former slaves, her name was Mary Church Terrell. One hundred years ago, in 1904, she spoke about the intellectual progress of African American women and the profound importance of education. She asked that the schools be open to all people, regardless of gender or ethnicity or circumstance. She demanded that we all, in her words, "knock at the door of Justice and ask for an equal chance."

An equal chance can be given through choice. It is right and just to make choice available to students and parents. Some are overtly denied an education, like John Hurt. Others are covertly denied, millions of students, who are not given a chance or a choice. Let us end indifference and disregard, uniting our country through the power of knowledge, the moral equity of our institutions, and the inclusive message of our learning environment. That's is how this country will best provide educational, political, and cultural leadership for its citizens and for the rest of the world.

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