Webcast of the Secretary's speech.

Good afternoon. At the beginning of every school year, I have the good fortune to come to the National Press Club to give my "Back to School" address. I have been traveling from Georgia to the Pacific Northwest as part of my annual back to school push, and I can tell you that America's schools are overflowing with children. It is an exciting time for children and parents; but in too many cases our schools are overcrowded, wearing out and in desperate need of modernization.

As I noted in our annual report on the "baby-boom echo" which we released last week, we are once again breaking the national enrollment record. There are currently 52.7 million young people in school and more on the way. And in the next ten years we will need to recruit 2.2 million teachers to teach them.

This is why I believe that the education of our children should be this nation's number one national priority in this time of peace and prosperity. I also believe that this is the patriotic thing to do as well.

Like many of you I had the opportunity to see the movie, "Saving Private Ryan." It is a wonderful movie that acknowledges the sacrifice of a generation of Americans who did their duty in World War II. Tom Hanks plays Captain Miller, an English teacher, who does what he has to do, even at the risk of his own life. I believe that the new patriots of our time will be those Americans, young and old, who go into teaching to educate this generation of children.

And I will tell you this -- as I travel around the country, parents tell me again and again that they have very clear priorities about what we should be doing here in Washington. They want safe schools, our help in building new schools and modernizing old ones, smaller classes, and the assurance that there is a good teacher in every classroom. This is the nation's business and we need to get on with it.

If Congress is serious about getting dollars to the classrooms, I urge them to enact our legislation to modernize our schools and reduce class size by hiring 100,000 new teachers. Rearranging existing programs, which seems to be the intent of the Congress, does nothing to address the real challenges facing schools today. In addition, Congress should fully fund the President's initiatives in the Appropriations bill that they are now considering.

The focus of my speech is on what we must do to prepare the next generation of teachers and this is why I am releasing a report today entitled, "Promising Practices" which highlights new ways that we can improve teacher quality. This publication was developed following a national search for models of excellence that address the needs at every stage of a teacher's career.

In preparing my remarks I have had the good advice of three members of my staff -- two former National Teachers of the Year -- Terry Dozier and Mary Beth Blegen -- as well as that of Paul Schwarz, the former principal of a nationally recognized high school -- Central Park East in New York City. Like all good teachers Terry, Mary Beth and Paul have clear opinions about how we can improve American education. In other words, they do not mince words. So I won't either.

Missing the Mark in Recruiting New Teachers

We have more than a million veteran teachers on the verge of retiring. The first chart attached to my speech makes this point very vividly. By my reckoning, we are about five years away from a very dramatic change in our teaching force.

The vast majority of these experienced teachers who are about to retire are women. This, in fact, may be the last generation of women who went into teaching because there were limited opportunities in other fields. In 1998, women have many more career options -- and that is a very good thing for our nation. These new opportunities for women will require us, then, to work much, much harder to recruit and train a new generation of teachers.

Many people ask me whether we have a teacher shortage. My answer is yes. We face a shortage of high quality teachers. We are already seeing spot shortages developing in specific fields of expertise -- math, science, special education and bilingual education. The recent news that New York City recruited math teachers from Austria highlights this growing dynamic.

School districts usually find a way to put somebody in front of every classroom, and that is the problem. Too many school districts are sacrificing quality for quantity to meet the immediate demand of putting a warm body in front of a classroom. This is a mistake. Even now, too many school districts are issuing emergency licenses.

Many of these emergency teachers are dedicated and want to do their best. But I have heard about and read too many horror stories about provisional teachers who are teaching by the seat of their pants with no preparation and no guidance.

The coming wave of retirements has enormous implications in our continuing effort to raise standards, to develop successful recruitment strategies, and prepare new teachers. We also need to recognize that the teaching profession is dramatically changing -- the use of computers, teaching in teams, and the recognition that children learn in many different ways -- are just three of the many factors reshaping this demanding profession.

Three other dynamics also require our attention: the increasing diversity of our classrooms and the lack of diversity of our teaching force; the increasing number of special education children and Limited English Proficient (LEP) children in the regular classroom and teachers who lack the training to teach them; and the need for many more incentives to keep veteran teachers up-to- date and in the classroom.

What is Wrong with the System

The task is multi-dimensional. For example, too many teacher education programs are focused on theory and not enough on clinical experience.

Also, the current certification process is a cumbersome obstacle course that has little to do with excellence and much more to do with filling out paperwork.

And once a new teacher enters the classroom we allow a perverse "sink or swim" approach to define the first years in teaching. New teachers are usually assigned the most difficult classes in addition to all the extra-curricular activities that no one else wants to supervise. Then we wonder why we lose 22% of new teachers in the first three years -- and close to 50% in our urban areas.

This churning process and over-reliance on emergency teachers just doesn't cut it in my opinion. Imagine the outcry if a quarter of all new doctors left the profession after their first three years. This is why I encourage local school districts to develop some type of long-term induction or mentoring program to help new teachers stay in the profession.

Creating a National Partnership

Now a great deal of effort has gone into improving and supporting the teaching profession in the last decade. The National Commission on Teaching led by Governor Jim Hunt of North Carolina and Linda Darling Hammond has provided an excellent "road map" to improve the teaching profession. This is all to the good. But now we need to make things happen and go to a new level of intensity.

And I assure you -- we will place a very strong emphasis on teacher quality when we ask the Congress to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act next year. The bipartisan leaders of the Congressional education committee understand that need, and we will be working with them to shape that legislation.

Improving Recruitment

The Clinton Administration strongly supports the Feinstein-Boxer Amendment to the Higher Education Act that will provide Pell Grants for a fifth year to those college students who want to become teachers and need another year to meet state fifth year requirements. This is particularly important to the state of California which has the daunting task of recruiting 250,000 teachers in the next decade.

I am pleased that strong support is developing in the Congress for improvements in teacher education and standards. The Administration will continue to press the Congress to pass our proposal to recruit nearly 35,000 teachers over the next five years for underserved areas. As members meet today to advance this higher education legislation, I urge them to support our recruitment proposals.

This important piece of legislation will almost certainly include valuable new teacher loan forgiveness provisions that have been championed by Senator Kennedy.

I also urge Congress to fund the President's initiative to train new teachers in technology.

I support the creation of some type of national job bank to match teachers with districts with a growing shortage of quality teachers. There are wide regional variations in the need for teachers. We can do a lot to help get teachers in different parts of the country matched with school districts in other regions that are facing growing shortages.

At the same time, the increasing mobility of Americans is going to require states and school districts to take a serious look at the portability of teacher credentials, their years in service, and pensions. We do not need artificial shortages developing because states have not brought their policies up-to-date.

Our federal efforts to enlist millions of Americans to go into teaching can have an impact. Our best hope, however, is the strong encouragement of parents and grandparents whose lives have been touched by good teachers. I get distressed when I hear stories about parents discouraging their children from going into teaching. Teaching is about serving your country and being patriotic.

I also challenge the myth that teaching is only for those who can't cut it in other professions. Anyone who has ever spent an hour in a classroom full of demanding second graders or had the challenge of motivating a group of teenagers knows how difficult the job can be.

America's teachers are some of the most idealistic and patriotic Americans in this country. I am extremely proud of them. So many of them have entered teaching because they want to change the world and many of them do.

What are our other challenges?

Challenges to America's Higher Education Community

First, colleges of education should give basic skills tests to students entering teacher education programs prior to their acceptance and at the same time hold themselves more accountable for their graduates. This is why I endorse the thrust for accountability by Senator Bingaman and Representative George Miller.

Second, stronger links must be developed between our colleges of arts and sciences and colleges of education. Future teachers should major in the subject they want to teach, and that type of course work takes place in the colleges of arts and sciences.

Third, I urge teacher prep programs to put a much stronger focus on giving future teachers rigorous grounding in developing the skills they need to teach. It is harder than you think. Knowing your content is not enough. There is a skill and a craft to it all, and that is especially true when it comes to teaching reading. This is why I believe that every teacher who is seeking a certificate in elementary education should have solid preparation in reading.

One of the major aspects of the reading bill now up in the Congress is strong support for increased professional development for reading. I support this effort and ask the Congress to pass this needed legislation. We will never raise standards if we just stay with the status quo when it comes to improving literacy.

Fourth, colleges of education need to recognize that our special education and LEP populations are growing and deserve much more of their attention as they prepare teachers.

Finally, I urge colleges and universities to develop much stronger links with local schools. The El Paso school district, which we feature in our report "Promising Practices," has dramatically improved its test scores by working hand-in-hand with the University of Texas in El Paso to improve teacher education.

Challenges to State Government and Local School Districts

This is why I challenge every state to create a demanding but flexible certification process. Becoming a teacher should not be an endurance test that requires future teachers to overcome a bureaucratic maze of hoops and paperwork.

I believe a much stronger focus should be placed on assessing the knowledge and skills of future teachers however they got them. This is why I support rigorous alternative pathways to teaching which can be so helpful in recruiting mid-career professionals to the teaching profession.

I challenge every state to eliminate the practice of granting emergency licenses within the next five years. You cannot set standards and then immediately discard them when the need for another warm body arises. New York State has taken the lead in doing away with emergency licenses and other states should follow this good example.

At the same time, we cannot challenge high poverty schools to raise their standards and then shortchange them by doing nothing to help them recruit the best teachers. This is why we are pushing the Congress to pass our strong teacher recruitment initiative. At the same time, our nation's urban areas have to do their part as well. Outdated hiring practices sometimes seem to be the reason that they are losing good candidates for teaching positions to suburban school districts.

State and local school districts must also end the practice of teaching "out of field." (Over 30% of all math teachers, for example, are now teaching out of field.) I believe that every teacher, at a minimum, should have a minor in the subject that they teach.

I cannot even begin to tell you how baffled foreign education ministers are who visit me when I explain our unusual habit of allowing teachers to teach "out of field."

Incentives for Veteran Teachers

We are developing more and more evidence that school districts that invest in quality professional development for their teachers see positive results in the classroom. The good work of Tony Alvarado in District 2 in New York City, who made sure learning new skills was an everyday experience for his teachers is a wonderful national model.

We need other incentives as well. The current system of providing salary increases for credits earned seems flawed. There is often no connection between the credits earned by a teacher and what he or she actually teaches in the classroom. And, there is little incentive to encourage teachers to gain more knowledge or improve specific skills for their classrooms. Excellence, in a word, is not rewarded.

Only 14 states, for example, currently provide salary supplements to those teachers who set out to become master teachers through the National Board Certification process. As a result many of the best teachers leave the classroom to get a bigger paycheck as a school administrator.

teachers leave the classroom to get a bigger paycheck as a school administrator.

This is why I ask states and local school districts to take a good look at a new and developing concept called "knowledge and skill-based pay." Put simply, teachers are paid extra for new skills and knowledge they acquire. Teachers under this system get rewarded for specific skills and knowledge that help a school reach its own established goals.

Now, a word about teacher salaries. As I have said many times before, we cannot expect to get good teachers on the cheap. Mary Beth Blegen, the national teacher of the year in 1996, was being paid a $36,000 salary with 30 years of experience -- a fraction of what she deserved -- and what other professionals expect after years in service.

If we are going to entice more Americans to enter teaching we need to offer them fair and competitive salaries. And, if we are going to ask teachers to meet new and demanding standards we also need to pay them for their effort.

States like Connecticut and North Carolina have had the good sense to raise standards for teachers and raise salaries at the same time. The results in the classroom are promising. I believe every state would be wise to follow their good example.

If we really want to recruit and retain good teachers we need to let them teach in first class school buildings. What kind of message do we send our children and our teachers when we ask them to go to a run down school building just a mile down the road from an immaculate prison? President Clinton has proposed a very strong school construction initiative. Congress needs to get off the dime and pass it.

In this speech, I have challenged many different groups to come forward and join a national partnership for excellence in teaching. It seems appropriate to end my remarks by taking a moment to talk to America's teachers. You are the heart and soul of the renaissance of American education. As I travel throughout the country, I have the opportunity to meet many of you. Each time I am struck by how important, yet how difficult, your job is.

As teachers, you are being asked to know more and do more than ever before. Please continue your good work and go out of your way to recruit new teachers. Let others know the joy you get from teaching. Help the struggling teacher to improve -- and help to counsel out of the profession those who cannot. And make the effort to measure yourselves against the best.

I end now with a quote from an old friend of mine from South Carolina, the writer Pat Conroy. This quote is from his novel Prince of Tides. In this passage, Tom, a teacher who is the main character of the book is asked why he chose to "sell himself short" when he was so talented and could have done anything in his life.

Tom's reply goes like this, " There's no word in the language that I revere more than "teacher." None. "My heart sings" he says, "when a kid refers to me as his teacher and it always has. I've honored myself and the entire family of man by becoming a teacher."

With that I thank all teachers on behalf of the American people. Thank you.

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