Thank you for that introduction. It is an honor to be here in the beautifully restored Charles Sumner School.

I want to thank our presenters today for their tireless effort and dedication.

• Corinne Allen, Executive Director, Benwood Foundation.
• Michelle Rhee, President and CEO, New Teacher Project.
• Lew Solomon, Director, Teacher Advancement Program.

They each have contributed substantially to our understanding of the forces that must change if we are to provide universal, high quality education.

All of you bring an entrepreneurial spirit and creativity to our education system. And you continue to elevate the debate on how best to improve American education.

We gather today to discuss our common interest, education. It is a profession and a service. It is a job and a calling. It demands patience, sacrifice, commitment, and compassion. It is one of the most difficult tasks, yet one of the most rewarding.

I was in a classroom for many years. I know the joy and frustration of teaching. My parents were teachers. I greatly admired their work, so I became a teacher, too. And I admire anyone who teaches, because it is a noble, honored profession.

It is the link between the past and the future. Teachers have a front row seat to the future through the minds that we touch, enlighten, and inform. As a teacher you are called to muster equal amounts of compassion, courage, knowledge, wisdom, and humor.

I know that, at times, the task seems overwhelming and the accolades under-whelming. But our nation is greatly indebted to our teachers. I firmly believe that we wouldn't be a free people without our teaching profession.

Teachers stand at the vanguard of our efforts to create a more perfect union. They are the source of our society's greatness. I thank each of you for your work. The peace, prosperity, culture, and greatness of our country is a direct result of your efforts, and the foundational work of educators throughout our history.

I have spent most of my adult life as an educator or helping others to enter the profession. I've been a producer of teachers as the dean of the school of education. And I've been a consumer of teachers as superintendent of the Houston public schools. Now as the Secretary of Education, I still spend a considerable amount of my time educating. One of my jobs is to explain the revolution begun on January 8, 2002 with the signing of No Child Left Behind Act.

I have been asked by President Bush to make clear that No Child Left Behind will address the persistent achievement gap in American education. The President understands that quality education, like justice, must be equally available for all, or no one can fully partake of its benefits.

And he agrees with World War II General Omar Bradley, "Teachers are the real heroes of democracy. Others can defend it, but only teachers can make it work."

We are here today because our poor and minority students have a disproportionate share of new, unqualified or underqualified teachers. Poor districts are chronically under staffed and have alarming turnover rates. In other words, just as we have a student achievement gap, so too do we have a Teacher Quality Gap.

Research and reason tell us that the quality of a teacher is the most important component of how well students learn. If we're serious about closing the achievement gap-and we are-then we need to get serious about closing the teacher quality gap.

But how did we get here in the first place? Surely no one sat down to create a system in which our neediest students would get the least experienced, least qualified teachers. Yet, sadly, that's exactly what we have today.

We got here through misguided policies-policies that can be fixed, but only if we have the courage to fix them.

For example, policies that pay, place and promote teachers based on seniority-policies that provide no incentive for great teachers to stay in our neediest schools.

Michelle Rhee is with us here today. I'm sure she will be telling us about her organization's recent report that looked at why so many urban districts struggle to hire enough highly qualified teachers.

Michelle, I want to compliment you on this report. It is an important addition to the national debate on education. I don't want to steal too much of your thunder, and I won't. But I do want to mention a couple of its of its conclusions.

The report found that with smart, creative recruiting methods urban school districts can attract many highly qualified candidates-thousands and thousands of people willing to teach our neediest students. However, upwards of 60 percent of these candidates withdrew their application before they even entered the classroom.

Why? Because of delayed hiring timelines. Many qualified applicants were kept waiting, sometimes for months. When they were contacted it was not until late summer—after other, more aggressive, districts or employers made hiring decisions. Tragically, the candidates most likely to give up on the urban districts were the most qualified.

The result?

Hard-to-staff districts, usually urban, almost always poor, did not receive the high quality teachers they needed. Most likely, their students performed poorly because their teachers were ill equipped to handle the demands of their assignment. All those involved were placed in an impossible situation by a counterproductive hiring and placement system.

Not surprisingly many new teachers did not walk away; they ran away from the profession. And many professionals who wanted to make teaching a second career never made it to classrooms that could have benefited the most from their talent and innovation.

And why was it that these high-poverty districts weren't able to be quicker with their job offers? Was it bureaucracy or incompetence in their HR offices? Generally, no.

It was because the hiring timeline was designed to delay new job offers until late into the summer. Unfortunately, many union contracts allow teachers to wait until well into the spring to give notice to their principals that they aren't coming back the following year. Then, under seniority rules, experienced teachers get first dibs on openings.

Many teachers in high poverty schools understandably take advantage of this opportunity, fleeing their tougher schools for better working conditions across town. (Remember, they weren't getting paid anything extra to work with the neediest kids.) Only after the seniority transfers take place can districts offer jobs to new recruits. And then you're talking about July or August, and all too often you've lost the best candidates.

We can and must do better. We have a hiring and personnel system that seems more attuned to the needs of some adults, than the needs of all of our children..

The good news is that it's fixable. It's within the power of local school boards and superintendents to put in place policies that allow for the recruitment and retention of great teachers, especially in our neediest schools, policies that eliminate seniority transfers, that accelerate hiring timelines, and that provide real incentives to teachers to work in our neediest schools.

I applaud the work of the Benwood Foundation, and it's executive director Corinne Allen, which has provided the financial resources to do just that in Chattanooga's Public Schools. You show us that these issues can be placed on the table, and that we can indeed close the teacher quality gap.

There are other steps we can take. We can fully implement No Child Left Behind, which requires teachers to be appropriately trained. Each state will determine its own standards. Yet, this basic requirement is an important step forward. I know that teachers hate to be placed in a situation where they have to provide instruction in a subject they do not know. Teachers spend years of preparation in one subject, and then they are told to teach something else. It is frustrating.

Let me use stronger language, the language I often heard from my teaching colleagues…it is absurd…it is an outrage. The No Child Left Behind provisions on quality is designed to protect teachers and students. They provide stable, objective qualifications for hiring, and predictable expectations in both training and performance. They are a tool for your own protection.

The President and Congress have provided the resources to fully implement all of the provisions of No Child Left Behind. I am pleased that our fiscal commitment is the highest federal support in history. The Administration has provided record spending—the highest investment per child ever.

President Bush and the Congress have provided a $3 billion increase for Title I spending in the first two years following passage of No Child Left Behind. That is a 33 percent increase. The President sought an additional $1 billion for Title I in Fiscal Year 2004.

I know there are some who have severely criticized the law, but, in reality, it is one of the most positive, helpful, actions taken to assist teachers. It is a promise to all involved in the educational system. We will be guided by professionalism, quality, service, excellence, and performance. The accountability provisions will give us measurable results and the state will provide educational objectives. By making the system more public and accountable, we will make education itself more effective and more equitable.

The Department of Education stands ready to support local and state efforts to put these reforms into place. Our Teacher Assistance Corps continues to make visits to state capitals to help with implementation of the law.

Recent grants to The New Teacher Project, the American Board, and the National Center for Alternative Certification will promote exactly this kind of change. The FY 2004 budget proposes $4.5 billion for teacher-related programs and benefits, including $2.85 billion in state formula grants for teacher quality, almost $800 million in set asides for professional development in other state formula grant programs, and an additional half billion dollars in loan forgiveness and tax benefits for teachers.

Henry Brooks Adams once wrote that "A teacher affects eternity; he [or she] can never tell where his influence stops."

The President and I want our educational system to be the best in the world. I know you want that, too. It is possible, and No Child Left Behind gives us the direction and guidance to achieve that objective.

It will enable you to influence more students, help more students, and give to more students. It will help you become the finest teacher possible by providing you with the environment, expectations, predictability, and resources to become your best.

Of course, as with any revolutionary change, there has been some resistance. That just shows you how powerful the change, and how vital the results. This is a law we must implement to improve our educational system. It is an opportunity that must be seized.

I look forward to our partnership. Together, we can help millions of children receive the quality education they deserve.

Thank you.

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