Senator Elizabeth Warren's Statement on the Every Child Achieves Act Vote
United States Senator Elizabeth Warren released the following statement today:
"The first version of ESEA was a landmark Civil Rights law. In the 1960s, the American people, through the federal government, committed to improving educational opportunity for children living in poverty, children of color, children with disabilities, and other groups of kids who had been underserved, mistreated, or outright ignored by public schools. Today's bill does not live up to that powerful legacy.
"In many ways, this bill represents a significant improvement in federal education policy, moving away from rigid standardized tests and respecting the vital work that our teachers do every day--and I strongly support those changes. But this bill is also about money, and it eliminates basic, fundamental safeguards to ensure that federal dollars are actually used to improve both schools and educational outcomes for those students who are often ignored.
"I supported this bill in Committee on the promise that it would improve, but over the past two weeks, Republicans have blocked every attempt to establish even minimum safeguards to ensure that money would be used effectively. I am deeply concerned that billions in taxpayer dollars will not actually reach those schools and students who need them the most, and I cannot support this legislation until this critical issue is meaningfully addressed."
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