Education:

It is a testament to the families of rural Nebraska that our rural elementary and secondary schools remain some of the best performing schools in the nation. Math and writing scores have improved steadily since 1990, while much of the nation has watched their scores fall. Nebraska ACT college entrance examination scores place it in the top four among the 25 states that rely on the ACT as the primary college entrance exam.

Many of our best schools are located in rural parts of the 3rd District. According to research done by the Nebraska Alliance for Rural Education, Nebraskan high schools with less than 70 students have an average graduation rate of 97 percent, while those with 10,000 students of more graduate just 84 percent of their students.

Nebraska has 246 school districts with less than 600 students and sixty-three districts with less than 70 students. I believe we should celebrate these schools, not cut their budgets, or threaten to toss them into larger, lower-performing districts. It would be an incredibly tragic thing to dissolve some of our best schools, and in the process undermine the very identity and independence of some of Nebraska's proudest communities, all because of short-term budget pressures. The budget pressures are real, it is true. But what I would like to propose is this: Let's get a federal government that doesn't boil down education policy into a crusade to punish struggling schools. Let's have a federal government that rewards high performing schools by giving them the financial support they urgently need to maintain the strength of their programs.

In some of our fastest growing cities - Grand Island, for example - population growth is quickly pushing school districts to the limits of their resources. Classroom space is insufficient, and student-to-teacher ratios are getting worse. And instead of increasing school spending in this state, we've been decreasing it. Per-pupil spending has declined 6 percent in Nebraska since 2001. Nebraska ranks 41st among the 50 states in per pupil revenue raised for public education.

If we don't deal with this situation now, by making the necessary investments in modernization of these schools, we could begin to see the erosion in quality that has afflicted larger cities around the country. We cannot let that happen. In the era of globalization, a strong public education system is the greatest competitive advantage we have.

We must have greater fiscal discipline at the local, state and federal levels if we are going to ensure that schools are given the resources they need. It is my belief, for example, that the federal government would have been able to fully fund No Child Left Behind had Congress not been so determined to run up the greatest deficit in our nation's history. As it stands, the budget for 2006 provides $12 billion less than was promised by the No Child Left Behind Act.

We need investment to keep class sizes small, and to ensure that our schools can recruit and retain some of the best teachers in the country. But it doesn't stop there. We have to make sure that our high school graduates are not just college ready, but college bound. According to U.S. Census Department data for Nebraska's 3rd District, nearly 85 percent of residents over the age of 25 have a high school degree or higher, compared to 80.4 percent nationwide. But only 17.1 percent of 3rd District residents over 25 possess a four-year college degree, compared to 24.4 percent nationwide. In the age of globalization, this is a very serious deficit. Studies have shown that each additional year of post-secondary education increases a person's income by 5 to 15%. Over a lifetime, a person with a college degree can expect to earn almost to $1 million more than those who only have a high school diploma.

We must increase federal funding for tax credits and scholarship programs that enable economically disadvantaged youth to afford four years of college. The last four years have seen no increase for the Pell Grant program, which provides scholarship support to 5 million American undergraduates. A Pell Grant now funds less than 40 percent of the cost of a public university, compared to 84 percent when the program was founded in the 1970's.

An investment in our young people is an investment in the future.

There is a way. It is up to us to summon the will.