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�A Bridge over the Mississippi
Keynote Speech Delivered by Hillary Rodbam' Clinton
Second Annual Urban Education Symposium'
Memphis State University
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January 24, 1990
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I am very pleased to be here and,bepan of this collaboration betwee~ Memphis State'University and
Goals for Memphis and the ,lar~er educatio!1 and business co~unity. as well as the parents and student
who are hopeful for the results of such a symposium. I appreciate that much too kind introduction and I
hasten to add that I was not the drily ArkansaS lawyer on the list There weren't very many Tennessee
lawyers on the list. but there were lots of Arkansas lawyers: I couldn't resist. I'tnsorry.'
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This is a real opportUnity for me and what I would like to ddthis evening is cover quite a bit of groun
in as oointed and focused way. as I can. and then to have' an opportunity, for some conversation with son
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, The issue' of urban education and the challenges it poses far all our communities. is one that has to be
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approached with a continuing sense of the challenge it presents. I don't think th~ is any. one answer. : ,
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don't think there is any answer· that will remain an answer for an indefinit~ period of time.. We are.living ,
in a changing environment and the challenge to us is to learn what we can from our paSt. and our values
but apply it in, the dynamic. changing environment w~ fmd today. So what we ri~ed to be doing is askin
ourselves all the time. every singleday~ "What can we 40 better to educate our children? And'what
panicularly can we do ,better to help those families who are unable themselves to be advocates for their
own children!s educatiol,l. health and well being?" And'because that question has to be asked'every day
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I stu't with a position that asks all of us to challenge ~e established order wherever we find it We have
to be willing to ask ourselves. whether we arc the dean of a college of education. or the chair Of the boar
of a large cOfporaoon, or the principal of a school. or a citizen concerned about the furore of Memphis.
"What can we do better?" And we,have to be willing to take hard look at ourselves as well as others to
come up with some answers. And then we have to continue to evaluate what we are doing.
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Let me say at the O~ltset that one of the biggest challenges we face is the inherent contradiction that is '
presented by the education system to itSelf. 'By that I mean that the education system has been designed
to perpem~lte 'and pass on the learning. the wisdom. the values of the past That is what it is designed to
do. It is based on a Inodei that arose from an industrializing America. You can see that from the way thl
sC.hool year is broken up~ with three months off each year because that is when children had to be out
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working in the fields. You can see it in the hours that are spent You can see it in the waY'most s=hools
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�. . are still organized on a faacry model. with a principal and a hiera:rchicalline of authority coming down.
The education system was established to provide this kind of model and transmit those values. And yet
what we are. saying now. is that we have to rethink how we deliver education. not just to the poor children
among us but to all of 0UI" children.
Imagine if you will what it is like to be an educator today, especially, a veteran educator who has seen
fads come and go, has seen conventional wisdom change as some researcher has come up with yet
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another new idea, and has surViVed largely by just staying the course that had been taught by the college
of education,based on the expCrience of the past. And then to know that there are all k::i.nds of symposia
like this going on all over the U.S. saying, "You have to do things differently_ What we are doing isnOI
working." So. there is an inherent tension in what we are about uXLay, and that tension is good and it's
healthy. as long as we use ino create positive energy.. So at the outset let me just acknowledge that· thai
we need to talk ~ut what needs to be done with education.- And it's not just education .that needs to
change the way it docs its business. All sectors ofour society are in the midst of great change and
challenge. and it is a mistake to single out education and triakc it separate, from what is going ~>n in the
family, the workplace and the political system. All ofthat is part of a whole. and has to be seen as
imercoMected. But we are focusing a lot of OUI" attention on education because we believe that it is
. through education that we will be able to ameliorate the effectS of a lot of what is going on in the family
and in the larger society, and that if we get a better result from our education system many of our other
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problems will take care of themselves. So although we want to focus on education' tonight. we need to
.see it as pan of a whole. We need to recognize that we have asked it to do one thing traditionally. and
that we are now asking it to free itself in m~y ways from its ~ons. and go about the business of '
teaching y~ung people in a time of rapid change, using new idea5J.newapproaches, or applying and
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having the freedom to apply ol~ ones. And that there is that contradiction. .
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It hel~ me when I think about the challenges to urban education to think about a child. And let's fOI
,few minutes think about that child and particularly let's think about the many th,?usandsand thousands (
poor children in your state and inine.today. BeCause we have to recognize that we cannot iI,nprove the
education system without taking a look at the ~ntil'e environment of the children who are the subjects of
So lefs think about a child. from before binh through school. And there arC some very specific issues
that have to be addressed that directly relate to what kind of education system we. are going to have.
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Very briefly; what kind of prenatal care docs the pregnant mother receive? What kind of suppon is s'
given for the medical and other need.sthat she pas, particularly if she is a teenager, if she never graduat~
from high schOQl. if she is on a job thai provides no health insurance, if she has no husband to assist ht
in this process. What kind of help do we give her? Some people might say, "What docs that have to dl
with education?" We begin the process ofeducaring young children in our counay at approximately the
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�rlith year. More than 50% of the learning that any of us will ever acquire happens by the time we are
five. The acquisition of language, the ability to begin to think critically. learning motor skills (which w
ma~ not remember how difficult that was unle~s we again ~ a year-old child trying to master thar);Iht
J.IIlountof learning that takes place in those first five yearS will determine to a large extent what kind of
,capaCity and opportunities that young child w~ be able tritake advantage of. And yes. we may be able
do ~mediation. and we may be able to do intensive work. but the health and wellbeing of thar child up
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the first day of entry int9 school will be a critical factor in how successful our education system is.
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So I suggest that those of us-th'at are concerned about education think about the very beginning of tru
child's life, and we need to do better than we do in am country, in Memphis. in Ark3nsas, in ensuring
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that as many children 'as we are able to reach are born as healthy as they can be. And we don't do that
right now., Neither your S:::l.te nor mine, provides enough of a safety net for poor mothers. In this
.country as a whole we rank 19th in infant mortality, and for black children it's an even higher number.
and so we lose a lot of babies. And then those We don't lose who are born premature, born with other
kinds 'of preventable problems, often again to'the teenage mOther. cost us not only a lot of money, but
::Usa are themselves burdened . ' from tbebeginning of their life. During the first yea: of Iii
with problems
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we don't have in our country a comprehensive public health system that ensures that the kind of,
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well-baby care that every child needs isprovided or required., We have
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dc:crcase in the
percentage of our immunizations for young children. :We are beginning to fall behind much less
developed countries. Weare not producing the serums for the, immunizations; ,We are not staffing our
public health facilities. We are not doing the outreach. We are beginning to see the results of
mini-epidemics in the inner cities of things like measles, which can carry a great cost for young children
So the whole health care system provides us, if you want to be crass aboutit. with the raw material that
walks into the doors of our schools.
In addition to that is what happens in the' home to help prepare and stimUlate the young child to be
.ready for schooL Our country and South Africa are the only industrialized nations in. the world without
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:my kind of comprehensive system of childcare. Weare still debating whether its propcrwhen we have
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52% of the mothers of children under the age of one in the workforce. And we have a patchwork: 'of
. childcare that not only interferes with those mothers' productivity, but I believe interferes in many
instances, because of the lack of quality care, with the development of the children. We have no system
of parental ~r maternity leave that gives wori:::ing mothers the support they need to feel comfortable aboul
ma..kiOg a commitment to their young children. If we compare am parenting policies in the workplace
with those available in our industrialized competitors around the globe, we seem to put less actual value
on the act of parenting than any other ~ despite our rhetoric. despite the political talk about who can be
more pro-family than the next politician. When it com~ to either govc:mment or corporate policies. we
don't put our monev, or our time or our commitment where our mouths are.
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�So we put our families. particularly single parents. in an impossible bind from the moment they have
whaI should be a joyous event in their lives. They begin to worry about how will they c~ for this chile
especially if they have to get back to work: in two weeks. or four weeks. or six weeks. Most infant care
, is han::!. to fInd and most which is available does not really want to take children under six months. So
we. from the very beginning create this tension in our homes., Now. many people say we could solve
thaI real easily. if mothers would just go back to being full time mothers.. And I think that more women
would at least take more time to be full time mothers if: 1) they were not the sole support of their childre
and themselves at a cenain point in their lives; 2) they believed thatthelr commitment to mothering wou]
be valued and validated by the larger society; and 3) they believed they would not be penalized
economically if they stepped off the wage earning or career track long enough to commit themselves to
their children. But the message from this society. day in and day out as evidenced by workplace policie
and government policies, is :that yes, we think it's important to parent, but do it on your own time.
So what we are left with. from the beginning of a child~s experience. is this ambivalence that we have
created in this society about the imponance of parenting. And we can hold a million conferences about
how important it is to be a parent but the message that comes through loud and clear day in and day out i
that you can't afford to do it economically. you don't get validated for it emotionally or psychologically.
and if you are l,ucky enough to be able to afford to stay at home. you ju~t better hope you don't get
divorced. That's what we are dealing With.
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So when we talk about what we need to do about education. we have to think about health and we
have to think about what is really going on in the homes and families of this country right now. And
what is going on is a tremendous amount of stress over the responsibilities of parenting. And that Stres~
is clearly documented when one looks at the kind of outcomes that we see in very young children. in the
research that we are now collecting about what is happening to them in their lives. And the stress is
, elevated the poorer the family is, because the poOrer the family isrthe least likely they are able ,to be able'
afford fmancially or summon up psY,9t1010gically the resources to deal with the Stresses they are under ir
teday's world.
One other issue I thirik we need to address ,is economics. Uyou look at what has happened in the las
ten years in our country. in the midsrof one of the most phenomenal periods of employment and job
growth. you can see a very clear income differentiation occUrring in oUr country. 'The people who are
. well educated. those of us in this room. those of us with at least ~me years of college, or maybe a
college degree and beyoncL have done quite well. thank you, in th~ last decade. We ~ among the fort)
.. percent or so of Americans whose incomes have risen and who have 'not been hurt by changes in the tax
laws. Forry percent of other Americans, however. primarily those with a high school degree or less.
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�,have had a CUt that amc:>WllS to about. 'depending on their level of education~. ten to forty percent of their
real income. So that 40% of Americans in the last ten years have had a declille ~ their income.. and 20%
. have sort of held on..So you've gOt 60% who have .not done 'better eCo~omically. That's even with their .
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. pursuing strategies such as postpOning childicaring, having smaller families, and having both the
husband and wife go to work: • because it ~s two service sector jobs to make up for one lost
. manufa~g job.
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Inflation hasn't stood. still It's been creeping slowly, hickilynot the way it was in the late 70's but it
still is taking a bite. Certain costs such as medical care have skyrocketed. The bOttom line for many
families is that economically they are just barely hanging on. And'the people thaI impacts on the most are
young families with minimal education (high school) and poor families, primarily female head-of
household families. so that economically, at"thetimewh~n all of this Stress is pccurring. when services
are riot reaching out and able to take care of ~ lot of their ne«is, whether it's child care or health care,
economically a lot of these families flria themselves less financially able to go out and buy what they
might need in the ma:r:K:etplace. So there is a tremendous amount of economic pressure on lower middle
class arid below working families, and the'p06r . p f course, as always, fcel the brunt of it.·
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So if you loo~ at a broad set ofissues such as these. you then can begin to say to yourself. "What car:
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we do to try. to ameliorate the effec~
of those trends and circumstances, so that the children whom we
have in the schools are better prepared to take advantage of what goes on inside the schools?" That is on
"/ big set of issues. The second big set is: whaI does the ~hoot'need ~do a ~tter jo~ with whateve
child they get? But let's just finish on this flist set for a minute., Improved access to health care and
better outreach. better enforcement of child support. better'corporate policies in the workplace that
encourage parenting whether ifs something as simple as giving rime off to go to student teacher
conferences, 'providing medical benefits for all workers, providing parental leave, whatever it might ~
acrually suppo~g the responsibility of parenting~ Better access to qUality child care and specific'
programs that try to help overcome whatever dis3dvantages children ~ poor. fairly unedUCaIed families
might have. And with these protium: it is important to recognize that we have two targets. One target is
the 'child.· 'What can we do for this child? The second target is.the family. Wbat does it need?, Wbat can
we do to help change the attitude towaros education? What can we do to motivate the family to help' the
child?
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I want to talk briefly about a program ~t will be discussed in more de.pth tomorriJw because it
symbolizes this approach that I think we have tO'adopt strategically. And that is the HIPPy program..
'which stands for Home Instruction Program for Preschool Youngsters. -It's a program that I flI'St learne!
about in 1985. from reading about it in the newspaper. What inttigued me about it is that it was a
.. prograri::l.created in Israel. .in'response to a very real need. Israel in the late '60's began to have an influx
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�of Jewish immigrants from Nonh African countries, many of whom came from very depressed
circumstances, were uneciticas:ed, had lived a Vf!fY traditional.. a.l.rJ:x>st biblical, life and were seeking their
. religious homela.Dd. The children of these immi1;l'3.Dts were placed into the programs that Israel had..
because they provide nearly universal childcare, available to most preschool children. ,And they were
given health c3rc: and a lot of those things that I advocate that we need to give to our children. But they
were still not periorming well academically. so that when they moved into the early grades in the Israeli '
schools. they JUSt weren't doing well. They came from families that might not have spoken Hebrew or
any English. They came from families where the parents were uneducated. and somehow the work JUSt
on the child wasn't doing what the Israeli educators thought needed to be done.
So some researchers at Hebrew University devised a program aimed at changing the dynamic within
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the family by working with the mother, and enabling that mother to work with her own child. It's a
highly Smlctured program. Paraprofessionals from the community are hired and trained. They then take
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very Smlctured lesson plans out to work: with the mother in a role-playing way, so that the mother is
, asked to act like the child and the paraprofessional acts like the. mother and they go through the class for
the day -five to ten classes for one or two weeks. ,The mother is asked to commit fifteen minutes each
day to her child. That may not sound like a lot to you, ,but the average American mother spends about
eleven minutes a day ta.1.kiIlg to her child. The avcr.ige American father. if he is available. spends maybe
five,and the average child watches six and one-half to seven hotn"S of TV per day. So fIfteen minutes
may not sound like a lot but.. in terms of acrually interacting between mother and child. it is above the
current norm in our society.
What the'Israelis found is that as the mother's self esteem and interest in education rose. so did the
child's. Why should that be such a surprise? Yet we have to keep learning that over and over. again. '
And in this country we have to learn it over and over again.. So when I decided that I wanted to do that if.
, Arkansas.. because I viewed what was happening with the mother as key to the sustaining of interest in
education among the children, we began to implement the program in Arl::ansas. It is now operating in 2~
counties, in many different fonlls. some sponsored by schools, some by Head Stan programs, some by
community action groups~ But the message is all the same, and that is the educators reach out to the
parent and say, "We believe you are an important pan of your child's education- And the result for us,
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as in Israel, has been thar mothers have ,gone back to school. they've gonen jobs, theyve gotten .off of
Welfare. They have gonen their GED's. Some have even stancd to go to college, Vo-Tech schools. or
community colleges. ,And what they report to us is that they never knew they had anything to teach their
children before.
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Now, what is it they teach in these little lessons? They teach things that you and I, coming from the
f3.mili.es we came from, were taught without anybody knowing they were teaching it The lessons are
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�,very simple ones and can be done with whateVer is found in the house. The mother is told to get a knif(
, a fork and a spoon, to hold them up to the child and say, "Are these' the ~e or are they different?" Tnl
.I mother is told to g~the T.V. and turn it up and-doWn on the voiume,imd to say "Is it louder or is it ,
softer?" What that does is lay the groundwork for not only more critical, analytical thinking but the
ability to make differentiations and to be more comfortable with ;he, use of language. Because what yO!
will find in many poor hornes OuI country. as they found, in Israel. or you can find anywhere this
world, is there is not much l'¥lguagegoing on between the adults and the children.
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I have been. as many of'you have been, in and out of housing' projeCts and snlan rural homesteads,
and talked to people who lived in cars. and in nearly any other kind of serr.ing. And I have been sll'Uck
'over and over again, when, I ask a simple question of the mothCr'. wh,o is clearly doing the beSt she can I
care for this child, "Do you talk to your baby?" ~d the respOnse has been, ''Talk to him? WIly should
talk to him? He's just a baby." When you can't ,yet understand that one, of your main jobs as a parent j
[0 model'1anguage; is it any wonder that so'tria.ny of our young chlldren today don't have adequate
language skills? So these simple little lessons that we just did as a matter of course, or were done to us,
and for us, is what so many paren~ in our society right now need. '
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The great irony' of liVing in a culture likeouriwhich is saturated by the television and the mass medi:
is that it has in my vIew. and I have nO,research for this. but in my view having that television set on in
,many homes tWenty-four hours a day has severely diminished whatever conversation ever did take plael
'in homes like that. and has made the acquisition of language a one-way stn'!et. strictly aural, passive.
People don't need to talk'to one another because th~ T.V. is talking rothem. One oCthe biggest probler.
we:ve gOt with many of our youngsters coming in,particularly from disadvantaged backgrounds. is the
inability to think and articulate well en~)Ugh to'be able to take advantage of what is offered to them. So j
commend to rou programs like the HIPPY program. which try to help deal with the family environmen
and do what it can to help suppon that and change it to be more 'motivating for the child's education.
Well. there are Ql3.lly other things: that need to goon in those preschool years if they are really to give
all children the chance that you and I want for'o~'own. Let's talk: now aoout what needs to go on in thl
schooL One of the things is that the sChool has to become more of a center for coordinating and
delivering services in addition to educational serviCes that disadvantaged children particularly need.
When I was wori:.:ing on the education standards in Arkansas. we had hearings in all 75 counties. but th
we had two days of hearings with groups of educators. The top request from elementary school teache]
in our state was for eleIIlCntary school cOunselors. The teachers believed that they were deluged with th
health. and social. and economic problems of their students, and they couldn't do what they needed to c
for all of those students with all of those needs. And so, we did, we required elementary school
counselors. And it's one of those things that I'm most pleased about doing, because we now have at
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�least. where it worXs, somelx>dy in each elementary school responsible for, helping to get the services that
every child who is in need requires.
But school is going to have'tO be even more open to thaL'And the lines between professionals, arid. the
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turfs and the jurisdiction banles that go on betWeen social welfare workers who were trained one way,
and medical personnel who were trained another way, and educators who were trained another way have
gOt to stop and there has to be a
open and flexible understanding about how to cut throughthe red "
tape and the bureaucracy to deliver servi~s in a ~ated coherent Way to children and families. rr I
hear one more educator complain to me about social workers, and doctors with their medical models, and
one more social worker complain to me about educators with their view about what's appropriate'
le~ingt I don't know what rm going to do. You may read about it in, the newspaper. My response is
that you are the adults in this situation, you are the profe'ssionals. you figure out how to work: together.
You stan breaking down the barriers that prevent youfrnm delivering services across those artificial
lines. In every community, the school district, the social welfare agency, the public health people. the
local, hospital shottid have a wOIting group which comes together periodically andthe kind of
questions that I said to, you early at the beginning: 'What are we doing to help our children?" "How can
we help our schools do a bettc:r job?" 'What can the school do for us?" We should begin to implement
some of those great ideas that once they're laid out on the table seem to go nowhere. and we need to see
the ,school as more of a delivery site.
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We also need to figure out why it is. in my experience. most educators are'reluctant to implement or IT:
proven' new ideas if they worked somewhere else. I have had countless conversations with principals ane
superintendents and school board members about models'that work well for disadvanraged children and
asked
don't you do it in your school. in your district?'~ And invariably I get a response something'
on the order of either. "Well it's only work:ed. for a couple of years: it will probably fail." or "You know
we are nOl real happy about taking ideas from those people: we kind of like to think about what is right
for our kids beca~se. you know, our kids are different from those kids." And sometimes we hear. "Well.
you know. they are claiming that works. but fm sure that they are lying about it and we don't want to ge
caught in thaL" And my response is: "Well if you don't like that model go find another one!"
"Why
We have a little school district in east Arkansascal1ed Bald Knob. that'S its real name Bald Knob. ana
its superintendent decided a few years ago that they had to be able to be doing a better job with their
Chapter One and their Special Ed. and their LD kids than they were. So' he called up the State Deparaner. '
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and he said. "I want a Federal Waiver so that I can put back: into the classroom my Chapter One teachers
and my Special Ed. teachers and my librarians and everybody else I can get into that classroOm. and I
want them spending all their time with the kids that are there. And I want them to be doing team teaChinE
and I want peer tutoring all the things that he'd heard about that he was Willing to try. So we helped ,
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�him get that and get it setup and. sure enough. within a year the teSt scores were up for everytxxiy,
including the Special Ed k:jds~The Chap~ One kids' did it whole lot better in that setting then they did in
the pull out progtam. And the morale among both then:achcni and the children was much higher. We
were just there the other day talking to their parent/reacher organization.
But I found myself at a conference of other Arkansas superintendents a few months ago and I said
·...you know what's happening at Bald Knob? Have you seen their tests results? Have you talked to their
teac:hcni? They were really excited about-this," I said.. "Have any of you thought about going over and
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visiting?" and one superintendent from a larger distri~t said "You ~ I'm nuts? You think'rm going tl '
the board and say I learned anything about education from Bald Knob?" I said. \'Then where are you
learning about education from? What are you exposing yourself to?"
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I can guarantee you, ~ you have a conference about new' and proven models that work in education in
Tennessee, and invite every superintendent.you will get the same handful of superintendents who alwa:
come to whateVer is new because 'every other one of them doesn't think he has anything to learn. What
. was good enough ten years agois good enough now and all this talk about education reform. if hejust
waits long enough and lives to. retirement. will pass him by.
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And pan of the prol::llem.is that there; are no incentives in the system' for changing the way the system
operates. Now, you all in this state have worked veryhard on a Career Ladder whiCh'providesincentiv(
to individual teachers. I cOIIlIIlend you for th~ but we have to figure out how to change the entire
system in which the individual teachers work. You and I know a lot of teachers who are flI'St-rate
teachers who have figured out how to avoid e,ver coming into contact with any principal or superintende!
or school board member. And they will tell you that they ha~e their strategy very well worked out to be
able to Shut the door in September and open it in June because that's the only way. they thinlc, they are
ever going to be able to accomplish anything withther s~dents. There is no sense of collegiality; there'
is no sense of risk taking; there are no incentives for them to take on what they consider the thankless jc
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of dealing with the education bureall,~. And so they do the beSt they can and maybe they, in
Tennessee, apply for Career Ladder.
But the whole system is not being challenged and. not being given incentives to change. One of the
.primary issues, for urban education and American education in general. is what kinds of incentives for
change and for decentralization and for even some risk taking can we provide American educators? Wh2
is it that we can do for them as policy makers. as corporations, as citizens that will say to them: "We
want you to be like Bald Knob, or be yourself and do whatever it is that works better." . Instead you anc :
I know that the status quo is rewarded day in and. day out Any of you who saw thaI won~erful movie
about Jaime Escala.nte. the calculus n:acher in Los Angeles - well, he and his principal have been basicall
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','
-,~.
�exiled to Sibc:ri.a within the LA school system. The principal who let him do all 'this and get all this
attention and shake up the establishment went off to get an advanCed degree and came b3.ck and was
,assigned tome asbestos regulating department in.the L. A. school ~ Jaime Escalante has tlad every
road block thrown in his way. -
What is it about excitement and excdlence and yes, even eccentricity, among good teacherS - what is it
that drives principals. superintendents. and school board members C1'a%)'? , What is it ~t prevents them
from gi~g rewards to people who get the results we want? That man should have his face on Mount
Rushmore! He took those poor Hispanic kids.. and convinced them that they were as good as anybody'
who went to school anywhere in this country, and had the results to show for it Is he rewarded by the
system in which he operates? Not on your life! He is considered a problem that needs to be dealt with.
and just as soon as everybody can get back to thinking that all these ,kids are dumb. the better off we'll ,
be. I don't think that's an overstatement. and it is not just' the eduCation bureaucracy, it is-any
bureaucracy which has a vested interest in pe:rperuating itself and not rocklng any boat We will never
solve the problems in Memphis. Arlcansas or anywhere else if we don't rock some boatS. We have to '
figure out how we can redo the incentives 'so that educators themselves feel comfortable getting out and
rocking it
Butfinally.. let me just say something about what the expectations and attitudes of all of us should be.
My feeling is that we are still selling thousands and thousands of children short When I went around to
•
those 75 counties and talked about requiringccrtain core curriculum for high school graduation. and
talked about raising standards across the board.. and talked about an eighth grade exit exam (which we
have. before they can get to ninth grade). what I was told repeatedly· by educators, not by parents but by
educators • is that I just didn't understand how hard. I was mak;ing it for all those poor children because
look who they were, look who their parents were, look where they came from. ' We couldn't really expect
much from them. , We ~ve over the last twenty years. largely because of our inability to come to grips
with desegregation, made all kinds of excuses to a~oid holding children. black and white. rich and poor.
accountable to high standards. We've. excused it by Saying, ''Well they can't really do' it anyway. so
why Try?" We've ex~used it,by saying, ''We'll probably end up in coun if we try." Weve excused it by
saying. "It won't make any difference in. the long run."
,
"
a
So our e~ons.•.ifall of us really were hooked up to lie detector machine tonight and everyone
in oUr heart of heans were asked, "00 you really believe that. the Poor black childrcnin Memphis or the
poor white children in nonn ArlCansas
really make it in today's world. and succeed educationally?"
can
despite all of oUr best intentions a lot ofus.lf we said, yes, would be shown to be liars. We do not yet
, believe that we need all these children and that they all can suCceed if ~e give them the right combination
•
of discipline. expectation and love.
10 .
�e"
Any solution to the urban ed.ucation·problem ultimately comes doWn to how we treat our ch.i.ldren on a
one-to-one basis, and what we think about them. We are not doing them any favors by letting them get
away with things. We are not doing them any fav~ by letringthem go to school in unsafe schools. We
are not doing them any favors by e~g that they can't achieve.
When we implemented. the ~ighth grade test I was apprehensive, because my view of it was that
eventually young people would begin to.realize that there was something at stake here, that they wen::I)'t
.
just passing time, and that they would live up to that higher expectation. A lot of my friends,said. "You
know, what you've done is drive up·the dropout rate drat:ilatically. They won't be able to do it and they
will be gone." The first year that we gave it for real - we gave about a year or two of practice tests - ~
Me ,em we gaid! ferJ:eat'"there was a.pretty.high failure .rate.;rn some of our districts, 20% of the'
eighth graders failed it, and I mean this was a basic teSt And some of those eighth graders were
interviewed by 3em., eethe news media and they said things like, "I never knew I was supposed to kIlo,
all that stuff.," or "Nobody ever told me that," or "I guess I didn't take it verY seriously." They had [W(
more chances over the summer to pass to be able to go on to ninth grade and every year that we've giver.
it fewer ofthem have failed. 'They have expressed more of a willingness to trY to pass it 11tey've gone
for the extra tutoring that we give during the summer. But the bottom line for me is that we set some
standards for all of them and didn't make excuses for any of them.
"
'
And so many of our children today, living in disorganized families, in violent and dangerous
environments, don't have any standard. set for them at alL If the school doesn't structure thelT day and
.heip set some expectations, it's unlikCly anyl:xxiy will. But the school has to do it in a spirit of love.
."
.
Much of what we are talking about today andto~w at t.hls conference is real old fashioned. How C
'.
we get parents to take responsibility? How do we insure that children are given the health care that they
deserve to have? How do we give incentives to our educators and our school systemS to reach out to all
of these children and to care about them and not make excuses for them? And how do we instill in our
children the belief that education for them is llnport3nt, that it is the way out, and that the~ will not be
scorned by their community and their family if they commit themselves [0 learning.
There is more than enough work for all of us to do for a lifetime. but there are also lots oflittle St~
each of us can take. What I hope is that over the next day with the various forums that are held. each of
us will find a way about what step we can take wherever we are. We really don't have a whole lot of
time. We can look at it from an economic perspective and say that by the middle of this dc:c~e only 20~
of the new enmmlS into the job market will be white. native, male Aniericans; 80% will be women.
minorities. and immigrants, and economically we are·going to·need every person we can get to be as W(
eduCated as we can help them be. And we can look at it socially and Say ,"You know, we cannot continr
11
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Lissa Muscatine - Press Office
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First Lady's Office
Press Office
Lissa Muscatine
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1993 - 1997
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<a href="http://clinton.presidentiallibraries.us/items/show/36239" target="_blank">Collection Finding Aid</a>
<a href="http://catalog.archives.gov/id/7431941" target="_blank">National Archives Catalog Description</a>
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2011-0415-S
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<p>Lissa Muscatine first served in the Clinton Administration as a speechwriter. Within the First Lady’s Office, she served as Communications Director to the First Lady.</p>
<p>Lissa Muscatine’s records consist of materials from First Lady Hillary Clinton’s Press Office, highlighting topics such as health care, women’s rights, the Millennium Council, Hillary Clinton’s 2000 Senate campaign, and deal extensively with press interviews given by the First Lady; her domestic and foreign travel; and speeches and remarks, on a wide variety of topics, given by her before and during her time as First Lady. The records include interview transcripts, press releases, speeches and speech transcripts.</p>
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Clinton Presidential Records: White House Staff and Office Files
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Clinton Presidential Library & Museum
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Adobe Acrobat Document
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1,324 folders in 27 boxes
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Paper
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FLOTUS Statements and Speeches 5/31/69 - 10/12/92 [Binder]: [Memphis State Education Symposium 1/24/90]
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Box 11
<a href="http://clintonlibrary.gov/assets/Documents/Finding-Aids/Systematic/2011-0415-S-Muscatine.pdf" target="_blank">Collection Finding Aid</a>
<a href="http://catalog.archives.gov/id/7431941" target="_blank">National Archives Catalog Description</a>
Creator
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First Lady's Office
Press Office
Lissa Muscatine
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2011-0415-S
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Clinton Presidential Records: White House Staff and Office Files
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11/26/2012
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2011-0415-S-flotus-statements-and-speeches-5-31-69-10-12-92-binder-memphis-state-education-symposium-1-24-90
7431941