EDUCATION OF THE DEAF ACT,

TABLE OF CONTENTS………………………………………………………………iii

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JUDY HEUMANN, ASSISTANT SECRETARY, OFFICE OF SPECIAL EDUCATION AND REHABILITATIVE SERVICES, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION………………………………………………………………………………………………

STATEMENT OF I. KING JORDAN, PRESIDENT, GALLAUDET UNIVERSITY, WASHINGTON, D.C…………………………………………………………………………………………………………

STATEMENT OF JAMES DeCARO, NATIONAL TECHNICAL INSTITUTE FOR THE DEAF, ROCHESTER, NEW YORK………………………………………………………………………………

STATEMENT OF NANCY J. BLOCH, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF THE DEAF, SILVER SPRING, MARYLAND…………………………………………………………...

STATEMENT OF THERESE KNECHT DOZIER, SPECIAL ADVISOR ON TEACHING, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, WASHINGTON, D.C…………………………………………….

STATEMENT OF CAREN MATTEUCCI, TEACHER, PINE LANE INTERMEDIATE SCHOOL, PARKER, COLORADO………………………………………………………………………………….

STATEMENT OF LORI PARISE, TEACHER, OUR LADY OF VICTORY SCHOOL, WASHINGTON, D.C…………………………………………………………………………………….26

STATEMENT OF JOANNE CASHMAN, DIRECTOR, LEADERSHIP FOR FULL PARTICIPATION, TEACHER PREPARATION AND SPECIAL EDUCATION, THE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY, WASHINGTON, D.C…………………………………………………………………...

STATEMENT OF KAREN ZUMWALT, VICE PRESIDENT FOR ACADEMIC AFFAIRS AND DEAN, TEACHERS COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, NEW YORK, NEW YORK…………

Appendix A – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JUDY HEUMANN, ASSISTANT SECRETARY, OFFICE OF SPECIAL EDUCATION AND REHABILITATIVE SERVICES, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION……………………………………………………………………...

Appendix B – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF I. KING JORDAN, PRESIDENT, GALLAUDET UNIVERSITY, WASHINGTON, D.C…………………………………………………………………...

Appendix C – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF JAMES DeCARO, NATIONAL TECHNICAL INSTITUTE FOR THE DEAF, ROCHESTER, NEW YORK…………………………………………..

Appendix D – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF NANCY J. BLOCH, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF THE DEAF, SILVER SPRING, MARYLAND…………………….

Appendix E – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF THERESE KNECHT DOZIER, SPECIAL ADVISOR ON TEACHING, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, WASHINGTON, D.C………………………...

Appendix F – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF CAREN MATTEUCCI, TEACHER, PINE LANE INTERMEDIATE SCHOOL, PARKER, COLORADO…………………………………………………

Appendix G – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF LORI PARISE, TEACHER, OUR LADY OF VICTORY SCHOOL, WASHINGTON, D.C………………………………………………………………………...

Appendix H – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF JOANNE CASHMAN, DIRECTOR, LEADERSHIP FOR FULL PARTICIPATION, TEACHER PREPARATION AND SPECIAL EDUCATION, THE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY, WASHINGTON, D.C………………………………………………...

Appendix I – WRITTEN STATEMENT OF KAREN ZUMWALT, VICE PRESIDENT FOR ACADEMIC AFFAIRS AND DEAN, TEACHERS COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, NEW YORK, NEW YORK……………………………………………………………………………………..

Appendix J – PREPARED STATEMENT OF DR. DAVID IMIG, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF COLLEGES FOR TEACHER EDUCATION……………………...

Table of Indexes…………………………………………………………………………………………207

Tuesday, July 15, 1997

House of Representatives,

Subcommittee on Postsecondary

Education, Training and

Life-Long Learning,

Committee on Education and the Workforce,

Washington, D.C.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 9:30 a.m., in Room 2175, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Howard P. "Buck" McKeon [chairman of the subcommittee] presiding.

Present: Representatives McKeon, Petri, Kildee, Roemer, Romero-Barcelo, Hinojosa, and McCarthy.

Staff Present: Sally Lovejoy, Senior Education Policy Advisor; Todd Jones, Professional Staff Member; Andrea Weiss, Legislative Assistant; Marshall Grigsby, Senior Legislative Associate for Education; David Evans, Legislative Associate; and Alex Nock, Legislative Associate.

Chairman McKeon. Good morning. I would like to call to order this hearing on the Subcommittee on Postsecondary Education, Training and Life-Long Learning on the Education of the Deaf Act and Title V of the Higher Education Act. I would like to thank my colleagues, our witnesses, and the members of the general public for joining us today.

Our two panels today are on different topics but are connected by a common belief that I share with my colleagues. There is nothing more important to the future of our country than the opportunity for a high-quality education for all Americans. We believe this can be achieved by working together by building on what works: Basic academics, English, math and science, parental involvement, and dollars to the classroom.

The first panel we will hear from today will address one of the longest Federally supported education programs. The Education of the Deaf Act is the authorizing legislation for Gallaudet University, which has conferred collegiate degrees since the Lincoln administration. The act also authorizes the National Technical Institute for the Deaf, which is located at the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York. This is the first hearing on these institutions since the law was last authorized in 1992.

Our second panel will discuss the teacher training portions of the current Higher Education Act in Title V. This committee saw its latest teacher training legislation enacted on June 4, when President Clinton signed the 1997 amendments to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. That bill included a professional development program that will create a real link between classroom needs and the providers of professional development. I believe we can do an equal amount of good with this act's teacher training program and would invite today's witnesses to comment from their experience on the need for a link between academic environment and the real teaching world.

I look forward to your testimony this morning.

I turn the time over now to Mr. Kildee, the ranking member of the committee.

Mr. Kildee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank for you having this hearing this morning.

I come from Flint, Michigan, which has one of the oldest schools in the country for the deaf, Michigan School for the Deaf, and because of that, we have a larger number of deaf people in Flint. Many parents move there so they can be near their children. It has residential students or day students. For 32 years as I have campaigned through Flint, I think I have come to know every deaf or hearing-impaired family. Of course that when I ring a doorbell and see a light go on inside, I know it is going to be one of my friends. I have learned two signs, two very essential signs for someone in my profession. One is this, which means hello. Another sign I learned in my profession which is important is this, which is to vote. I realize, of course, that I sign with an accent.

But I have had a deep interest in education for the deaf and hearing impaired for a number of years, and I really look forward to the hearing this morning.

In the area of teacher recruitment and training, I am very interested in addressing this matter, because we are going to have a large number of teachers who reach retirement age. We want to make sure that we recruit and train talented people for the teaching profession.

I thank you for having these hearings and look forward to the testimony of the witnesses this morning. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman McKeon. Thank you.

We will begin our first panel, hearing first from the Honorable Judy Heumann, assistant secretary of the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, from the U.S. Department of Education. Then we will hear from Dr. King Jordan, president of Gallaudet University here in Washington, D.C.; then from Dr. DeCaro, who is the assistant to Dr. Robert Davila, who is ill this morning.

We are happy to have you here with us.

Dr. DeCaro. Thank you.

Chairman McKeon. And then Ms. Nancy Bloch, who is the Executive Director of the National Association for the Deaf here in Silver Spring, Maryland. We will begin first then with Ms. Heumann.

Ms. Heumann. Thank you.

Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Congressman Kildee and the rest of the members of the panel. Thank you for inviting us to discuss the reauthorization of the Education of the Deaf Act. This act, as you know, provides the funding authority for Gallaudet University and the National Technical Institute for the Deaf.

The President has emphasized universal access to postsecondary education and lifelong learning as top priorities for the administration. This access is needed because today's good jobs increasingly require skills and training beyond a high school education, and this means that effective and accessible postsecondary education is critically important.

I am pleased to be here today because Gallaudet and NTID provide important postsecondary educational options to assist individuals who are deaf to obtain the skills necessary to succeed in today's competitive job market.

Under the EDA, the Department of Education is responsible for monitoring and providing oversight to Gallaudet and NTID to help ensure services and programs are being provided in accordance with the authorizing legislation and that these activities meet the needs of the students for whom they are intended.

Over the years, we have worked closely with each of the schools to ensure that Federal funds are being used efficiently and effectively to expand educational opportunities for individuals who are deaf.

Currently the Department is working with Gallaudet and NTID to meet the requirements of the Government Performance Results Act of 1993. The Department has provided guidance to the institutions on the requirements of GPRA related to developing an appropriate system of strategic objectives and performance indicators that can be used to help measure the effectiveness of their programs.

Both Gallaudet University and NTID have recently undertaken strategic planning processes that have formed the basis of their performance plans. Each institution has submitted its plans, and we are working with the schools to ensure that the plans include appropriate objectives, indicators, and data sources.

The Education of the Deaf Act Amendments of 1992 incorporated a number of important changes into the Act that were recommended by the Department and the Commission on Education of the Deaf. These include provisions for updating the operating agreements for NTID and Gallaudet's elementary and secondary education programs, establishing limitations on the expenditure of Federal funds, creating a tuition surcharge for international students, and setting a limit on the number of international students that can be accepted and subsidized by the schools.

The amendments modified the endowment grant provisions to increase investment options and expanded the requirements for annual reports for the institutions. The amendments also incorporated procedural safeguards specified in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act into the requirement for Gallaudet's elementary and secondary education programs; broadened the mission of these programs to include students who are lower functioning academically, from non-English speaking homes, from rural areas, or who have secondary disabilities and require the elementary and secondary education programs to conduct model demonstration activities in an equitable manner based on the distribution of deaf or hard of hearing among various education environments.

The changes to the elementary and secondary education programs at Gallaudet helped to ensure that all individuals with deafness benefited from the demonstration activities conducted by these programs. We believe that the EDA was substantially improved in 1992 and that these changes helped increase the accountability and focus for Gallaudet and NTID.

The Department has worked closely with the institutions over the past several years to ensure effective implementation of the requirements of the EDA. For example, the 1992 amendments incorporated provisions of the IDEA related to students who have been placed in Gallaudet's elementary and secondary education programs by their parents. The Department began monitoring Gallaudet's compliance with these provisions in 1994 and provided extensive technical assistance to the university, which is now in compliance with the law. In addition, the Department and Gallaudet successfully re-negotiated the agreement for the operation and demonstration activities of the elementary and secondary schools as required by the act.

We strongly believe that nothing should be done to weaken the act's current direction. The current law is a good law and does not need to be substantially amended.

You have asked us to specifically address a proposal to include the authorities for Gallaudet and NTID in a separate title under the Higher Education Act of 1965. Although we have not had the opportunity to fully explore this proposal, we have some initial reservations. Based on our assessment thus far, we do not believe that there are any advantages to this proposal from either an administrative or programmatic perspective.

If Gallaudet and NTID are incorporated into the HEA, the schedule and process for reauthorization of the Higher Ed Act will control the timing and process for reauthorizing these activities. Inclusion of these authorities into such a large and complex statute could also diminish the amount of attention these programs receive from the Congress during the reauthorization.

Finally, one could question the appropriateness of the fit, given the fact that the Higher Ed Act and the EDA authorize two elementary and secondary programs in Gallaudet, the Kendall Demonstration School and the Model Secondary School for the Deaf whether or not that is really an appropriate fit into the Higher Ed Act.

We are concerned that the title of the Education of the Deaf Act has caused some confusion in the deaf community as to the purpose of the act. In 1986, the Education of the Deaf Act was enacted to consolidate the separate authorities for Gallaudet University and the National Technical Institute for the Deaf. It was not intended to address the broad range of issues related to the education of individuals who are deaf.

We believe the title should be changed to the Gallaudet University and National Technical Institute for the Deaf Act to better reflect the primary purpose and scope of the legislation. To ensure that all students have equal educational opportunities, individuals with disabilities must have a full range of education options available to them.

The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 have provided students with disabilities a wide and increasing range of postsecondary educational options. However, the education provided by Gallaudet and NTID offers an important option along the continuum of postsecondary options for individual who are deaf.

I believe that by working together, the Administration, Congress, Gallaudet, NTID, and individuals who are deaf can continue to ensure that the education these schools provide continues to be a viable and important resource for our Nation's students who are deaf.

Those of us involved in the effort to bring top quality postsecondary educational opportunities to people with disabilities have a common goal. That goal is to create policies, programs, and institutions that facilitate the ability of all Americans to lead independent, productive lives and to be able to contribute to the American society. We believe that the Education of the Deaf Act is an appropriate statutory framework for the activities of these institutions and therefore are not recommending any substantive amendments to the authority for these programs.

Mr. Chairman, and other members of the subcommittee, thank you again for allowing us to testify, and we look forward to any of your questions.

See Appendix A for the written statement of Assistant Secretary Heumann

Chairman McKeon. Thank you very much. Dr. Jordan.

Dr. Jordan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning, Mr. Kildee, Members of the committee.

I have submitted a written statement for the record, but I would like with your permission to make a few oral comments at this time. Let me begin by briefly describing the history of Gallaudet and the very special relationship we have enjoyed with the United States Congress and the Federal Government for 140 years.

Legislation was first enacted in 1857, establishing the Columbia Institution for the Deaf. The next year, we received our first appropriation from Congress.

I need to use this. Thank you.

Do I need to start over or can I just--

Chairman McKeon. No.

Dr. Jordan. Okay. Fine. Thank you.

The next year, we received our first appropriation from Congress, and we have received on an annual basis support from the Federal Government ever since.

In 1864, as you said in your opening statement, Abraham Lincoln signed into law the authority to grant collegiate degrees at Gallaudet University. It is probably worth noting at this time that the vast majority of people who are deaf in the United States who have collegiate degrees receive them from Gallaudet. In 1966 and 1970, Congress established first secondary and elementary schools as a national demonstration program and charged them with helping to educate deaf children around the Nation.

Again, it is worth noting that two-thirds to three-fourths of the graduates of our Model Secondary School for the Deaf go on to a college or university program and that those same graduates read at two to three grade school levels higher than the norm for deaf high school graduates.

More recently, in 1996, Gallaudet officially became Gallaudet University, and our authorizing legislation, the Education of the Deaf Act, included the pre-college programs as part of the corporate structure of the university. Further refinements were made to the EDA with the amendments from 1992, the current law we are operating under.

At this time, and all this time, Gallaudet's mission has not changed. We continue to be the only independent, comprehensive collegiate program in the world designed to meet the needs of deaf students. As I said earlier, most deaf individuals with bachelors' degrees earned them at Gallaudet.

Since the late 1800's, we have also trained teachers and carried out resource designs to help forward the agenda of the deaf community. Because of Gallaudet, deaf individuals are able to participate fully in the American dream. High percentages of our alumni hold executive, professional, and managerial positions. Their salaries compare favorably with other college university graduates'. More than half our graduates go on to earn advanced degrees. This is really important when you compare it with the benchmark. Nationally, the norm is, about 19 percent of people with a B.A. go on to earn advanced degrees.

The EDA amendments of 5 years ago were directed primarily at reaffirming the missions of Kendall School and MSSD and are increasing the accountability of the university and its use of Federal funds. We have been very responsive to those directives.

I have documented our responsiveness in my written statement and would be happy to answer any questions that you have in that regard. In general, I agree with Ms. Heumann, it is a good law and we can operate effectively under the laws as it now exists.

When you and I sat down recently, you told me that your view of the reauthorization process is an effort to improve legislation. It is easy for me to point to how the 1992 amendments did, in fact, improve the legislation.

Specifically, the endowment matching program, begun in 1986, required that we invest our endowment match in government securities at a very low yield. In 1992, we were committed to invest in the common fund. Since the market is doing very well, this really substantially increased our earnings, and the endowment program has really improved. It is also something I should thank the Congress for, because the endowment program has allowed our endowment to grow sevenfold during the period that it has been in place, from about $10 million when I became president to about $70 million now.

After 5 years experience with the 1992 amendments, I have a good sense of the strength and weaknesses of the law as it is written, and I have identified four areas in which I believe the legislation could be improved to better serve the Federal Government, the University, and the population we serve.

First, I would like to see the removal of the 10 percent cap on foreign students which was imposed in the 1992 amendments. As I said earlier, we are still the only comprehensive collegiate program in the world serving deaf students. Recently, we have had to turn away highly qualified international deaf applicants because we have reached the 10 percent limit.

We have never and will never turn away qualified American students to admit foreign students. However, as long as we have the room to admit them, then there should be no restriction on the number we serve.

Allow me to give you one brief example of how important it is to educate international students. Before 1960, there was no education for deaf children at all in the country of Nigeria. One graduate from Gallaudet University went to Nigeria; he went on missionary work and established a school for the deaf there. To make a long story short, some of the graduates of that school for the deaf came to Gallaudet, graduated from Gallaudet, and went back and established other schools for the deaf. Currently, there are about 20 schools for the deaf in Nigeria, each and every one established by someone who graduated from Gallaudet. Stories like that are repeated in other countries around the world.

The majority of deaf people who graduate from Gallaudet go back to their countries and work to improve the situation for deaf people there. Gallaudet is certainly one of the most cost effective and successful foreign assistance programs that exist today. Please don't limit our ability to educate foreign deaf students.

There are three other small changes which I describe which I believe could improve the law. These are spelled out in my written testimony, and I have discussed them with the Department and with your staff. I won't detail them here but will be happy to respond to questions that you might have.

Mr. Kildee, you mentioned that you know two signs. Perhaps I could teach you and the Chairman and the Members of the committee just one more. That sign would be "Yes." Yes.

Thank you very much for the opportunity to testify before you this morning. I will be happy to respond to questions when you have them, sir.

See Appendix B for the written statement of Dr. Jordan

Chairman McKeon. Thank you. Thank you very much. Dr. DeCaro.

Dr. DeCaro. Thank you, Chairmen McKeon, Congressman Kildee.

I am here substituting for Dr. Robert Davila today, NTID's chief executive, who is flat on his back with a pernicious case of the flu. Dr. Davila, as you know, is no stranger to Congress, having served in the Bush administration as assistant secretary in the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services, and, in that capacity, he oversaw the 1992 amendments to the EDA. Dr. Davila sends his sincere apologies for not being here.

It is, however, my distinct pleasure to appear before the Subcommittee on behalf of the National Technical Institute for the Deaf at the Rochester Institute of Technology. NTID was created by Congress in 1965 as a national coeducational residential education and research center for our Nation's deaf youth. NTID provides educational programs directly for deaf students enrolled in NTID and indirectly through academic programs, training workshops, and seminars for professionals in the field. When combined with the dissemination of information regarding NTID's research into communication, NTID provides for the Nation a significant service to young people who are deaf.

There are Mr. Chairman, Mr. Kildee, two areas delineated in our written statement that was submitted by Dr. Davila that I would like to highlight if I could: First, how our statement of purpose is articulated in the law, and, secondly, the cap on international students. These are two areas where we feel we could improve the law. Let me first address our charter.

The law, as currently written, states that NTID exists--and I will quote from the law--for the purpose of providing a residential facility for postsecondary education and education of individuals who are deaf in order to prepare them for successful employment. However, the charter for NTID includes not only the law but the guidelines for the establishment of NTID which were drafted in the mid sixties.

Throughout our 30 years at the Rochester Institute of Technology, we have remained true to that charter. In fact, in 1992, we confirmed that charter through our strategic plan which drew upon the law and the guidelines and rearticulated our mission. The mission reaffirmed the basic principles on which the college was founded and is fully consistent with the spirit and intent of the guidelines for the establishment of NTID and also the law.

We ask now that this mission be incorporated into the law so that the law articulates clearly the charge to NTID that is so clearly reflected in the guidelines for its establishment. It is not sufficient to simply refer to NTID as a college for deaf people, we are much more than that, and that was clearly recognized by those who drafted the guidelines for the establishment of NTID.

Please note that the mission statement that is contained in the testimony provided by Dr. Davila is not an expansion of our original charge but, rather, a clear delineation of the charter under which we have been operating successfully for the past 30 years.

Second, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Kildee, in the 1992 amendments we were authorized to admit international students for the first time, but a 10 percent cap was placed on those. We would like, as does Gallaudet, to have this cap lifted. The international student body that has been admitted to NTID has, in fact, increased our ability and enhanced our ability to prepare deaf students to live and work in the global marketplace. There is no question that our U.S. nationals have benefited significantly through interactions with these international students who bring their cultures, their customs, and their world view to our college.

As stated previously, our international students population is currently capped at 10 percent. We are able to provide, however, education beyond those 10 percent to young people and still assure that no qualified U.S. national is deprived of access to our programs and services.

By admitting additional international students, we will be able to utilize our unfilled capacity, not add to our expense base, increase our revenues, and simultaneously provide a very valuable service to young deaf people from other nations who do not have access to technical education within their countries. Lifting this cap makes good fiscal sense, good academic sense, and is a sound educational international service to people who are deaf and hard of hearing.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, we agree, the law is a very good one and does not need to be changed substantially. However, as I pointed out, there are two areas that we request that changes be made, as slight as they may be: First, a clear articulation of the mission under which we have operated for the past 30 years; and, second, a lifting of the cap on the international students for the National Technical Institute for the Deaf.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Kildee. I am prepared to answer any questions you might have.

See Appendix C for the written statement of Dr. DeCaro

Chairman McKeon. Thank you very much. Ms. Bloch.

Ms. Bloch [through an interpreter]. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before this committee to convey the full support of the National Association of the Deaf for the reauthorization of the Education of the Deaf Act of 1986.

As education is a critical, if not paramount, building block for each and every individual child and adult, and perhaps more so for deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals, for whom communication and language needs pose a unique challenge to the process of learning, the NAD is here today to respectfully request that the Committee recognize the importance of preserving the Education of the Deaf Act, in its present form and to reauthorize it accordingly.

The NAD is the Nation's oldest and largest consumer-based organization which safeguards the accessibility and civil rights for 28 million deaf and hard-of-hearing Americans. The primary focuses of the NAD include advancing policies to implement the highest standards of quality education for deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals in the pre-college as well as postsecondary setting.

The EDA was enacted in 1986 with the proclamation that this bill is to, quote, authorize quality education programs for deaf individuals, to foster improved educational programs for deaf individuals throughout the United States, to reenact and codify certain provisions of the law relating to education of the deaf, and for other purposes, unquote.

The NAD commends Congress and the administration for successfully carrying out in the last decade the many crucial programs and services for deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals. Instances of such exemplary programs and services made possible by the EDA are those existing at Gallaudet University and the National Technical Institute for the Deaf.

As an alumnus of Gallaudet University and a member of the advisory panel for each of these respective institutions, I can attest to the unique program and services that are unparalleled anywhere. Gallaudet and NTID students will have access to professional personnel who are proficient in the student's language and preferred communication mode, unhampered interaction with peers and colleagues, enhanced opportunities for participation and academic and extracurricular activities, and invigorating academic challenges. Maintenance of appropriate funding for these institutions pursuant to the EDA as it stands should remain a high priority.

The EDA provides a rare and much needed opportunity for increased public awareness of the uniqueness of education of the deaf and hard-of-hearing children and adults. The EDA, as amended in 1992, confers to the Secretary the authority to provide scholarships for students specializing in education of the deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals.

Further, the Secretary may conduct studies regarding the provision of preschool, elementary, secondary, and postsecondary education and other related services to individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing. This vesting of authority is necessary to effectively address a continued national crisis in the education of deaf and hard-of-hearing children and adults in the United States of America.

I report to the President and the Congress of the United States on the mission of education of the deaf.

Most important is the fact that the EDA is the piece of legislation that created the Commission on Education of the Deaf and investigated the status of education of the deaf, which was published in the report to the President and the Congress of the United States in February of 1988. This report indicated that the present status of education for persons who are deaf in the United States is unsatisfactory, unacceptably so. This is the primary and inescapable conclusion of the Commission on Education of the Deaf.

During the 1992 EDA reauthorization proceedings, the postsecondary institutions funded by this act have testified to their staunch commitment to the recommendations provided in the COED report. These 52 recommendations are attached to my written testimony. So suffice it to say that the COED report has indeed become a guiding source for the establishment of fundamental principles underlying education programs and services for deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals in this country.

As we gear up for the 21st century, we strive to obtain a common goal, quality education for all Americans in order to generate literate, productive, and contributing citizens of our society. To do otherwise may bring about habitual failures who become expensive lifelong rehabilitation and welfare cases. Therefore, the NAD asks that the Committee keep intact the autonomy of the Education of the Deaf Act.

Mr. Chairman, we will be pleased to answer any questions you or your colleagues may have. Thank you.

See Appendix D for the written statement of Ms. Bloch

Chairman McKeon. Thank you very much.

I want to thank our sign language interpreters, Jolinda Greenfield and Harry Zarin for their work here today.

Secretary Heumann, I understand that 2 months ago, Dr. Jordan sent you a copy of the proposals that he outlined. Could you please give us the Department's views on these four proposals?

Ms. Heumann. Well, in summary, I have spoken with Dr. Jordan and also with Dr. Davila about the proposals that were submitted, and we are willing to continue to have discussions with them in all the areas they have submitted.

In the area of the cap, which I recognize both institutions are wanting to remove, we are interested in discussing ways of enabling a greater number of foreign students to come, reviewing the surcharge issue, and looking at allowing the cap to possibly rise, with additional charges for foreign students. I think we are trying to be flexible and that at the same time we appreciate and support the original reason why the cap was put on.

In the other areas that have been discussed, as I said, we are open to discussions with all of them. We don't have opposition on the face of any of the recommendations.

Chairman McKeon. Speaking of those caps, let me ask Dr. Jordan, Dr. DeCaro, others, if you favor removing that cap? Would you be willing to eliminate the subsidized tuition in place of removing the cap?

Dr. Jordan. I am very concerned about the apparent belief that we have a larger subsidy for international students than we do for students in general. When you compare the cost per student of Gallaudet University students with other small liberal arts colleges in the United States, our costs are very much the same. The costs per student are high, but that is the same at other fine small liberal arts colleges or universities.

Currently, international students pay a 90 percent surcharge. That means that they pay almost double what American students pay. That is quite a lot of money, and I am very concerned about the notion that we could increase that further and not jeopardize the admission of international students. It is a marginal cost, that is a phrase I use. When we have 2,200 students and we are talking about admitting an additional 50 or 100 students, then we are not really talking about substantial additional costs. So the additional cost to the University and to the Federal Government of admitting more students is really not very much.

Dr. DeCaro. Mr. Chairman, we are concerned about the burden that might be placed on an international student in terms of their capability to come. In the end, our concern would be, we would be serving the most wealthy of the international students. So that is a significant concern on our part.

As Dr. Jordan has just pointed out, we are committed to serving those additional 50 students, if we can do that, without adding to our cost base. In effect, the marginal cost for adding them will be to place them in programs that have now unfilled capacity, pretty much like flying an airplane with an empty seat. We do have some empty seats. We feel that, bringing in a student at a surcharge, we will be in a position to serve them well and simultaneously not put an undue burden of full cost upon them.

Chairman McKeon. How much is the 90 percent and the 10 percent? How much are we talking about?

Dr. DeCaro. I am sorry, sir?

Chairman McKeon. The 90 percent subsidy and 10 percent, how much are we talking about?

Dr. Jordan. The tuition cost for an American student is almost $6,000. The cost to an international student would be about $10,000, or $11,000.

Dr. DeCaro. Very similar to the Technical Institute, Mr. Chairman.

Dr. Jordan. If I can follow up on the empty seats in the airplane analogy, it is very much like that. At the same time, the university is losing significant revenue. We had to turn away about 100 students last year for tuition and fees. That would be revenue equal to about $1.5 million. I seriously can't see any benefit to anyone on putting a cap on the admissions of international students.

I would be willing to include language saying something like we won't at any time admit international students at the cost of turning away American students. I would say we will admit every qualified American student. If we then have room, we will continue to admit international students.

Dr. DeCaro. We are prepared to make the same statement.

Chairman McKeon. Okay. Secretary, it looked like you wanted to say something there.

Ms. Heumann. We are not talking about changing the rules for the 10 percent. What we are looking at is if we move above the 10 percent. And quite a number of the students that are coming in right now to both of the universities are coming from Canada. So I think that has been one of our issues in looking at an idea which similarly approached the direction that you are moving at, and, as I said earlier, we are totally open to continuing these discussions, because we are sensitive to the needs of allowing more foreign students into the university. If there are seats available and American students are not going to be prevented from attending these schools, there is probably an option that we can arrive at.

Chairman McKeon. It sounds like there is room that we can work with on that. I think that is the concern, is subsidizing foreign students at the expense of our own students.

Mr. Kildee.

Mr. Kildee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to pursue that some more also.

I went to the University of Michigan, and one of the, I thought, great things about the University of Michigan is the fact that we had a number of foreign students there, which really helped in the total gestalt of what one gets in the university. When I was in the legislature, we were trying to crack down on the number of foreign students. As a matter of fact, we were trying to cut down on the number of Ohio students coming to Michigan. But I always felt both the Ohio students and the foreign students helped create a wonderful atmosphere at the university that I think was important.

What do your American students feel about the institute and university expanding the number of foreign students?

Dr. Jordan. I appreciate your use of the word "gestalt." My training is in psychology, and I agree with you completely, the university community is much richer for the admission of international students.

Currently we have students from about 50 countries. All of the students on campus are very anxious to see the cap removed. In fact, if there is one issue that students approach me about related to congressional oversight, it is how to get the cap off so that we can admit more international students.

I traveled to South Africa last year, in October, and I met many students in South Africa who very much wanted to come to study at Gallaudet but were aware of the 10 percent cap, and they asked me: "Are you going to go to Congress and ask them to remove that cap?" So I can tell you there is no opposition whatsoever to it among the American deaf community, among students on the campus of Gallaudet. Everyone wants to see a change.

Dr. DeCaro. Mr. Kildee, the only thing that I could say is, a wide-eyed enthusiasm comes from the young people who are U.S. nationals because of the desire to learn about other countries and other cultures and to establish the bond of brotherhood and sisterhood with their fellow deaf people who come to our country from those nations.

In addition, our students see very clearly the value of interacting with people of other cultures, given the globalization of technology and science and the realization that when they leave they will be entering an international workplace where they may work for a company that is held by U.S. interests, by Japanese interests, by German interests. The capability to interact in that kind of setting is incredibly valuable.

Mr. Kildee. Then if you would not turn away qualified American students to be able to take more foreign students, your enrollment would grow then; you foresee a growth of enrollment.

Dr. DeCaro. That is correct, sir.

Mr. Kildee. At both your institutions.

Dr. Jordan. Yes, sir.

Mr. Kildee. Ms. Bloch.

Ms. Bloch [through an interpreter]. I would like to add that the National Association of the Deaf is in full support of removing the cap for international students' admittance.

We have been in regular contact with people from foreign countries, and they too raise this issue with us, because they feel that the United States is the place where they can get the kind of education that they really need and in order to reach the kind of careers that they really need and be able to come back to their home countries, as King Jordan mentioned earlier, to establish schools for the deaf, to establish other programs in their own home countries.

Mr. Kildee. I really appreciate that.

As I say, having gone to the University of Michigan, I really felt one of the great values I got was the fact that we had foreign students who helped create an atmosphere at the university which was very important. So I am very flexible in trying to work with the chairman to see what we can do to work on the cap.

Let me ask you one other question of the panel, and maybe start with you, Judy. Some would prefer a separate title in the Higher Education Act, and others would want a separate act. Could we maybe start with you, Judy, and--

Ms. Heumann. As I said in the testimony, we haven't come to a conclusion on this, but our concern is that if, in fact, this authority gets rolled into the Higher Ed Act, that it would be a little bit overpowered by the--you know, the scope of the Higher Ed Act, and that more attention being able to be paid to the EDA is a separate piece of legislation we think is appropriate.

We also do have concerns about the fact that this legislation is different because Gallaudet has the authority to deal with issues for the Kendall School and the Model Secondary School for the Deaf which are clearly not higher education related issues. So at this point, we are still looking at it, but we are not leaning strongly in that direction.

Mr. Kildee. Dr. Jordan.

Dr. Jordan. I would borrow Ms. Heumann's word, "separate." My focus would be on an independent and separate title for Gallaudet University. As I said in my statement, Gallaudet has enjoyed a very special relationship with the Federal Government for 140 years. If we are to continue to enjoy that kind of relationship, then there needs to be separate and special recognition and authorization of the university programs.

So while the ideal resolution of that would be a separate law for the University, if it is moved into the Higher Education Act, then I would want very much to be assured that there be a separate title for Gallaudet.

Mr. Kildee. Okay.

Dr. DeCaro. Mr. Kildee, we are concerned about rolling the EDA into the Higher Education Act, because the Higher Education Act and its titles are massive in terms of the Federal investment and resources as compared to the investment in the National Technical Institute for the Deaf and the Gallaudet University. It is our concern that we would be overwhelmed in such legislation.

It is also our concern that what we might find occurring is that we would be lost in such legislation. We operate programs that are very, very important for people who are deaf and hard of hearing, and yet deafness and hearing loss has, in fact, a low incidence of occurrence in the United States. So while we are very important and we are providing a continuum of service, we are concerned that if we were folded into the Higher Education Act, that uniqueness would be lost and we might very well find ourselves overwhelmed and unable to pursue the missions that we have stated for ourselves.

Mr. Kildee. Ms. Bloch, do you have any--

Ms. Bloch [through an interpreter]. I guess that the full impact of the EDA is yet to be realized. You know, it has been 11 years, and I feel that it reflects the sentiments of our community. We feel that the impact has not yet been realized, especially when we consider the status of deaf and hard-of-hearing students across the country.

And consider as well the COED report. The COED report brought out that if this combination were to happen, then there would not be sufficient focus on the unique mission of both these institutions. So we would prefer that they remain separate.

Mr. Kildee. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman McKeon. Thank you.

Mr. Romero-Barcelo.

Mr. Romero-Barcelo. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First of all. I would like to say that when I first came to Washington is when I really started learning anything about--I know very little about it, although I know quite more about it than then. Unfortunately, I still don't know much of anything at all about the National Technical Institute for the Deaf, and I hope I will learn a little bit more.

But I wanted to take the opportunity of your presence here to ask the questions that have been bothering me since I started focusing on the institutions for the deaf. And I understand that there is an American Sign Language and an International Sign Language. Am I correct? They are different, American Sign Language and International Sign Language; am I correct on that?

Ms. Heumann. Yes.

Mr. Romero-Barcelo. I see the heads nodding.

Has there been an effort made to standardize the sign language, of course have us adapt ourselves to the universal sign language instead of insisting on our own sign language? Is that a good idea? Is that a bad idea? Could I have Dr. Jordan and Dr. Bloch and Dr. DeCaro address that.

Dr. Jordan. I would be happy to try and answer briefly. I am tempted to ask if you want the short answer or the long answer.

Mr. Romero-Barcelo. It depends on how long it is.

Dr. Jordan. The situation with sign languages is basically the same as the situation with spoken languages. Sign languages are indigenous to the countries in which people live, so that if you travel, you will find very, very different sign languages. For example, Japanese Sign Language is different from spoken--or from sign--ASL, as spoken Japanese is from spoken English. There have been attempts to standardize them. There is a sign called Gestuno. I would say it is like the--

Mr. Romero-Barcelo. Esperanto.

Dr. Jordan. Esperanto, spoken language. When people get together, they can communicate with each other all right. But when they go back to their countries, they go back to using the sign language indigenous to their countries.

It used to be it was more interesting trying to standardize signs. Now I believe the National Association of the Deaf would agree with me that we are more respectful of the individual countries' sign languages, and when we go to them, we work in their language and don't try to impose a different language on them.

Mr. Romero-Barcelo. I think that that explains something to me differently that I have not focused on. There is as much difference in the sign language as there is in the spoken language. I begin to realize now why that becomes much more difficult than it seems.

The other thing I would like to ask, what is it--am I correct that the enrollment in Gallaudet, for instance, has been decreasing in the past years? Or is that--is that information that I have, is that correct or not?

Dr. Jordan. Yes. The numbers have decreased over the past few years. I would say that is due in part to the wonderful enactment of the Americans with Disabilities Act. It used to be that if someone was deaf and wanted to go on to a higher education, then that person went to Gallaudet. NTID was established, and there was a choice between Gallaudet and NTID.

Recently, deaf high school graduates have the same choices that other high school graduates have. So many of the graduates of MSSD in the last few years, for example, have gone to Smith, to Howard University, to the University of Arizona, Arizona State University, to Michigan. That didn't used to happen. So we have much more competition than we used to. We are addressing very seriously the competition and intend to be more active in recruiting the students who are out there.

Mr. Romero-Barcelo. And is there another--I know you are increasing your recruitment of foreign students. But at least from the point of view of Puerto Rico, is there really any outreach to recruit the students from Puerto Rico? Maybe I am wrong. Is there something being done to recruit underserved populations in the United States?

Dr. Jordan. Yes. We have a number of Puerto Rican students at our Model Secondary School for the Deaf. For example, I should take a minute here to thank you for granting to serve on the task force I established a year ago on Latino and Hispanic issues at the University. We sent materials to your office. I know, in fact, the issue of Puerto Rican students and students who come from homes where English is not the first language is something that we are working hard to find a way to address.

Mr. Romero-Barcelo. Okay. Thank you very much. I appreciate it.

Dr. DeCaro. The enrollment at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf has remained at around 1,080 and will approach 1,100 in the next year. So it has remained pretty level and seen small increases over the past few years.

As regards Puerto Rico, we have now at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf the Northeast Technical Assistance Center, and Puerto Rico is one of the regions within that center. That center is supported by a grant from the Department of Education. We are reaching out for postsecondary education for Puerto Rico through the Northeast Technical Assistance Center.

Mr. Romero-Barcelo. Thank you very much. Anything I can do to help in those efforts would be my pleasure.

Thank you.

Chairman McKeon. Ms. McCarthy.

Ms. McCarthy. Thank you.

I also was wondering during your testimony how you would teach international students if there was a difference in sign language. So I am glad you clarified that. And I also read your briefing papers, so I know how hard you have been working to cut back on your expenses by reducing staff, and I appreciate that.

My question is, when we bring in foreign students, which I happen to think is wonderful, because everyone should have the opportunity to meet people from around the world, would their governments want to subsidize them so they can come into our schools and bring our technology back to their countries? Our whole reason for educating everyone is so that they can go to work, be fulfilled, and be able to pay taxes to their government. So wouldn't that be fair?

Dr. DeCaro. The Canadian international students who come to the National Technical Institute for the Deaf receive support that is comparable to what is called vocational rehabilitation here in the United States. So the Canadian government is making a significant investment in the education of those young people who do come now.

Part of the issue that we face with the Canadian students as it relates to the cost for them to come has to do with the exchange rate. The Canadian dollar is about 75 cents on the American dollar. So in spite of the fact that they receive a significant contribution from the Government through vocational rehabilitation, there is still a significant family burden for them to be able to come. So the Government of Canada is making an investment.

Ms. McCarthy. And what about other governments?

Dr. Jordan. May I add to that? I had the privilege to be awarded an honorary degree from St. Mary's University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, recently. When I was there, I took the opportunity to visit with the deaf community in Nova Scotia, and virtually every person I met voiced a concern about the increase and the surcharge that now exist. The exchange rate is a big part of it, but simply the fact that they have to pay double what American students pay, they say things like they are reaching a point where the Government will reduce support and the students can't afford to come. I am very concerned about further increases in the surcharge.

Ms. McCarthy. Thank you. I have one more comment. I hate to see that your enrollment is going down a little. But I think it is wonderful that we have been able to give the opportunity to students that are hard of hearing and deaf to be able to mainstream into regular universities. So obviously in that respect we are doing our job right.

Thank you.

Chairman McKeon. Thank you.

Mr. Hinojosa.

Mr. Hinojosa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

What a privilege it is for me to listen to experts such as you. I think you are the panel that I respect so very much because I relate to the difficulties that I had as a limited English proficient student. And just last Friday, I was invited to be on a transition program and to speak all in Spanish. I was sharing at that program with the Ambassador of Mexico who spoke very eloquent Spanish, and they had some terms that I found very difficult to translate in my mind. So as I listened to your testimony, I can really identify with the work that you do and the difficulty of it.

So please know that any questions that I ask, I ask because I want to be better informed and I want to better represent your association and do a good job in setting policy. So I ask this question to Nancy Bloch.

Your testimony spoke to the NAD's position that the committee should recognize the importance of preserving the Education of the Deaf Act in its present form and to reauthorize it accordingly. I assume from that statement that you are opposed to the idea of including the EDA as a separate title under the Higher Education Act rather than in its current form as a separate program. Could you please expand upon your organization's reason for that view.

Ms. Bloch [through an interpreter]. Thank you.

As I said earlier, we feel that putting the EDA into the Higher Education Act would diminish the focus and the uniqueness of both of these institutions. There is still much work yet to be done, as evidenced by the COED report. We are monitoring those reports and recommendations and have done so over the years, and we feel that both institutions have done such exemplary work. And, you know, they have not had full opportunity yet to do more. And under their current mission, again, we feel that if we were to move this under the Higher Education Act, I think it would really take away from the uniqueness of the focus of both of these institutions.

American Sign Language also would take away from the importance of that, from the importance of teacher training programs, especially as it accords with the education of the deaf.

On the importance of education in general, especially as seen by the deaf community, we have made such great strides in the area of education of the deaf, and these two institutions, particularly Gallaudet University, have lead the way. Gallaudet, with their pre-college program, is evolving into a national mission effort on developing a relationship between educating pre-college children and relating with pre-college programs across the country. So I feel that these are very important activities.

Now, if we were to fold this into the Higher Education Act, then the focus on such activities would be diminished significantly.

Mr. Hinojosa. Very interesting. As I listen and as I learn more, I see the importance of bringing this type of information to lots of people in many countries.

I would like to close, Mr. Chairman, by saying that education has been a very important advocacy for me and that I am sponsoring an education forum this weekend, Friday and Saturday, at Texas A&M University in Kingsville, Texas. And I see in the program that we have--and I will make a copy of this available to you--that we do not cover this very important component of education. But it is probably best that we didn't because we just were not prepared.

And as we complete this reauthorization, I envision that in 1998, that we would want to sponsor an information forum specially designed for your special needs and the needs of the students you are training nationally and internationally. And I would welcome the opportunity of working with people of such high caliber as the four of you to help me bring this type of a forum in 1998 to the Texas-Mexico border and that we bring this wonderful information you are sharing with us. And, again, I will look forward to working with you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman McKeon. Thank you.

Mr. Roemer.

Mr. Roemer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to join in welcoming the expert panel that we have giving us very important information this morning.

I want to especially welcome Dr. Jordan, who last time I saw him--and I am sure he would not recognize me--I was in a basketball uniform, trying to play basketball on your basketball court for a very important fund-raiser for Gallaudet University.

Dr. Jordan. Oh, I recognize you. And I hope you are coming back October 9th of this year.

Mr. Roemer. You are already making your pitch for me to come back, despite the way I played.

Dr. Jordan. Some professional talent, I might add.

Mr. Roemer. Well, we Democrats were defeated by the Republicans. And my first question was going to be, do you have any good recruits that we might get suited up in Democratic uniform to try to take on the Republicans and beat them this time?

Ms. Heumann. Do you take women?

Mr. Roemer. We sure will take women. Absolutely.

Seriously, my question comes back to the Education of the Deaf Act and specifically targets the Model Secondary School and Kendall Demonstration Elementary School Programs. My question, first of all, to Dr. Jordan would be, how are these programs presently working? And do you have any specific recommendations as we reauthorize these programs as to what we might do differently?

Dr. Jordan. Thank you for your question. Now, the second part is easy to answer. I don't have any specific changes to recommend for the law. The 1992 amendments were very much geared toward improving the national mission programs at the Kendall Demonstration Elementary School and the Model Secondary School for the Deaf. Since the 1992 Amendments were put into place, we have established a process for obtaining public input in the establishment of priorities, and we have established several cooperative programs we call collaborative relationships with programs around the country.

We have developed some very interesting special projects. One that is worth talking briefly about, we call the Share Reading Program. You probably are aware that children who are read to by their parents become better readers when they grow up. Well, most of the parents of deaf children are hearing parents and are not sure how they can read to their children. So we have developed a program that includes tutoring, videotapes, and special reading materials, where we have individuals go out and teach parents on you they can read to their deaf children.

Now, we are doing this at many sites around the United States. I believe that the changes that were made in the EDA in 1992 and then the new agreement between us and the Department of Education has led to a very good cooperative position between us and the Department. The Department has sent many special aids to the university to help assure that we comply with Part B of IDEA and I think we are making very good progress.

Ms. Heumann. I would like to say we also are not going to be recommending any changes in this portion of the statute. We have been working very closely with Gallaudet, the Kendall School and the Model Secondary School for the Deaf, and they are in compliance with the law right now. We have been working with them on some areas that they needed further technical assistance with and over the next year we are going to providing more technical assistance as it pertains to the new provisions in the IDEA. So we envision no need for change.

Mr. Roemer. Just last week we had one of the most interesting hearings that I have been part of in this session of Congress. We listened to experts from around the country tell us what needs to be done to help young people learn how to read. Dr. Jordan mentioned that briefly in his answer to my question, that we need to work more specifically, either through professional development, through different training methods of our teachers when they cannot teach to certain students that have disabilities. Too many teachers don't know how to teach to those students.

We learned about recommendations to Head Start as to how we might try to gear Head Start toward vocabulary and reading and mentoring parents when it is reauthorized. Certainly, we are learning more and more in these areas. Are there specific things that we have learned in the last 4 or 5 years in this particular area, and are we spending enough on research and development to do that, to reach down, not just at Gallaudet, but to reach down earlier to help the parents and children?

Ms. Heumann. Maybe what I could do is start and maybe Dr. Jordan would talk for a few minutes on some of the results he articulated earlier where students are graduating with higher reading levels when they are coming out of MSSD. As you are aware, the President's initiative on reading is very extensive and the Department of Ed is really taking the lead on it, and we have been integrating issues affecting disabled students into the reading initiative that the Department has been embarking on. And also as a result of the reauthorization of the IDEA, there was increased attention paid to many of the issues that you have addressed, such as professional development at the university level to assure that teachers are being more effectively trained to be able to work with disabled students, and in the area of reading, one of the issues we have been equally concerned about is the need to assure that general ed teachers are trained to be able to identify students having trouble with reading and be able to provide appropriate interventions with those students and not have to depend on special education instruction.

So I think we are looking through the discretionary grant programs that we also operate under the IDEA on some efforts that would focus on the areas you are talking about. I do feel good about the fact that the volunteer programs developing around the United States are focusing also on disabled students, that we have developed materials through our office, OSERS. There is a booklet called, "Learning to Read, Reading to Learn," which focuses on students with learning disabilities and is being utilized by about 30 major national organizations and being disseminated, so this is a tool for parents and others.

Mr. Roemer. Thank you. Dr. Jordan, did you want to answer that?

Dr. Jordan. I talked about using the public to help inform us about establishing priorities at the pre-college about programs at Gallaudet University. We established a national advisory panel and that panel was made up of experts from all the areas in educating deaf children. They came together and established priorities. Their number one priority was literacy, reading and writing. There is no question that to further the education of deaf children, we have to improve the literacy of deaf children. And so that will continue to be the top priority at our pre-college programs for the next several years.

Mr. Roemer. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman McKeon. Thank you. A couple of things came to my mind as we were hearing some of the other discussions. You said that each country has their own sign language. Does that correlate with the country or does it correlate with the language spoken? Like Spanish is spoken in Spain and Mexico. Is the sign language correlated to that?

Dr. Jordan. That is an excellent question, and a very perceptive question. I said that I just visited South Africa. That is a great example because their two main spoken languages are Afrikaans and English, and the sign languages are very different. In fact, there is no national sign language in the country of South Africa. There are several different sign languages that are pretty much mutually unintelligible, so it is a babble situation with sign languages in the world today. There are hundreds, literally hundreds of different sign languages.

Chairman McKeon. Mr. Romero-Barcelo had to leave, but he speaks two languages, and I speak a little Spanish so I know it is difficult to learn another language. So it would be probably even more difficult to have a universal sign language than it would be to have a universal spoken language.

Ms. Heumann. I think one of the concerns we also have is that in many developing countries there are many young children who are not really learning any sign language. And I know in Latin America, and certainly Dr. Jordan can speak to this, but I think we find that there is not necessarily a common language, for example, in Mexico. We have a U.S. language and there may be dialects within the country, but one of the problems for deaf people I have spoken to in Mexico is there isn't this common language, and it is something they have been trying to develop. So we definitely see an important link by bringing foreign students into this country, not to duplicate the language, but to recognize the value of having a common language and to be able to recognize the importance of appropriate communication for deaf students and late-deafened adults within different countries.

Dr. DeCaro. Mr. McKeon, I came to the field of deafness in 1971 knowing absolutely no sign language, and it required from me a commitment not just to learn the language, but to appreciate the culture that goes along with the language, because a friend of mine from Kenya once said to me that a person knows and understands only one culture, sees with only one eye, the world becomes flat.

Chairman McKeon. That is a good correlation. The reason we were proposing putting the EDA in with the Higher Education Act was to facilitate, expediate, not to make things tougher. What we were thinking is we could have, instead of running just the time on the Floor, the running the two separate bills, the hearings. So we were not trying to make things more difficult. We were trying to make things easier and better. It doesn't sound like that is what you want to hear. So I think we will go back and look at that again. As it gets tougher to get Floor time, we will just have to make sure it happens.

I want to thank you for being here today, thank you for your input. I think it has been very helpful, and as we go through this process, continue to work with us and help us, it looks like in your particular area, we don't have to make much change. The one thing that we need to look at, it looks like, is that we still need to work on the idea of removal of the cap. So we will look at that, and try to work with you on that and your other recommendations. And again, thank you very much for being here today.

We will take just a very short break to bring up the second panel. Mr. Kildee had to leave, so Mrs. McCarthy will be sitting in his chair as the Ranking Member. Thank you very much.

[Recess.]

Chairman McKeon. Good morning, we are ready to begin with our second panel. Let me ask, before we start, is there anyone that requires the need of an interpreter? Okay. Then, we will we will ask the interpreters to stay and continue to work. Thank you very much.

Our next panel will begin with Dr. Terry Dozier, the Special Advisor on Teaching to the Secretary of Education Riley, the first appointment of its kind. Dr. Dozier directs the Department's teaching initiative created in response to the President's call to action. I might also add that while teaching at Irmo High School in Columbia, South Carolina, in 1985 Dr. Dozier was named national teacher of the year.

Dr. Dozier. Thank you. I am joined by Tom Crowin from our Budget Office. I am pleased to appear before you to testify about the Department of Education's proposal for the reauthorization of Title V and the Higher Education Act. This reauthorization comes at a time when it is particularly important that we, as a Nation, do more to develop our teacher work force. I care deeply about this issue.

As a former National Teacher of the Year, I was invited as you heard, to the Department to provide a teacher's perspective on the work that we do. So I know first-hand the importance of good teaching and of providing teachers with high quality preparation and support.

David Haselkorn, the president of Recruiting New Teachers, may have said it best. Teaching is the essential profession that makes all other professions possible. The highest standards in the world, the best facilities and the strongest accountability measures will do little good when we do not have talented, dedicated and well-prepared teachers in our classrooms.

Our Nation's goals and education will not be achieved without the development of an excellent teacher work force. As a Nation, however, we face significant challenges in this regard. Over the next decade, we will need to hire more than 2 million teachers because of increasing teacher retirements and an enrollment boom that will bring more students than ever before into our classrooms, a total of almost 55 million students by 2006.

High poverty urban and rural schools will experience the most severe teachers shortages. Of the 2 million teachers needed, approximately 15 percent or 345,000 will be hired in central cities, in schools with large concentrations of low-income students, and an additional 207,000 teachers will be needed in our isolated and often poor rural areas.

In addition, a critical gap exists between the diversity of our Nation's students and that of their teachers. While a third of America's students are minority, only 13 percent of their teachers are. The gap is growing and is most severe in our urban and rural schools. Teacher shortages will continue to become concentrated in our Nation's under-served communities. Students in high poverty urban and rural schools, the very students who need our best teachers, often have teachers who are the least qualified.

For example, 71 percent of physical science students and 33 percent of English students in our high poverty schools take classes with teachers who lack even a minor in the field. Quality of preparation is a key factor in teachers' ability to facilitate student learning, and the need for effective teacher preparation in high poverty sections is particularly great.

For example, in urban school districts, rates of attrition can often reach 50 percent in the first 5 years of teaching, due in part to inadequate teacher participation and poor support or sink or swim approach to new teachers. Title V of the Higher Education Act is one vehicle through which the Federal Government for its part can address teacher quality in America. We began the development of our Title V proposal by examining teacher development across the continuum, beginning with recruitment and preparation, including the first few critical years of teaching which educators call the induction period, and on through ongoing professional development.

We considered two questions. Where in this continuum can the Federal Government and Title V appropriately play a role, and how can Title V, through a targeted Federal investment, make a significant impact on teacher development in America. In answering these questions, we have decided to focus Title V on three critical areas. Unlike the current Title V, which authorizes an array of disconnected programs, our proposal will focus on recruiting new teachers, preparing them well, and supporting them during the beginning stages of their career. We chose this focus for several reasons.

The Federal Government already makes a significant investment in ongoing professional development for current teachers through programs such as the Eisenhower Professional Development Program. Those programs, however, are not adequate to promote the reforms that are needed to develop our future teaching force. The Federal Government's current efforts simply are not sufficient to address the teacher recruitment, preparation and induction challenges that we face.

In these areas, there is a critical gap in the Federal commitment to teacher development. These are the arenas in which Title V can make a difference. Further more, we have an opportunity now to get it right and to make a dramatic difference in the development of our teaching force. Our Nation will be preparing more teachers than ever before to teach in increasingly challenging classrooms. By addressing the development of these teachers, we have a unique opportunity to make a substantial impact through the reauthorization of Title V.

We are considering a proposal that addresses the communities with the greatest needs, areas with high concentrations of low-income students. The proposal would encourage the recruitment of a diverse and excellent teaching force and promote the highest preparation. Our proposal would also address induction, those first critical years where 30 percent of new teachers leave the field because of poor support.

The Federal Government alone cannot solve all of our recruitment problems. It can, however, be a catalyst which simulates the recruitment of teachers where it is needed most. Therefore, we are considering a program whose objective is to increase the number of students, especially minority students who complete high quality teacher preparation programs and teach in high poverty areas.

In developing our proposals, we are keeping in mind several guiding principles of effective recruitment programs. For example, it is important that institutions of higher ed work in partnership with elementary and secondary school districts to determine the teaching needs of the districts. The partnership should then identify a pool of candidates fitting those needs, recruit individuals from this pool and design high quality induction programs tailored to those needs. We believe that paraprofessionals are a particularly rich pool of teacher candidates.

We also know that financial support can help teacher candidates with this education, but support is also important, especially for individuals such as paraprofessionals for whom scholarships alone are often not enough. A recruitment program based on these principles and targeted to communities with large concentrations of low-income students can help our Nation meet these critical recruitment challenges. We also face--yes, sir?

Chairman McKeon. Are you just about at the end?

Dr. Dozier. Yes, let me just quickly tell you about our teacher preparation plans. We face major challenges in this area and it is in large part due to the incredible diversity that we face.

Chairman McKeon. We have your full written testimony, but we are about out of time.

Dr. Dozier. Okay. What we are planning to do with teacher preparation is to identify best practices. It is critically important that we have the research and equalization to be able to definitively say how best to prepare teachers. So we are looking at identifying best practices, helping to disseminate them by partnering institutions that are doing a good job with institutions that seek to improve their practices, and working in very close collaboration with the elementary and secondary schools in designing these programs. Teachers and administrators in those schools should play a central role in both the design and implementation of those programs. So we look forward to working with you in the future on these issues.

See Appendix E for the written statement of Dr. Dozier

Chairman McKeon. Thank you very much. Let me introduce the rest of the panel, and then we will have you each take your time. Next, we will hear from Ms. Caren Matteucci, I hope I pronounced that right.

Ms. Matteucci. That is correct.

Chairman McKeon. She is a 5th grade classroom teacher at Pine Lane Intermediate School in Parker, Colorado, where she has been teaching since 1991. Ms. Matteucci received her Masters in Elementary Science Instruction and her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado at Denver. Then we will here from Ms. Lori Parise, a first grade teacher at Our Lady of Victory School here in Washington, D.C.. This past May she received her Masters of Education in Curriculum Development from Trinity College in Washington, D.C. and in 1995 graduated from Marywood College in Scranton, Pennsylvania, with a Bachelors of Science in Elementary Education.

Then we will hear from Ms. Joanne Cashman, Director of Leadership for Full Participation, which is an interdisciplinary doctoral program within the Department of Teacher Preparation and Special Education at George Washington University here in Washington. Concurrently, she is principal of Oaklyn Elementary School in the Shikellamy school district, Pennsylvania. And finally then Dr. Karen Zumwalt. Dr. Zumwalt is Dean of the Teachers College, Columbia University, in New York, New York.

Ms. Matteucci.

Ms. Matteucci. Thank you for having me here today, Mr. Chairman, and you can call me Ms. M. That is what I tell the kids, because my name is quite a mouthful. Just to start off with, I graduated from the University of Denver in 1991 working on a degree in international studies. I finished that up in my junior year and then I completed my undergraduate degree by going through the Teacher Certification Program at the University of Denver. That is an intensive one-year program geared mostly to people who had been out of the work force and decided to come back to education.

We met primarily on Saturdays and Wednesdays. We met for 2 hours of language arts in the morning, 2 hours of math, and then 2 hours of science, technology and society all combined. So I didn't take a class of, say, children's literature and then reading in the classroom or anything like that, it was taught all together. So it was very interesting to me when I graduated that people would say, well, didn't you have this in your ed/psych class, and I wouldn't know; no, actually I didn't get that. We had a guest speaker on this topic for one hour and that was it. But when I actually entered the classroom, there were some aspects of the program that were very, very beneficial. I was able to work with the math and the manipulatives and aligning with the standards from the NTCM committee. Being able to do all that, I was not well-versed in communicating with parents and letting them know why I was doing what I was doing. That eventually caused some problems because what I thought I was doing really well, and doing with the support of my principal and other teachers, but when the parents saw it, they asked where was the text book? In our district we have a BRT, the Building Resource Teacher Mentor Program. My mentor teacher really helped me to design a way to communicate with parents and still work with the kids with the method I had been taught, because I had never been taught to use a textbook for teaching math, or for reading, or for science.

I had no frame of reference for using a textbook. When parents started calling for that I had to take two steps backward and abandon what I had been taught in my college courses and gear my classroom towards what the parents wanted to see until a certain level of trust was reached. That was very tough.

Again, because I was taught to use manipulatives to teach math, and in a more open classroom structure, I wasn't taught classroom management. So when parents or the principal would come into my classroom and ask what was going on because there were kids scattered everywhere, and well, I really didn't know what was going on in there. So it was kind of tough at first. The reality was that as a first year teacher, I was not prepared. As soon as I had the comfort of classroom management, which happened during my first year of teaching and during my second year when I took classes offered through the district, I was finally able to go back to what I was taught in my college classes. And now I am entering my seventh year of teaching.

So my first couple of years were years that we struggled, and like you said, where teachers maybe leave teaching because they are not feeling successful, but luckily for me I had the support system of other teachers I worked with and the structure of the school, that I was able to survive and then go back to what I had learned in college and piece things all together.

See Appendix F for the written statement of Ms. Matteucci

Chairman McKeon. Thank you very much.

Ms. Parise.

Ms. Parise. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Members of the committee, I would like to introduce myself once again. My name is Lori Parise and I am the first grade teacher at Our Lady of Victory here in D.C. where I have been teaching for the past 2 years since entering the Teacher Service Corps of the Archdiocese of Washington after graduating from Marywood College in Pennsylvania.

I would like to thank you for this opportunity to speak before you today regarding pre-service training for educators. To begin with, I want to start with the statement that children are our future and it is imperative that we train teachers to effectively educate the future of our world. I raise two questions that are colleges and universities effectively training teachers to have the teacher help themselves in the classroom every day; and secondly, are funds and energies being channeled in proper directions to ensure that teachers are able to help the individual child while they were in the classroom.

To begin with, I would like to give a little bit of my background experience from Marywood College that I found was helpful and beneficial from my training. We were made to go into the classroom from freshman year on, to have hands on experiences working with students from the K through 6 level, with my particular degree, and I found that most effective in both the private and public schools. That was one benefit of my pre-service training.

Secondly, I was given a very extensive and broad academic base, where I was made to take classes from how to teach reading to how to teach the arts. Thirdly, I had very high standards. During our sophomore year we were made to go through a screening process where we were asked to provide a written sample of our writing, and to take the first portion of the actual national teachers exam; and finally, to go through an interview and screening process to see if, basically, we were fit to further ourselves in that educational degree.

As a new teacher, though, even though I felt I was very well trained through Marywood College, I still face many challenges each and every day in the classroom. To begin with, as was said before by one of my peers, one of the difficulties I faced was communication skills in dealing with the parents on a day-to-day basis. I needed to learn how to deal with parents in a non-confrontational yet informative way, especially on things we did not see eye to eye on.

Secondly, I found that those communication skills are necessary when dealing with colleagues in the school, because you are not generally used to and familiar with cooperating with teachers and doing peer lessons and team lessons and things of that nature. You are not trained to do that, in a sense.

Secondly, I think that as a new teacher I felt, I experienced challenges in terms of training to deal with multicultural sensitivity. In other words, I was given an academic base on how to teach children about multicultural issues and give them multicultural experiences, but I was not taught how to deal with children of different cultures in the classroom itself, and how to communicate and interact with their parents, things of that nature.

And thirdly, as was said earlier, too, I found that a very large problem was classroom management and discipline. You are made to interact with 30-plus children every day, and that was a huge problem that I faced, classroom management and discipline. Another area that I see that needs help in funding and programs being made is in terms of teachers helping the individual child.

Every day we are made to interact with students who come from abusive families, whether it be physical or sexual or emotional abuse, and these cases are coming into our classes more and more every day and we have not been trained to interact and cope or even to recognize what is happening in their homes.

Another thing is dealing with children with special and unique needs. There are children coming to our classrooms more and more each day that have disabilities, whom we have to interact with, and whom we have not been properly trained in our courses to deal with. We are also not trained well enough to deal with gifted and talented students on a day-to-day basis.

To conclude, because I see my red light is coming on, funding has to be properly channeled and I appreciate this opportunity to speak with you today, and I welcome any questions you may have where I could be of further assistance. Thank you.

See Appendix G for the written statement of Ms. Parise

Chairman McKeon. Thank you.

Ms. Cashman.

Ms. Cashman. Thank you for the opportunity, Mr. Chairman, to allow me to address the Committee this morning. As you said, my name is Joanne Cashman, and I am currently the Director of Leadership for Full Participation, an interdisciplinary doctoral program at Georgetown University. But I am new as a teacher educator. Until December, I was concurrently the principal and the supervisor of special education in the Shikellamy school district in Pennsylvania.

Over my 26 years in public education, I was a general education teacher, a special education teacher, I was a regular education administrator, I was a supervisor of special education, and through a technical consulting relationship with the Pennsylvania Department of Education, I helped both rural and urban schools to implement systemic reform strategies. So the remarks I am about to make today are really based on that experience.

They don't reflect the Leadership for Full Participation Program specifically or the George Washington University views specifically. Rather, they are my views based on what I believe is a broad and deep experience in trying to have teachers understand what the current challenge is. I want to frame these remarks by reviewing a quote which I read once that really touched me and helped me crystallize a lot of things. It is from Michael Fullan, the book, "New Meaning of Educational Change." He said educational change depends on what teachers think and what teachers do. It is that simple and it is that complex.

To me, that says it perfectly. It is simple because it focuses on what we need to do for teachers and it is complex because understanding what teachers think and do means we have to understand what constrains them from actually changing. And it is the way I would like to frame these remarks today.

As a special educator, I think it is important for us to understand what constrains teachers from changing, because as you said, the new wording of IDEA creates an even more important role for general educators in education. As a special educator, I understand that we not only have to give regular educators the techniques to deal with students who have special needs, but we need to help them deal with the other challenges so they can effectively focus on dealing with students with special needs. The way we have prepared teachers worked for a while. We trained them in content and we had them working alone in their classrooms. But now, things are much too interrelated for that and much too complicated for that.

We need to have teachers able to collaborate among themselves, with their administrators, with their communities, with parents, and we need to have teachers who see the interconnection of content and learning of classroom-based experiences and work-based experiences. I would like to look at improving pre-service programs by looking at the kinds of things that pose persistent problems to teachers in the field. Because by looking at those things, we lessen the chance that we will make the same mistakes with the new teachers that we may have made with our present teachers.

I see four persistent problems. First, program content is insufficient to prepare teachers to deal with the real problems in schools. Content has to be linked in every course, in every field experience with learning theory so they know how to deliver instruction that is sound in content. Secondly, all our educational barriers, all our barriers to achievement are not educational in nature. Teachers need to learn how to collaborate with parents and child-serving agencies if we are going to address the kinds of things we need to get out to improve performance for all children.

Third, the best practices that we focus on are not the reality of classroom instruction. So not only do we need to address those practices and continue to use best practices to point the way, to show us how we might be successful, but we need to have teachers understand that when they find a practice that is less than a best practice, they can somehow see what their building blocks are and be able to move toward that best practice.

Lastly, we need to have teachers have a more systemic look, they need to understand the interconnections. One of the biggest problems we face now is teachers do not understand the reform strategies. They don't see how they are linked together and don't see a thread running through them. The only way we can improve that is if teachers understand how things go together in schools, how elementary education fits with secondary, how general ed and special ed and voc ed all relate, and that has to be concrete right in their first class, drawn out of every field experience. It has to run through everything that we do in teachers' education.

I think there are a few strategies that will help us. First of all, we need to teach reflection and inquiry, and we need to practice reflection and inquiry in every educational endeavor. Secondly, we need to give the message that teachers have to be technically competent, but we are not looking for technicians. It is not a cookbook approach. You can know strategies, but it takes a thinking, feeling teacher to choose those strategies well.

We need to teach people how to work in teams because things are too complicated today for people to do it alone, and lastly we need to have teacher education programs that accept new rules, that they will be delivering instruction which may be traditional, but they have to do it in new ways, more reality-based, maybe in the classroom setting so we are using field experiences more, but possibly delivering teacher education right in real school settings.

As you look at Title V, I think you can move this agenda along in two ways. First of all, the way that you frame this problem is going to move these things up on the teacher education agenda. The kind of things that you frame for teachers to be prepared in doing will create interest in the professional world. And secondly, the way that you look at the current funding of teacher education programs can assure that we won't just have pockets of good programs, but there will be a national distribution of good programs that prepare teachers to educate students for employment, for citizenship, and eventually for change. Thank you very much. I appreciate the opportunity to address you this morning and to share my thoughts on this.

See Appendix H for the written statement of Ms. Cashman

Chairman McKeon. Thank you.

Dr. Zumwalt.

Dr. Zumwalt. Mr. Chairman, Representative McCarthy, thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak today. I am honored to be here. I have been Dean at Teachers College at Columbia University in New York City for 2 years now. We have the largest graduate school of education in the United States. We have approximately 4,700 students enrolled in 60 different programs of study in the areas of education, psychology and health.

About a third of our students are preparing to be teachers at the Master's degree level. We have no undergraduates. And given the previous panel, I should point out that we have 12 percent international students and 28 percent United States students who declared themselves as ethnic or racial minorities, so we have a 40 percent minority population.

Although we have a private institution, we have an 110-year commitment to public education as a feature of our democratic society. My own teaching career started 30 years ago as a teacher in inner-city Boston. After teaching in inner-city Cleveland and suburban Chicago, because I couldn't get certified in Chicago, I earned a doctorate and started a teacher career as a teacher educator, first at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, and then 20 years ago I came to Teachers College.

As I reflected on what I wanted to say to you this morning, I was reminded that my own choices to become a teacher and then a teacher educator were positively influenced by Federal policies in the sixties which enabled me to pursue my Masters and Doctoral programs in education. From my perspective, highest on the national agenda should be the goal of increasing the number of good teachers for rural and urban poor children.

All of our children deserve the kind of teachers that all of us in this room want for our own children. Good teachers are needed to break the cycle of poverty facing too many children in rural and urban public schools. These youngsters and the social and economic conditions they bring to school with them present challenges to even the best teachers. Unfortunately, year after year they are taught by unprepared teachers, often a series of substitutes, who would not be hired in the school districts certainly more privileged and middle-class communities in this country. Mediocrity perpetuates mediocrity. It is not good enough.

Federal initiatives, in two areas you are concerned with teacher recruitment and teacher preparation could be helpful in reaching the goal that good American children should be taught by good teachers. First, Federal financial initiatives could do more to help attract well-educated adults of all ages to teaching in hard-to-staff urban and rural areas.

Secondly, once attracted to teaching, Federal support could help ensure that these prospective teachers are prepared to meet the challenges of ensuring that all children learn in our public schools. First was recruitment. In the sixties, it was not just the Vietnam war nor desire to have a relevant career which drove a good portion of my generation to teaching. There was a generous loan repayment policy which forgave the loan if one taught in public schools.

As I remember, the loans were forgiven at a rate of 10 percent for each year of teaching up to 50 percent of the loan. If one taught in a Title I school, 20 percent was forgiven, up to 100 percent of the loan. I know for many of my generation, this was an incentive that made a difference. Reintroducing a similar forgivable loan policy could be a critical factor in attracting the next generation of teachers into our classrooms, particularly in the urban and rural areas which already have teacher shortages.

Because of demographic trends, it is estimated that up to 50 percent of our Nation's teaching force right now will have to be replaced in the next 10 years. That is up to 2 million teachers. Trends also indicate that as our school population becomes increasingly diverse, the proportion of minority teachers is declining, hence recruitment of teachers, especially minority teachers and teachers for rural and urban schools should be as critical today as it was for the national defense in the sixties.

Our Masters students at Teachers College graduate to become teachers at a debt of $45,000, owed mostly to the Federal Government. You can imagine how long it takes to pay off this debt at an entry level teacher salary and you can imagine how much pressure there is to leave teaching for easier and more lucrative kinds of work. Forgivable loan policies might encourage some to teach who might otherwise not be able to and to encourage more to stay in teaching. Such a Federal initiative would not only have an impact on recruitment of teachers for our Nation's schools, but send a symbolic message about the importance of teaching in our society.

In terms of preparation, recruiting well-educated, well-meaning people to the teaching profession is not enough. Good teaching is not easy nor something that happens naturally. Quality teacher education programs, be they undergraduate or Masters, are essential to providing a competent teaching force. Basically, a lot of this is in the State domain, but how can Federal initiatives help. It seems to me there are two areas where you can help, and these are long known as problems that have been mentioned by other people on the panel, and one is the real big problem we have in this profession is the teacher who graduates, goes into the classroom, and the first day has the same exact job as the teacher next door who has been teaching for 15 or 20 years.

We have to break that cycle, and as the teachers have explained here, all those things that happen in the beginning years that often are horrible for kids and make many teachers leave teaching, we have to break that with some sort of induction or internship introduction into teaching. And the second area related to, also something that the teachers said, and that is that much of what is learned in the college classroom is hard for new teachers to apply.

A new model and a better model which some of you may know is professional development schools, but it has a lot of other names, is when college faculty and school faculty and teachers are working together to problem solve about education for young people, and I hope that is what you can do with some, perhaps a major Federal investment, grants to States that have competitions to allow these, this money to go into programs that will have sustained change, not just a project here or there. We have to get out of that project orientation. Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to chat with you this morning.

Chairman McKeon. Thank you. I was just trying to take a few notes here as you were all speaking and this is a big subject. I spent 9 years on the school board and I saw some of the problems that you speak about. The last point you made just about a brand-new beginning teacher going into the classroom has all the responsibility and potential of a teacher that has been there for many years.

Some of the problems that you found when I was on the school board trying to deal with this, we tried to put in a mentor teacher program, and it was at first opposed by the union. They didn't want to do anything that set some teachers apart from other teachers, and we were giving a stipend to them, to the mentor teachers.

Now, this, we worked out, and I think it had some positive impact, but this just pointed out to me some of the problems you have in trying to institute change in education. It is very difficult. I talked to a friend years ago who was a principal in the LA unified district, principal of a high school. He told me at that time, that from the time a person conceives an idea until it is fully implemented throughout the LA unified school district took 20 years.

Right there you have some, you understand, some real basic problems. Ms. Matteucci, I think you talked about dealing with a mentor teacher, and Ms. Parise, you talked about your first year in college where you spent time in with students. Did you decide to be a teacher before you went to college?

Ms. Parise. Yes, I did.

Chairman McKeon. So that was your ambition. What do we do with students that maybe enter their junior or senior year and then decide to be a teacher? They are a little bit behind the curve.

Dr. Zumwalt. Then they come to our program, it is only a graduate program.

Chairman McKeon. And increase their student loans and their problems. I heard some good ideas and then I heard some things that are potential problems that we have to deal with. What would you do, how would you institute a program of internship where a teacher graduates and has a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of knowledge that they have just picked up from 4, 5, 6 years of school, want to go in right away and teach to kindergartners or first graders or second graders, and yet don't have a clue as to what it is like, what a classroom situation is like. When you talked about cultural differences, and then the dealings that you have with parents, how would you do that? What would you do to institute some kind of an internship program?

Dr. Dozier. This is, in fact, happening at the University of Cincinnati. They have a program where they are working in close collaboration with the Cincinnati public schools, and those candidates that are prospective teachers go through a program that has been designed jointly with the teachers and administrators in the public schools, so they don't enter that first day and are totally shocked. They are prepared for those settings, and through negotiations with the unions and other groups in the community, those teachers actually have a full year internship when they are not teaching a full load and so their transition into the profession is not complete.

Chairman McKeon. So they are graduates, they are hired teachers, but they don't start the first day with that kind of problem.

Dr. Dozier. Right.

Chairman McKeon. A one-year internship. We do this at the general tenure.

Dr. Dozier. I don't know when the tenure decision is made specifically for that school system. In many districts it is done anywhere from the second or third year, but I couldn't answer specifically for Cincinnati.

Chairman McKeon. But, you know, I think, as I see it, some of the problems that we have is some teachers can retain their enthusiasm for 20 or 30 years and still bring that same enthusiasm into the classrooms. Some burn out at the end of 5 years and then still put in the 20 or 25 years; and the students suffer, as does the teacher.

I see tenure as a problem there. You know, where you have teachers that have tenure and have union protection are totally insulated from any kind of fear of ever losing their job. I understand the need for that. But, at the same time, it causes real problems in trying to develop the kind of teachers and keep the kind of teachers that we need for our children and our grandchildren, as we go forward.

Everything we ever talk about always comes down to the teacher in the classroom. You can talk about all kind of administrations, all kinds of programs. You can talk about the Federal level, State level. It all comes down to the teacher.

Some teachers need all kinds of backup and resources and video and visual aids and all kinds of things. Some teachers go in and can motivate and develop a classroom just because of who they are and what they are and how they work. This is a big problem.

I am sure each of you have done very well and will continue to do well in working with young people, but we have millions of teachers.

My experience was we also lost some of the real good ones because they would get tired of putting up with what they had to put up with in the classroom. They would move to private industry. In some cases, we were left with teachers that couldn't do something else--not many--but I mean there were some cases like that. How could you motivate those teachers to do a better job or to move into some other field? This is a big, big problem.

Dr. Dozier. I would like to respond to the issue about the initial licensing of teachers, because that is an area that we also need to address as a Nation, to have very tough, rigorous standards for that initial licensing.

Today, you typically just have to have a degree of a college education that may or may be certified against any kind of rigorous standards.

Chairman McKeon. Actually, we have teachers hired in some cases that don't even have a degree.

Dr. Dozier. Absolutely. So we need initial licensing standards that are performance based.

We are encouraged at the Department with the work of 30 States that have banded together to form INTASC, which is the new Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium. And they are doing just that, trying to develop these rigorous, performance-based assessments.

I had the pleasure of going to Singapore recently and asked the people there why they thought they were doing so well and especially looking at their teacher development. One of the things they told me was they do a good job of screening up front before they let those people go into their classrooms.

Chairman McKeon. Okay. If you do that, that is very important.

What about in-service training? That is, as you move forward, keeping up to date, up to speed.

Dr. Dozier. Absolutely.

Chairman McKeon. I know in California we have had real opposition when we have tried to have tests for teachers. You know, they don't want that kind of thing.

I have gone way over time. Ms. McCarthy.

Ms. McCarthy. Thank you.

Number one, I have the most respect for teachers; and I thank you for your testimony. I spend Monday and Fridays in schools in my districts.

A number of points: Number one, everyone talks about urban schools and rural schools. I live in a suburban area, and we have good schools. But in my district we have four or five suburban that have the same exact problems as urban schools. We have gangs. We have kids falling out of school. So I think we have to stop talking about just urban and rural schools, because the suburban schools need just as much help today.

There is no distinction as far as the children are concerned. Children are children. All children should be taught the same, no matter where they live, because our world has become more complicated. Both parents are working most of the time. So we are seeing social problems, certainly in poorer areas. But we are also seeing these social problems in the good schools.

Number two, I want to discuss tenure. I had learned about tenure in the last year. Again, I talk to a lot of the teachers. The teachers themselves would love to get rid of those teachers that don't love to teach.

Tenure came into this system for very good reasons. Those reasons are still there. A year ago, I probably would have said, let's get rid of tenure. That is the way we will get rid of good teachers, not bad teachers. I don't believe in that anymore.

Number three, I graduated from nursing school. We had to pass State boards. We are professionals. Teachers are professionals, and we should help them reach the highest level. They are teaching our children, who are our future.

Last week, I happened to read in my local newspaper, that they were hiring 28 teachers, a little bit further east from my district. They had 450 applications. The school board decided to give a test. Half the applicants—teachers who graduated from teaching schools, could not pass a 12th grade test.

We have to raise standards for our teachers. We will give all teachers a lot more credibility in the profession that they are in. Unfortunately, it seems that we are bashing teachers constantly. We shouldn't be. There are a lot of good teachers out there. I see them every week. But we have to set national standards for our teachers, and they have to be met before they are out working in the classroom. They should have an internship program, find out if they really like being in teaching.

These are things that I want to address. I think we have to start at the college level. I would certainly like your input. If we are graduating teachers, I believe they should pass a test to graduate. I also believe they should take State boards as any profession does, whether they are a doctor, a nurse, or other professions. Teachers are a profession, too.

Thank you. Would you answer that?

Dr. Dozier. Certainly. As you know, the Federal Government cannot mandate the standards for teacher education. But one of the things we are very much encouraging and supporting is, as I said earlier, that idea of rigorous standards for the initial licensing of teachers.

Because, as a teacher, I would agree that you need to be able to show that you not only have the knowledge but also the skills to be effective. I believe that is the way that we are going to eventually close down those programs that are not effective. Because when those kinds of passage rates are made public--

In fact, there was just an article yesterday in the daily news about the CUNY system and teachers having problems in passing there. When that is made public, then the marketplace will deal with those programs. One of the reasons why we are really stressing identifying those best practices is so we begin to have some consensus in this country about how we should be preparing our teachers.

Dr. Zumwalt. I think, actually, in New York State, teaching is not a profession legally; and one of the efforts of the reform movement is to professionalize teaching, which includes having rigorous standards and being accountable as a professional. Each of the States I think are taking on this challenge in different ways. In New York State, we do have a series of tests where you know now how low the passage rate is amongst some of our programs.

I think critical to the issue is teacher education, and I am just using New York State as an example because I know it, and I know you know it. We prepare in New York State more teachers than we would ever need in any year, and one of the reasons we do that is that anybody who meets this sort of minimum standard can get into a teacher education program. Many colleges are raising those standards. But, also, any college can run a teacher education program. So then the State education department does not have the financial resources to evaluate those programs the way they used to.

So I think the accreditation or approval of teacher ed programs--and I would have to say closing quite a few of them should be something that we should be focusing on. But, again, that is a State issue rather than something that Federal policy can help.

I guess the way Federal policy could help is to give grants to States who would then use them for systemic change within the State to put in an approval process, to raise programs. But you know, nobody wants the teacher education program in their district closed. So the legislature in the State has a great investment in keeping up programs that probably should have been closed long ago, too.

Chairman McKeon. Okay, Mr. Hinojosa.

Mr. Hinojosa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I come from a family that has a lot of teachers. My daughter, Laura, is an English teacher; and my in-laws are teachers. One is a librarian. Another is a superintendent. We have had discussions like we are having today on qualified teachers.

So I want to make a statement, because there is a proposal that has come before me for consideration that will probably wind up being a bill considered by our committee. It has in its draft--and it is only in a rough draft that I am looking at.

It says: Statement of policy. That Congress declares it to be the policy of the United States that every student shall have a competent and qualified teacher. My colleagues, of course, have been addressing this; and you all have been responding.

I would like to ask you a question in how you would react if, in this bill, which would be considered--and, again, I repeat, this is in rough draft--the parent right to know. Each public school that receives funds under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act shall make available to the parents of each student information regarding the qualifications of the student's teacher, both generally and with regard to the content areas in which the teacher provides instruction.

If this were a bill that was passed in Congress, how do you all react to that?

Dr. Dozier. Let me say that one commitment that the Secretary has made to the quality of our teaching force is the issuing of a biannual national report card on teacher quality, where we would begin to identify for the public, because many people are not aware that we have people who are unqualified in our classrooms.

We would identify for the public the number of teachers, for example, teaching out of field or who are on emergency licenses and so forth. In this way, we would hope to arm parents with that information where they could go themselves and talk to the principals, administrators in the district to find out the qualifications of the teachers in their schools.

Mr. Hinojosa. Well, I am afraid, though, that many parents don't have the training to be able to go to the school and be able to ask the right questions and to be able to get that kind of information.

I can honestly tell you that many parents who go to Parent-Teacher Association meetings and to open houses that they have in the schools oftentimes have the best of intentions, but they have never been trained on how to be the effective parents that they want to be. They don't have the training. So how would you resolve that problem?

Mr. Corwin. Mr. Hinojosa, we actually in our Elementary and Secondary Education Act have a great deal of pretty strong language on parent involvement, particularly in the Title I program. As that program was reauthorized just a few years ago in 1994, it requires for each of those Title I schools that they enter into contracts with parents to ensure that those parents who tend to be the parents of the most at-risk kids are well informed of what is going on, are full partners in the education of their children.

It sounds like the draft language that you are looking at is fairly similar to that. We would have to take a careful look at it, because there are a number of these sort of add-ons to ESEA that require our school districts or States to take certain actions in order to get those funds. Sometimes they have, I think, mainly symbolic importance. Sometimes they can be effective. So we would want to work with you on that.

Mr. Hinojosa. Well, I am running out of time here. But I would like to say that, even though I endorse the idea of making teaching a professional career, that they be paid as professionals, that the pay be increased just like we pay a beginning vocational nurse $30,000 without any experience, just having that certificate, that teachers also be paid as such.

I think that there has been a disservice to the teaching profession in allowing that there be such a disparity in what is being paid in the business world as compared to what is being paid in the education community; and if that is to happen, if we are going to require that they be certified and be professionals and all this, I think that the pay needs to be increased; and I would support it.

Chairman McKeon. Well, I know we could sit here and talk for days about this. Because as Ms. McCarthy and I were discussing-- we have raised six children and now we have 15 grandchildren, and we have some of the same concerns.

She just made the comment that as soon as we know which teacher our children are being assigned to, there is kind of a scurrying around. You know, could we get this teacher instead? That has gone on. I know it happened when I was in school. I am sure it happened when my parents, grandparents were in school; and it continues to happen.

I can think back of the teachers that I had. I can remember some from elementary school, the really good ones and some that I didn't really like. I can remember from junior high and high school and college. There are always certain teachers that stand out in your mind.

You know, we keep talking about the story, you can tell how many seeds there are in an apple but you can't count the number of apples in a seed. A teacher has such a great impact actually down through centuries if they are really doing their job that we can never undervalue the great work of a great teacher--or, the work of a teacher that isn't so great. Because the things that don't get learned that should get learned.

So it is a big problem. How you can get people properly trained and motivated to do this kind of work is big challenge. I think you have given us some outstanding suggestions, both in your written and your spoken testimony here today; and we will use that as we go forward in the higher ed reauthorization there.

I know there are numerous proposals coming to us on what we can do to improve teacher training. We would encourage you to follow closely this process and to stay involved and to help us if you see us moving off in the wrong direction. If you think of things that you would have said had you had more time today or things you would think about when you get home, if you will drop us a note or give us a call, we will be sure to get that in the written record also.

Again, thank you very much

That concludes our hearing this morning. Thank you.

[Whereupon, at 11:53 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]