TODAY at the Carter Center in Atlanta, Georgia, Secretary Riley
delivered his fourth annual "State of American Education" address. Here
are most of his remarks (which continue in a second message). The full
text will be available soon in our Online Library at:
http://www.ed.gov/news.html
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PUTTING STANDARDS OF EXCELLENCE INTO ACTION
The Carter Center, Atlanta, Georgia
February 18, 1997
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I am pleased to be here in Atlanta to give my fourth annual state of
American education speech.
All of these speeches, and the one I intend to give today, are rooted in my
belief that we need to stop dumbing down our children, and reach up and set
higher expectations. We need to unleash all the brain power stored in the
heads of America's young people, and make excellence happen. Our children
are smarter than we think. We must give them more responsibility as young
children and then expect more of them as they grow and develop.
If ever there was a time to push American education to a higher level, it
is now. Everywhere I go I feel it -- the excitement and the determination
of the American people to expect more from our schools and more from their
children. This preoccupation with education is as old as America itself.
Even before they wrote the Constitution, our Founding Fathers set aside
land for the common school. Now, at the edge of the 21st century, the high
expectations of the American people can only be achieved if we strive for
national standards of excellence, and commit ourselves to decisive reform
on every front.
This is the purpose of my speech today: to suggest to you how we can put
standards of excellence into action to improve American education. And to
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