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U.S.
Office of Personnel Management
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Education and Opportunity
Thank you. Its a great honor to be here. I want to thank your principal, Jim Andersen, and everyone connected with your school, not only for the invitation to be here, but for what you are doing here. It is truly inspiring, and we in Washington have much more to learn from you than you do from us.
At President Clinton's request, I and other administration officials have been visiting schools across the country, to emphasize the Presidents commitment to public education as a great instrument for change in our society.
I've been to two other schools in recent weeks, in Vermont and Florida, and frankly they were a great deal different from Horizonte.
Those schools didn't have the diversity you have here and their students didn't face the range of challenges that you face. Some of you are from other countries. Some of you speak English as your second language. Some of you face other social or economic challenges. But you have important advantages too. First of all, you have this school, which is using innovation and dedication and flexibility to make Horizonte an international symbol of multiculturalism and of excellence in alternative education.
I salute you for what you are doing -- all of you, students and teachers and administrators and everyone who has made this school such a beacon of hope.
Although some of your programs are new, in other ways Horizonte embodies the oldest and most basic of American values, and that is our belief in opportunity for all.
When President Clinton first announced his candidacy for President, late in 1991, he said that our mission as a people must be to keep the American Dream alive for all who would work for it.
I wish the President could be here today, because I know how much he would appreciate what you are doing. I think it is because of his belief in people like you, and what you represent, and what you offer our nation, that he keeps working so tirelessly in the face of a great deal of unfair criticism and blind opposition.
I know that to many of you the obstacles you face must seem immense. But remember that overcoming those obstacles is a proud part of our American tradition.
My predecessor at the Office of Personnel Management was Irish-American. His grandparents came here as immigrants and his grandfather worked in the coal mines. They could remember when there were signs outside factories and stores in Massachusetts that said, No Irish Need Apply. But the Irish kept working and kept believing and in 1960 we saw John F. Kennedy elected President of the United States. That was a great, historic breakthrough for Irish-Americans, just as other waves of immigrants have scored their own breakthroughs over the years.
As a woman, I'm proud to serve in an Administration that has the first woman Attorney General, Janet Reno, and the first woman Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright -- as well as a woman of color, Alexis Herman, as Secretary of Labor.
I'm proud, too, that this Administration has included such outstanding Hispanics as Henry Cisneros, the Presidents first Secretary of Housing, Federico Pena, who has been both Secretary of Transportation and Energy, and Bill Richardson, who is now our Ambassador to the United Nations.
President Clinton promised a government that looks like the American people -- and more than any other President in history he has achieved that goal.
No, I'm not saying that this Administration is as diverse as Horizonte -- I don't know who is, outside of the United Nations -- but we've done a good job.
You at Horizonte are simply ahead of the rest of the country on diversity, but in time the country will catch up. Within a decade our largest state, California, will have no majority race. Within just a few decades our entire country will have no majority race.
The simple fact is that this country's future is as a multi-racial, multi-ethnic, multi-religious democracy -- and we are going to draw strength and inspiration from you and all the nations and cultures and viewpoints that you represent.
There are many things I admire about Horizonte's program, but I want especially to mention your emphasis on technology. My agency, the Office of Personnel Management, is involved in hiring young people for the federal government, and there is no skill more basic in the federal workforce today than the knowledge of computers and other office technology.
As you may know, one of the President's goals is to have every American classroom and library hooked up to the Internet by the year 2000. As I understand it, you already have fifty computers here, and you're hooked up to the Internet, and use other equipment as well.
So I can only urge you to take full advantage of this opportunity to learn these skills, because they will serve you well, in almost any field you choose to enter.
I might add that, although the government is downsizing, there are still some openings for qualified individuals. Were on the Internet, too, so visit us at www.usajobs.gov. You'll find there an up-to-date listing of positions that are available, and that you can tailor to your individual needs.
The President believes deeply in public education. Let me quote something he said in a speech just last week:
Equal opportunity is our central value, he said, but the very meaning of that has fundamentally changed. For example, in the 19th century, opportunity meant access to a land grant. In the 21st century, it will mean access to a Pell Grant to a community college, to a trade school, or to a university.
As part of his educational agenda for the 21st century, the President has proposed voluntary, nationwide testing in fourth-grade reading and eighth-grade math. The point of these tests is to inform parents, teachers and principals about how well students are doing in these basic skills, and to identify the areas where they need to improve.
I realize that all of you are beyond the eighth grade, but the goal of this proposal - and there are those who oppose it -- is simply to set high standards. Because if you are going to compete in our society, and if we as a nation are going to compete in the international marketplace, we need high standards, everyone of us. The President believes that, the Horizonte school believes it, and I think you believe it too.
The President has also proposed an America Reads program, which would train tutors to work with children after school and weekends and summers and help them catch up on their reading skills if they are behind. And that is important because nothing is more fundamental to your education than your ability to read. Part of America Reads is a program in which colleges can let their work-study students go into local schools and tutor children there. Already, more than seven hundred colleges and universities have signed up and that is going to be a tremendous source of volunteers to help young people who need and deserve our help.
The President's recent budget agreement with Congress contains the biggest increase in funds for higher education in fifty years. Not only the largest Pell Grant budget in our history, but in the last two budgets 300,000 more work-study positions, new opportunities for savings in IRAs for college, and tax credits of up to $1500 a year to help parents send their children to the first two years of college.
The President has often said that he wants to make the first two years of college as normal and accepted a goal as a high school diploma used to be. And he supports programs that help people go on for four years of college and to graduate school, if they have the desire and the ability to do that.
I want to stress that the President and Congress have a budget agreement, but now the funds must actually be authorized, and that includes the funds for many of his educational initiatives. So now we are all waiting and watching to see if Congress will actually provide the funds that are essential if we are to meet our educational goals. Last Thursday, the Senate voted overwhelmingly (87-13) in favor of the Presidents testing program, and we are hopeful that the House will soon add its approval.
Education doesn't take place in a vacuum. Those of you who go in search of work this year will be entering an American economy that is the strongest it has been in many years.
Unemployment is below five percent. We've seen more than 13 million jobs created since 1993. Inflation is low and is stable. Investment growth and consumer confidence are at their highest levels in a generation, and family incomes are starting to rise again.
I confess that, like most people, I don't really understand our economy. But I do know one thing. This President has worked very hard on the economy, and made some tough decisions, and fought hard for a balanced budget and for trade agreements and tax policies that would create this strong economy and benefit working people who have to sink or swim in the economy, however good or bad it may be.
Economics is a very complex issue -- it is sometimes called the dismal science -- but the bottom line is people, how they live their lives, how they are rewarded for their work, and I am proud that this President has created an economy that is so favorable for people like you, and I know he is going to keep working to make it even better.
I understand that Horizonte is receiving federal funds that are used for adult education programs, and for teaching English as a second language, and that Horizonte students enrolled in the federal Job Training Partnership program in the summer of 1996 had an average of two years growth in math and reading -- that's very impressive.
The improvement in your SAT scores is impressive too -- I know how hard you and your teachers worked for those achievements.
I'm glad your school is receiving federal funding. Frankly, I don't know a better use for that money.
But let me say this, too. The federal government can help. Your state and local governments can help. Your teachers and this outstanding, student-centered school can help. But, ultimately, no one can help you as much as you can help yourselves.
Ours is a big, complex, often bewildering society, and to work your way up in it can seem awfully daunting. But it can be done. Millions of people do it every year. But there are no quick fixes, no short cuts. Don't count on winning the lottery.
Count on yourself. Your own intelligence, your own dreams, your own determination, and what Winston Churchill once called your own blood, sweat and tears.
There's an old expression in America for achieving success. Its called pulling yourself up by your bootstraps.
By the laws of physics, that's impossible -- you cant pull yourself up by your bootstraps.
But life isn't always ruled by the laws of physics, and you can pull yourselves up, from wherever you are to wherever you want to be, if you work hard enough and care deeply enough.
There is a horizon out there, a limitless horizante for you and for all Americans, and I hope you reach out for it and grasp it and make it your own.
Thank you so much for having me here.
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Web page created 23 October 1997