School Readiness Act of 2005

SCHOOL READINESS ACT OF 2005 -- (House of Representatives - September 22, 2005)

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. LaHood). Pursuant to House Resolution 455 and rule XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill, H.R. 2123.

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Mr. HONDA. Mr. Chairman, as a former teacher and principal, I rise today to voice my support for H.R. 2123, the bipartisan Head Start bill.

Since 1965, Head Start has helped over 20 million children build the confidence and skills they need to succeed in school and to become the leaders and productive citizens of the future. Children cannot learn when they are hungry, sick, or too worried about their families to concentrate in school. That is precisely why we need Head Start.

Head Start is unique in its comprehensive approach to supporting children and families, offering early education, health care, social services, and nutrition services, while emphasizing parent involvement and support. This approach has represented a formula for success for nearly 40 years.

I am pleased that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have not pursued their strategy of last year and have worked with Members from this side of the aisle to produce a bill that does not include the block grant proposal that was advanced in the last Congress.

I am also pleased that the bill will align Head Start curricula with K-12 education while preserving the comprehensive nature of the Head Start program. This will support effective transitions for children's learning and development and ensure that children will enter school ready to learn. At the same time, the proposal will provide continuity for children by retaining the essential parental involvement, nutrition, and other non-academic features of Head Start.

I am glad that H.R. 2123 has a strong focus on early childhood educator professional development. Improving teacher quality in Head Start is critical to increasing overall program quality and helping more children reach kindergarten better prepared to succeed. I am concerned, however, that while the bill requires teachers to have higher academic degrees, it provides no funding to support the implementation of its important teacher quality provisions. Improving teacher quality is very important, but without providing the means to support the provision, the initiative is severely undercut. I hope that this problem is addressed in conference.

Despite my support for the bill, I will vote against it if the divisive amendment being offered by Mr. BOUSTANY passes. I strongly oppose this amendment, which would allow faith based-sponsored Head Start programs to use Federal taxpayer dollars to discriminate against qualified teachers and other employees solely because of their religion or personal religious views.

Head Start began as a civil rights platform--ensuring that all children, regardless of race, ethnicity, or religion--get a head start in life. This amendment would roll back civil rights for Head Start teachers and parent volunteers by allowing religious discrimination. This is an outright assault on religious liberty and civil rights in federally funded programs. To trample on this now will turn back the clock on the progress we have made in protecting the civil rights of the people we entrust to give our children a head start.

Allowing discrimination based on religion would significantly impede the important goals of Head Start as well as sending a damaging message to students. Religious institutions have been providing invaluable Head Start services for years and do not need this misguided amendment to continue their good work.

As chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, I recognize how important Head Start is to APA communities. Nationwide, over 25,000 APA children are served by Head Start. In California alone, over 6,000 APA children are enrolled in Head Start, with over half of them coming from homes where English is not the primary language.

I want to support the improvements in Head Start that this bill will make in order to provide the children in these communities with the opportunities they richly deserve. But these communities, which have had to fight so hard to protect their own civil rights, do not want a Head Start program that discriminates and do not want Congress to act for the first time to specifically repeal civil rights protections against discrimination.

Mr. Chairman, I urge all Members to put the needs of children first, vote against the Boustany amendment which is a poison pill that will kill this bill, and make a real commitment to improve the Head Start program.

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