John McCain: Town Hall Meeting 07/09/08

John McCain
Town Hall Meeting
Portsmouth, OH 07/09/08

TRANSCRIPT:
QUESTIONER: "I've been a teacher for about 31 years. What is your feeling about No Child Left Behind?"

JOHN MCCAIN: "Thank you. By the way, did I mention that Cindy was a teacher of special education before I took her out of that honest line of work?

MCCAIN: "[...] I think No Child Left Behind needs to be fixed. However, I think it was a right beginning. I think we need to be able to judge [...] students' performance all over America. [...] But now [...] we need to go back and sit down together again Republican and Democrat and fix what needs to be fixed.

MCCAIN: "And [...] some of what needs to be fixed is more full funding for some of the programs that were never adequately funded, as you know. Including special education. Including this terrible problem that you're very aware of in this rise in autism amongst children in America. It's a terrible thing that's happening. And it's going to require additional educational capabilities.

MCCAIN: "So I want to fix it but I also have to give you a little more straight talk. I'm for choice and competition. Now Cindy and I had the money to send—the ability to send our kids to Catholic school. I want every American to be able to send their child to the school of their choice.

MCCAIN: "[...] Charter schools work. Charter schools are good competition. Some of them don't work. Some of them don't work, so they should fail. But if you look at New York City today and if you look at New Orleans [...] New York City's education has improved rather dramatically. And also, New Orleans because they had to start from Square One because of the tragedy of Katrina; they know have 30 charter schools there. And the quality of education is improving.

MCCAIN: "Learn the lessons of No Child Left Behind. Fix the problem. Reward good teachers. Find bad teachers another line of work. Fix education, which is the future of America."

LABEL: JM OH 7-9 (SD#25) GHBST-ClipE

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