Education

A strong education system is the best investment we can make as we lay the groundwork for an economic recovery. A high quality public education is a cornerstone of democracy. Communities succeed when the government makes a strong commitment to education at all levels – for infants and families, for elementary and secondary students, for higher education, for career and job training, and for literacy in the workforce. Providing substantial federal support for education at each of these levels is a fundamental task of government.

Early Education
A federal commitment to early education programs, family literacy, and support services for pre-school children is fundamentally important. This is the best way to ensure that children begin school ready to learn and prepared to succeed. Rep. Grijalva supports federal commitment to universal pre-K and improving and expanding Head Start and Early Head Start programs. He has worked to support family literacy by supporting the Even Start program and by introducing the FLUEnT Act to improve programs for family literacy surrounding English language acquisition.

The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA):
Improving this bill is an important part of why Rep. Grijalva decided to run for Congress, and there is much work to be done. If we are to succeed as a country and lead the world again in education, we need a strong, rigorous school accountability system and the implementation of policies that are proven to work.

America’s public schools are struggling to help today's students, who face several major obstacles. The job market is a tough prospect for today's high schoolers and college graduates. Increased global competitiveness and shrinking state budgets have strained many public schools beyond their limits.

There are many elements of reform that can lead to success. While the goals and initiatives of the Obama administration and the Department of Education have made a positive contribution, many reforms must be made through legislation in Congress.

There are many things that affect Southern Arizona that should be addressed in reauthorization. Our state's budget problems have already adversely impacted education at all levels in our state, and threaten to do irreversible damage. ESEA reauthorization will need meaningfully  to address English language learners (ELLs); this is true nationally, but in Arizona in particular. A poorly developed policy coupled with paltry investment threatens the education of all ELLs.

As part of comprehensive ESEA reform, Rep. Grijalva has proposed important legislation and cosponsored other bills. One of his top priorities is improving middle schools and performance in the middle grades, which have been underfunded and overlooked for many years at the federal level. Today, when so much emphasis is placed on middle grade performance and high-stakes testing is focused on these years, we need to ensure that middle schools are given the support they need to succeed.

The dropout crisis is hurting our youth, deflating our economy, and compromising our national competitiveness. He has introduced the Success in the Middle Act to address these concerns. This bill seeks to provide federal support to middle schools to help them share best practices, identify students who are struggling and at risk of dropping out, and create effective innovations to keep students in school and help them succeed. He has been working with his colleagues to address this issue at the high school level as well, and is an original cosponsor of the Graduation Promise Act to do just that.

Rep. Grijalva has worked hard to ensure that schools will have a state certified and highly qualified library specialist. We need to ensure that students can appreciate libraries as a resource, learn the necessary skills of using library services, and receive needed guidance on research and library-based learning.

Higher Education:
Rep. Grijalva believes in ensuring national access to higher education, and worked hard last Congress to improve the federal commitment to higher education and save billions of dollars in education funding and support increases in Pell Grants. Those grants have recently been threatened in the new Congress due to cost-cutting pressures, which he believes should never reduce our nation’s education quality.

He has also worked to increase aid to community colleges, both for program development and for facility construction and improvement. He has vowed to continue to support adult education programs that aid local economies by providing support for everything from adult basic education to English language acquisition to job training and improvement.