Biden welcomes students back to school as Republicans target public education
By Steve Holland and Trevor Hunnicutt
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -President Joe Biden visited a Washington, D.C. public middle school on Monday, highlighting the federal government's efforts to combat cratering U.S. student performance since the COVID-19 pandemic, as Republicans target public education in the run-up to the 2024 election.
Biden, who returned on Saturday from a week-long vacation, marked the first day of public school in the U.S. capitol with his own trip to Washington's Eliot-Hine Middle School. He and first lady Jill Biden were greeted by excited young teenagers, shouts of «Joe Biden» and squeals as he walked into a classroom.
«The hardest thing is to come back after three months of not doing any work, not doing any homework, and all of a sudden… everybody has a lot to catch up on from the end of the last year,» Biden told students.
The Capitol Hill area school for children aged 11 to 13 is working to boost its predominantly low-income students' arithmetic with a tutoring program in partnership with George Washington University.
The Biden administration has pushed Congress to hike funding for public schools, including those that hire mental health professionals, through a bipartisan gun safety law last year. The vast majority of American kids, some 49.4 million in 2021, attend one of the country's nearly 100,000 free public schools that run though 12th grade.
They're mostly funded by local taxes, but Biden has also been directing more federal money into after-school programs, teacher apprenticeships, schools serving low-income students and public-private partnerships that bring tutors into classrooms.
Republicans, including Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, looking to elevate hot-button issues in the
Read more on investing.com
