I believe that education is first, last and always about our children. Every child, regardless of family income, should have the right to a quality education. We need to increase the role of parents in the day-to-day education of their children and decrease the role of Washington.

It is a widely-shared sentiment that schools need to do a better job of preparing students for the workplace. However, federal spending for public education has increased in the last few decades. We are constantly faced with signs that we are failing in our mission to educate our nation’s children. Recent studies have proven that American students, when tested against the rest of the world, are consistently ranked near the bottom in math and the sciences. This atrocity should not be happening in our country. I believe that the federal government should get out of the education business and give the power to the state and local authorities who best know the curriculum.

I support efforts to return educational decision-making to parents, teachers, and local school administrators. I also strongly support legislation to require that 95 percent of all federal education dollars be spent in the classroom—not on regulation and bureaucracy in Washington, DC.

Specifically, last Congress I was a cosponsor of the A-Plus Act which would give states the flexibility to consolidate federal education programs and funding and redirect these resources to result-oriented state education initiatives. Currently, the U.S. Department of Education forces states to use federal education funds on specific programs in an approach that has shown little success. I will continue to support this and other similar legislative initiatives in the current 113th Congress.