President Clinton and Americans are
Meeting the Challenge of Cherishing our Children
May 31, 1996
An outstanding record of accomplishment
for our children. President
Clinton is committed to protecting our children, improving their
quality of health, expanding educational opportunities, ensuring
economic opportunities for their parents, and strengthening parents'
capacity to nurture healthy families.
Cherishing our Children:
- WIC. The Clinton Administration is
committed to fully funding the
Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and
Children (WIC), reaching 7.5 million participants by the end of FY
1997. This program works: Every dollar invested in the pre-natal
portion of WIC has been proven to save up to $4.25 in preventive
health-care costs.
- Immunizations. President Clinton established a Childhood
Immunization Initiative to ensure vaccinations and healthy futures
for all children. In 1995, the immunization rate for two-year old
children reached 75%, an historic high.
- Removing barriers to adoption. The Administration is working to
encourage adoption, including adoption of children with special
needs, and to reduce the amount of time children spend in foster
care. President Clinton also strongly supports the adoption tax
credit in the Adoption Promotion Stability Act of 1996. During
this Administration, there has been a 60 percent increase in the
number of children with special needs adopted with federal
assistance.
- Protecting Medicaid for women and children.
President Clinton is
committed, as he demonstrated in his balanced budget, to
protecting Medicaid, which covers two-thirds of pregnant women and
children.
- Child care. Every budget submitted by President Clinton has
included increases to improve and expand child care services. In
addition, the Administration has launched a National Child Care
Information Center for policy makers and the public, and
highlighted solutions for including children with disabilities in
child care through technical assistance to states.
- Ensuring responsibility, enforcing child support.
Through tougher
enforcement, a record $11 billion in child support was collected
in 1995, a nearly 40 percent increase over 1992. President
Clinton has issued an Executive Order to help track down federal
workers who fail to pay child support.
- The Earned Income Tax Credit. President Clinton's balanced budget
continues the expansion of tax relief for millions of working
families and their children.
- Giving parents the tools they need, protecting children from TV
violence. President Clinton gave parents greater control over
what their children watch on television by requiring the
installation of anti-violence screening chips ("V-Chips") in all
new televisions. In addition, the President announced a
breakthrough agreement with the media and entertainment industry
to develop a television ratings system to enable parents to
protect their children from violence and adult content.
- Helping to stop teen tobacco use.
President Clinton has proposed
targeted measures to cut off children's access to tobacco products
and reduce their appeal to children.
- Combating teen pregnancy. The President has worked with
community, business and religious leaders to form a national
campaign to reduce teen pregnancy.
Keeping our Children Safe:
- Combatting youth drug use. The number
one priority of President
Clinton's 1996 National Drug Control strategy is to motivate
America's youth to reject illegal drugs and substance abuse. The
first ever White House Conference on Youth, Drug Use and Violence
in March 1996 launched a national media literacy and drug
deglamorization campaign aimed at youth.
- Supporting community-based curfews. President
Clinton believes
that curfews, when they are backed by a community of support and
are a part of a larger plan to help fight juvenile crime, can play
an important role in keeping our children safe.
- Keeping our communities safe. The
President's 1994 Crime Bill is
putting 100,000 new police on the streets in our neighborhoods,
while his Anti-gang and Youth Violence Control Act of 1996 will
strengthen laws that will help stop the rise of youth violence and
drug use, including expanded use of drug and gun courts.
Helping our Children Get the Education They Need:
- A major expansion of Head Start.
President Clinton has made a
commitment to fund one million Head Start opportunities for
preschool children by 2002. Since taking office, President
Clinton has increased funding for Head Start by almost $800
million to serve tens of thousands of additional children.
- Keeping our schools safe. President
Clinton believes that we
should be exposing our children to good teaching and learning, not
violence and crime, and that schools should be able to focus on
education, not crime prevention. President Clinton expanded the
Safe and Drug Free Schools Act, so that 97 percent of the school
districts in America can use those funds to keep violence and
drugs away from students and our schools. President Clinton also
signed the Gun Free Schools Act that demands "zero tolerance" --
if you bring a gun to school, you don't come back for a year.
Finally, President Clinton has encouraged schools to adopt school
uniform policies, which promote discipline and respect. The
Administration has developed a guide for schools to assist them in
establishing these policies, which will be distributed to 16,000
school districts.
- A balanced budget that supports what works.
President Clinton's
budget increases funding for education and training programs that
work, such as Pell Grants, Safe & Drug Free Schools, Charter
Schools, School to Work, and Goals 2000. His balanced budget
calls for a 24 percent increase in major education and training
programs for 1997 over 1993 levels.
- Investing in education. Through Goals
2000, President Clinton
supported the development of standards of excellence for students
while encouraging grass-roots local reforms to improve our
schools. In addition, President Clinton gave schools greater
flexibility to use federal aid and develop effective teaching
innovations to help economically disadvantaged students achieve
their full potential.
- Preparing our schools for the 21st century.
President Clinton has
proposed a $2 billion Technology Literacy Challenge Fund to help
communities and the private sector ensure that every student is
equipped with the technology literacy skills needed for the 21st
century. Additionally, President Clinton has been joined by the
nation's education leaders, parents and business groups in the
creation of a new voluntary teacher corps -- 21st Century Teachers
-- to help all teachers learn how to use new technology to improve
teaching and learning in every school, classroom and home in
America. Over 100,000 teachers already familiar with the new
technology will train more than 500,000 teachers nationwide.
Opening the Doors to Higher Education:
- More affordable loans. President
Clinton reformed the student
loan program, making college more affordable this year for more
than 5 million students and saving taxpayers billions of dollars.
- Preserving National Service. The
President's AmeriCorps program
enabled 45,000 volunteers to earn money for college by serving
their communities and their country.
- Innovative initiatives. President
Clinton has proposed a number
of other new initiatives to provide greater access to higher
education for more of America's youth:
- $1000 Honors Scholarships for the top five percent of
graduates from every high school
- Expansion of work study to reach 1 million students by the
year 2000
- A $10,000 tuition tax deduction to help middle-class families
afford college.