My view is this, that if you work hard and you want to go to college, you can find all the help you want. Now, some people don't like repaying loans, but that's part of life.

As yesterday's positive report card shows, childrens do learn when standards are high and results are measured.

When you find an inner-city kid that may not have the right curriculum to get he or she up to the grade level at the 4th grade, let's solve it now. Let's not wait. No Child Left Behind is workin', and it needs to be reauthorized by the United States Congress.

Why do we need 30,000 math and science professionals to go into classrooms to stimulate interest? Because we can't be a competitive nation without more scientists and more mathematicians. Because in order for us to make sure the best jobs are in America requires us having mathematicians and scientists and engineers and physicists. And the best way to stimulate that interest is from people who actually know what they're talking about.

And so one idea that we're working on is to encourage ethanol, which works. See, if you're driving your automobile based upon something a farmer grows here in northern Alabama, as opposed to something that's as a result of buying from overseas — makes sense to me.

In return for federal money, we expect local districts and states to measure, to have tests. The principal, the good Doc asked me to go into the 4th grade class and say to the kids, good luck on the test tomorrow. That was music to my ears, because you don't know whether or not a child is reading unless you test.

I like to tell people part of my job is to be the educator-in-chief.

No Child Left Behind needs to be reauthorized. I fully understand that if you read your newspaper articles — which I do sometimes — and listen carefully, you'll hear voices in both parties saying they don't like No Child Left Behind — it's too much testing, or, we don't want to be held to account, or whatever they say. The bill is working.