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US President-Elect Calls for Improvement of Public Schools
US President-elect George W. Bush said Monday that improving public schools was vital to realizing Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream of equality.
"Without excellent schools, schools that stress reading, discipline and character, the dream of equality is empty," Bush said at Kelso Elementary School in Texas State when speaking on the federal holiday that marks the slain civil rights leader's birth.
Bush, who takes office on January 20, recalled King's struggle to achieve equal rights for blacks and stressed the importance of reforming public education, one of his top priorities.
He pledged that his first priority after being sworn in Saturday will be congressional passage of his voucher plan to take government money away from consistently failing public schools and give the funds to parents to send their children elsewhere, including private or religious schools.
Martin Luther King Jr., recipient of the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize for his work for racial equality, was assassinated in Mephis of Tennessee State on April 4, 1968. The federal observance of his birthday is Monday.
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