[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 6] [Extensions of Remarks] [Page 8935] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]IN APPRECIATION OF OUR NATION'S TEACHERS ______ HON. RONNIE SHOWS of mississippi in the house of representatives Thursday, May 6, 1999 Mr. SHOWS. Mr. Speaker, I am glad to have this opportunity to add my voice as we honor our Nation's teachers on National Teacher Appreciation Day. I do so with great pride, because I was a school teacher and basketball coach back home in Mississippi for many years. Every day we entrust the lives of our children into the hands of our Nation's teachers. The best thing we can do to honor teachers on this special day is to take all the heartfelt words of praise and turn them into meaningful acts. We owe it to our teachers and our children to build new schools and modernize existing ones. We must move them out of old and overcrowded schools that are in need of repair, into new schools with new technology in the classrooms, so America can provide an education that competes favorably with schools systems around the globe. We live in a global environment. The ``arms race'' has become the ``economic race''. We must keep up with new technologies, because our economic security depends on it. We must prepare our children for the kinds of jobs that arise from new technology. As a Representative from a largely rural area in Mississippi, I have taken it upon myself to try to provide Internet access to every school in my Congressional district. Few students in my 15 counties are linked to the Internet, so I am bringing together school superintendents and local telecommunications executives and workers to make this dream a reality. I am proud to have been a schoolteacher. I love working with the kids of today, for they are the promise of great things to come. Celebrating National Teacher Appreciation Day affords us the chance to honor teachers who are the bedrock of our community. But we should not end the celebration when the gavel does down after the speeches are finished. We should honor our teachers every time we see construction cranes rise over a new school building, or every time a schoolchild logs on to the Internet to explore the world beyond the school walls. But most of all, we should honor our teachers in whom we entrust the health and well being of our children by being good parents, good neighbors and good role models. ____________________