To the Editor:
As a lifelong educator and current public high school principal, I read with interest your article “Renewals of Education Laws Languish in Congress” (Jan. 15, 2014) and was glad to see you bring attention to the critically important issues you identified.
I would also like to bring your attention to another law that would get widespread and bipartisan support if everyone knew that it existed. If passed, HR 1139, the proposed Strengthening America’s Public Schools Through Foreign Investment Act, would allow public high schools to recruit and retain international tuition- and fee-paying students for multiple years, rather than the current one-year limit imposed on public (though not private) American high schools.
The passage of this federal measure would result in public schools’ having the opportunity to increase their local populations with globally diverse international students, who would pay both tuition and home-stay fees to local schools and communities. But the time to act is now, before another academic year passes without action.
However, this bill now sits stalled in the U.S. House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security. This vitally important piece of legislation would enable local school districts to establish their own policies and guidelines in recruiting international students to their schools and communities, and would result in a new revenue stream that would create and support additional jobs.
John House-Myers
Principal
Bow High School
Bow, N.H.
