If the Members will pardon an example used from my own district. I shall present cases which are typical of the problems of migratory workers everywhere. In my congressional districtwhich probably has one of the greatest number of migrants in the entire Nationwe have only one school district which is qualified for the program under the present law. The grant per child has never been more than $250.75. and it has been been down as low as $171.57 per child. This has only allowed a program to be conducted during the summer months. and it is not conducted the year around. In the State of California. under the present system. only 10 percent of the migrant children can be given this special type of education. The U.S. Office of Education estimates that there are 30.000 children in California eligible. and this is based on the fallacious assumption that each migrant family has only seventyfive onehundredths of one child. The truth is that there are 65.000 known migrant children between the ages of 5 and 17 in the State of California and probably there are as many as 75.000 or 80.000. I make no complaint against the present program but merely say it is not enough for solving one of the most serious social problems that confront this country today. My amendment would send funds directly to the school districts and avoid the cumbersome mechanics of pooling local district and State programs and then in turn resubmitting them to the U.S.
Keywords matched
migrant migrants