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• Mr. STOKES. Mr. Speaker, I rise to announce my cosponsorship of legislation establishing an Undergraduate Critical Skills Scholarship Program at the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

• During my tenure as chairman on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I was struck by the lack of minorities and women employed in professional positions throughout the intelligence community. When questioning agency directors on the lack of minority and female representation, their responses fell into two categories: First, qualified women and minorities interested in intelligence community careers could not be located; and second, when such individuals were identified, intelligence community agencies did not possess the resources to compete with benefits offered by the private sector.

• Subsequently, to help facilitate the recruitment of minorities and women, language creating a Critical Skills Scholarship Program was included in the Intelligence Authorization Act of 1987. Under the act, the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency were authorized to provide college scholarships to high school students who agreed to major in disciplines such as computer science, mathematics, engineering, physics, and foreign languages. These disciplines were defined as being critical to the missions of the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency. In exchange, the scholarship recipients agreed to work for their sponsoring agency following graduation for a period of 1 1/2 years for each year or partial year for which a scholarship was provided. Similar authority was extended to the Defense Intelligence Agency in the Intelligence Authorization Act of 1990.

• Last year, the first group of students to receive critical skills scholarships graduated from college and became full-time employees at CIA and NSA respectively. The directors of the intelligence community agencies are confident their critical skills scholarship programs will insure a steady supply of talented and skilled men and women needed to perform their missions well into the future.

• The FBI is our Nation's primary agency responsible for defending against hostile foreign intelligence operations. The FBI's need to recruit highly skilled employees is no less difficult than that of the CIA, NSA, or DIA. It is time that we armed the FBI with the same tools to assist its recruitment efforts as are now employed by its brethren in the intelligence community.

• I am proud to cosponsor this important bill and urge my colleagues to join in its support.

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