jasminewu Mon Sep 14, 2009 7:57 amDraft 1
--
“Hello, everyone. How’s everybody doing today? I’m here with students at Wakefield High school in Arlington, Virginia, and we’ve got students tuning in from all across America, kindergarten through twelfth grade. I’m glad you could all join us today.”
Wait. Rewind to that middle bit: “We’ve got students tuning in from all across America”?
Close, but no cigar.
On Tuesday, September 8 (two days before our own Back to School Night), President Obama gave a speech aimed at students in regards to doing working hard, being responsible, and always striving to do their best in school. Along with school districts being asked to show the speech during school hours, principles and teachers were pushed to have their students write letters to themselves about how they could assist the President.
Thanks to conservatives throwing accusations up in the air like Frisbees and parents concerned with Obama possibly overstepping the boundaries between schools and federal involvement in them, school districts in a number of states decided not to show the speech or have their students write letters.
Other school districts, like those in the San Gabriel Valley region, gave teachers the choice to decide whether or not the speech was relevant enough to their lesson plans and whether or not they wanted to show it to their class. If the teacher deemed the speech appropriate (which would be done so by accessing a copy of the speech released online beforehand) and decided to show it on Tuesday, parents or the students themselves had the option of opting out of watching the speech.
Still, this displeased some parents. One ruffled mother left a comment on a blog: “It is not the President’s job to lecture my kids on responsibility. It is MINE.”
The conservatives, too, were not so easily abated. They pounded Obama with accusations such as trying to involve children in his socialist agenda and using an unspecified amount of money to broadcast the speech – tax money, to boot!
Some said that it was okay that he used money for this speech, since it was aimed, with good intentions, at students, which are now well known as the future of America. Sophomore Raymond Li agrees, saying, “If it’s for a good cause, then it should be okay… because we all want the best for every kid, right?”
--
“Hello, everyone. How’s everybody doing today? I’m here with students at Wakefield High school in Arlington, Virginia, and we’ve got students tuning in from all across America, kindergarten through twelfth grade. I’m glad you could all join us today.”
Wait. Rewind to that middle bit: “We’ve got students tuning in from all across America”?
Close, but no cigar.
On Tuesday, September 8 (two days before our own Back to School Night), President Obama gave a speech aimed at students in regards to doing working hard, being responsible, and always striving to do their best in school. Along with school districts being asked to show the speech during school hours, principles and teachers were pushed to have their students write letters to themselves about how they could assist the President.
Thanks to conservatives throwing accusations up in the air like Frisbees and parents concerned with Obama possibly overstepping the boundaries between schools and federal involvement in them, school districts in a number of states decided not to show the speech or have their students write letters.
Other school districts, like those in the San Gabriel Valley region, gave teachers the choice to decide whether or not the speech was relevant enough to their lesson plans and whether or not they wanted to show it to their class. If the teacher deemed the speech appropriate (which would be done so by accessing a copy of the speech released online beforehand) and decided to show it on Tuesday, parents or the students themselves had the option of opting out of watching the speech.
Still, this displeased some parents. One ruffled mother left a comment on a blog: “It is not the President’s job to lecture my kids on responsibility. It is MINE.”
The conservatives, too, were not so easily abated. They pounded Obama with accusations such as trying to involve children in his socialist agenda and using an unspecified amount of money to broadcast the speech – tax money, to boot!
Some said that it was okay that he used money for this speech, since it was aimed, with good intentions, at students, which are now well known as the future of America. Sophomore Raymond Li agrees, saying, “If it’s for a good cause, then it should be okay… because we all want the best for every kid, right?”