Obama Talks to Kids and Our Public School System

B”H

It’s not unordinary for a president to address school children and was under the impression that this was no different. It seemed to me that people were making way to big a deal just because the president wanted to make a clique ‘stay in school’ speech. I do believe he may have planed to make it political, but now that would be suicide. This is going to be a neutral speech. Sure I don’t like Obama, but what’s the big deal?

Then I looked at the accompanying lesson plan put out by the Department of Education under the suggestions of the Administration. Then I looked at the actual manner this speech would be given in comparison to others. When Bush senior gave a speech to school children about staying away from drugs, it was on closed-circuit Television and all, but it was not broadcast to every single school in the country. There were no lesson plans given out. Never before has there been such a broadcast address to children. There has never been a speech that was placed in every schoolroom in the country. If you’ve read ‘1984’ then you know what this sounds like. If you know history you can see its similarity to the strategies of fascist dictators. If you keep up w/ world news you’ll see a striking resemblance to N Korea.

Even then I wouldn’t have such a big problem w/ a feel good speech, but the lesson plan is alarming. It is supposedly meant to promote critical thinking to analyze the speech. But when I looked at it (now revised) it was based on pre-conclusions. It would make sense if had questions such as:

· Do you agree w/ Obama? Why or why not?

· What do you like about the president? What do you think he could improve upon?

· What suggestion would you have for the president?

These are is material that promotes true critical thinking. Here’s what the orginal lesson plan had:

· What is the President trying to tell me?

· What is the President asking me to do?

· What new ideas and actions is the President challenging me to think about?

· Students can record important parts of the speech where the President is asking them to do something. Students might think about: What specific job is he asking me to do…Are we able to do what President Obama is asking of us

· What resonated with you from President Obama’s speech? What lines/phrases do you remember? Is he challenging you to do anything?

These are my favorite:

· How has Obama inspired you?

· How will his speech make you a better person?

There is no part that questions whether we agree w/ Obama in general or not. Instead the answer is assumed and we can simply move on to the part of ‘how can we do what Obama wants us to do?’ And o geez, “How has Obama inspired you?” It is forgotten that the president is elected to serve us. Instead the notion will be promoted to impressionable kids that we have a duty to serve the president.

Thank G-d private schools and yeshivas don’t have to worry about all this. Only public schools, a Gov-t program, are being bombarded by all this. That is the fact. Public school is Gov-t education. It is extremely inefficient because there is no competition. Think about it. Competition promotes choices. If people had competitive things to choose from then the pubic system would have to improve to stay competitive. But they don’t have to. All they need to worry about is training the kids to take standardized tests to keep their funding. It’s also simply not fair. We all know how yeshiva costs an arm and a leg in tuition. Anyone who wants to send their kids to a superior private school has to pay the tuition, and pay the taxes to pay for public school that they don’t use! There are options, such as vouchers for private schools or more charter schools, but changing something we’re used to would be to inconvenient, aside for obviously not being in the Gov-t’s favor.

Jefferson had proposed public education but the legislature didn't want to levy a school tax, so it failed. The first real public schools appeared in Massachusetts around 1850. The public system was minimal and had to stay competitive w/ many other private options. Therefore the education remained on par. Along came the great depression and FDR. FDR poured money into public school along w/ his other Gov-t programs (which prolonged the recovery) and greatly expanded its influence (not to mention financial hardship had removed some private options.). The public school system had become a much bigger deal w/ the New Deal. Later the Soviets launched Sputnik in 1957 and the notion was “My G-d! We gotta get smarter to catch up w/ the Commies!” and the public school agenda was pushed further. Finally in the 70’s policies were pushed that practically made public school our only sensible option.

The result? Today’s 11^th grader is acquiring the same critical thinking and problem solving skills that yesterday’s 8^th graders were mastering.