Obama school talk stirs furor

Flowing Wells Unified School District Superintendent Nicholas Clement opened his inbox Thursday to an e-mail from a parent saying Obama's address "is an inappropriate attempt to campaign to our nation's youth under the guise of an educational message."

Clement received another note from a pastor, saying he was recommending that members of his congregation keep their children home on Tuesday. Acknowledging other presidents have made similar speeches encouraging youths to succeed in school, the man said he finds the speech "highly suspicious given the timing and the battle for health-care reform."

In the Amphitheater Public Schools, Superintendent Vicki Balentine said she's heard similar concerns from about two dozen people.

Much of it, she said, stemmed from misinformation. Some callers thought the purpose of the speech was to sell kids on health care, or to address students about homosexuality.

The White House has said the speech is simply designed to keep students in school, and it plans to post a copy of the speech online several hours in advance.

Still, there are rumors of an impending mass pullout from schools or of parents descending on classrooms to monitor teachers' discussions with students.

"This is absolutely shameful," declared Jeff Rogers, chairman of the Pima County Democratic Party. "I didn't hear the right-wing complaining when Reagan and Bush talked to students about education.

"There are a lot of agitated people — what I call the angry, white, middle-aged class — who are angry that they've lost the presidency and the Congress, and they see their way of life disappearing," he said, adding that there is a "climate of hate and fear being fomented out there."

But Trent Humphries, a 36-year-old computer consultant who counts himself among the Tea Party members, blames the controversy on the president himself. He said his daughter's first-grade class last year wrote letters to Obama and received responses full of what he called "campaign boilerplate language" — which is why he's now suspicious of Tuesday's event.

"If he were going to a school to speak, that would be a different issue, but to speak to all children in America without their parents present, I don't know," he said, describing it as "creepy" and saying parents should be included in conversations about staying in school.

He said the timing is suspect, sandwiched between partisan bickering over health care and then a speech to Congress.

"Maybe the whole thing is a good idea, but it was just really mishandled," he said.

Educational heavyweights on both sides are getting involved.

The nonprofit Arizona School Boards Association sent out a notice saying it "strongly encouraged" members to participate, pointing out that the address supports the mission of public schools and that encouraging high student achievement should be the common responsibility of everyone.

But Arizona schools chief Tom Horne put out a press release objecting to the "worshipful" tone that the White House expects students to use, drawing examples from some curriculum prompts suggested by the U.S. Department of Education to engage students in dialogue about the speech. One singled out by Horne asks students to brainstorm: "How will he inspire us?"

"There is nothing in these White House materials about approaching the speech critically, or engaging in any critical thinking whatsoever, but only adopting a reverent approach to everything they are being told," Horne objected.

Flowing Wells' Clement said whether the speech will be shown will be left up to individual teachers. But there is a bit of a logistical hurdle to clear because teachers need to get parental permission. Alternative activities must be set up for students whose parents don't opt-in. He said he isn't aware of a single high school or elementary teacher who plans to show it.

Parents didn't have to opt-in when Obama was sworn in, Clement said, but that's because it was treated as a historical event. "The opt-in is used for what we call a captive audience. When it comes to political messages, then we have to be cautious of that," he said.

Calvin Baker, the superintendent of the Vail School District, said district administrators rarely dictate specific materials. "We trust our principals and teachers to make good decisions," he said.

Baker said the mayor and members of Congress have spoken in his schools about the value of education. "So if that's the message the president is delivering, then if the teachers choose to use that, we will support that decision," he said, adding parents may request their children be excused from any such lesson.

Few students will likely see it anyway, he said, because many of the schools already had tests scheduled for Tuesday morning.

DID YOU KNOW

In 1991, White House press secretary Marlin Fitzwater was called to defend President George H.W. Bush's telecast speech to eighth-grade students on education.

Democrats complained then that the speech, and the hiring of a media firm to produce coverage of it, in effect used taxpayer money to paint Bush as the "education president." Fitzwater denied that schoolchildren were being used in a political event.

SOURCE: The Washington Post