This afternoon the Massachusetts Superintendent’s List Serve (E-mail messages between most Massachusetts Superintendents) had a frenzy of activity. The issue that was predominant today was the upcoming address that President Obama has planned for students. On September 8, 2009 at noon our President will deliver a national address to the students of America. According to the United States Department of Education the president will speak directly to the nation’s children and youth about persisting and succeeding in school. More specifically, the president will challenge students to work hard, set educational goals, and take responsibility for their learning.
The debate among teachers, principals, and superintendents today has been whether this event will be required, optional, allowed in certain circumstances, or not at all in classrooms, schools, and/or districts. Concerned parents have been calling schools with questions about the President’s address, some stating that they did not want their children to take part in viewing it. The aforementioned debate when paired with the concerns of parents has called upon superintendents around the Commonwealth to issue proactive statements with regard to the President’s address.
The students at Ralph C. Mahar will not be viewing the President’s address live. We have the technology to record the presentation and then use it at appropriate times in instruction, and this is what we have planned to do. This will allow our teachers the appropriate time to view the address and create lesson activators, lesson plans, and activities that will allow it to be connected with the Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks. What is more important is that our students do not have any reduction in teaching and learning time in mathematics by what appears to be an excellent lesson in civics.
If the President’s message is of particular importance to our families, we encourage that it be viewed at home. The US Department of Education has posted the many different ways in which the President’s address can be seen live or later on. President Obama’s address might stir up interesting conversations at home about school, motivation, learning, and educational success – great topics for the dinner table! I have posted the link to the United States Department of Education’s page below.
http://www.ed.gov/admins/lead/academic/bts.html
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I am so glad to see your quote about change from Woodrow Wilson- and I think it ties beautifully with the Presidential address. I wish, on behalf of all the students in the Commonwealth,that all of our schools agreed to show this address live to stress our cultural emphasis on education as a whole. People are up in arms over President Obama, however, he is our president, the leader of our country, and a clearly elected leader at that. One lesson in math or science, while very important, should not be deemed more important than the President's historic, direct message to students. It is unlikely that he will use this moment to slip in plugs for his other political priorities. Surely we all want our children to see and experience a leader who sees in them the hope of the future and who wants to help support public (and many private) educational values. While I think Superintendent Baldassarre has some fabulous ideas, I want to voice my opinion that students at Mahar should watch this broadcast live, as a community, with the support and attendance of their teachers, staff and administrators. To delay this is to diminish the moment.
ReplyDeleteI can't agree more with the above comments. Furthermore, we need to come to the realization that teaching is a political act, and it's politics are imbued in everything we choose to teach...as well as what we choose (or are forced) to avoid talking about in our classrooms. In deciding not to listen to President Obama, we perpetuate ideologies that accompany that choice...ideologies that are far from "neutral." If the pledge to the flag that we say each morning is more than a matter of routine, we should at least allow our kids to listen to our president's words and, as the critical thinkers they are, allow them to decide the validity of those words. In a message that is sure to encourage our students to aspire toward greatness, what are we so afraid of?
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