President Barack Obama’s speech to students today did not stream live in MISD. Bandwidth issues and its occurrence during lunch time, along with the possibility of unfavorable content, prompted the district to record the speech rather than broadcast it live.
However, teachers can later show the speech during history classes at their discretion.
“I think it’s important for Government class. It’s the president; to me, it would almost be wrong of us not to address it [the speech],” history teacher Rena Long said. “It’s a great teaching moment.”
In his speech, Obama addressed students of all ages about staying in school and taking learning seriously.
“Whatever he says isn’t going to make any kind of impact on the high school students, because they’ve already got their minds made up,” junior Ian Henderson said.
Parents contacted Principal David Wright on eight different occasions concerning whether or not the school would require students to watch the speech. In the case that a teacher can show the speech in class, students can choose whether or not to view it. Parents have the option to allow their student to opt out of viewing the speech by filling out a form.
“I think that they’re making a smart move by previewing it before hand,” US History teacher Mandy Gent said. “With as many questions as people had, I think it’s important that they’ve taken the step to make sure that it’s all good.”
While the speech was meant for students, rumors of hidden agendas have piqued the interest of parents and teachers therefore forcing districts to not show the video at school or at least until a later date.
“I’m planning on watching it. I want to see what the excitement’s all about,” Mrs. Gent said.
Drew Gassiot • Sep 12, 2009 at 11:55 pm
Michele you spelled speech wrong. Did a big red line not pop under “speach,” when you typed it in? Anyways, a lot of the hype was about whether or not it would be required for students to watch the speech. Which is perfectly understandable if you consider what possible motivations there could be behind it. Just about every student in America has sat through some sort of speech about staying in school already. It was sort of an unnecessary presentation. In fact I’d venture to say that some of the “Obama-haters” put there actually felt inclined to not stay in school. So yeah the overreactions were unnecessary, but making a live broadcast to schools everywhere about the benefits of education is also pretty redundant in today’s world.
Michele • Sep 11, 2009 at 2:04 pm
I don’t understand why parents are having such a flip out over this speach. We are in high school and should be old enough to decide if we want to hear what our President has to say. So many parents think that he is going to brain wash us with his medicare and other stuff that they dont realize that in the long run what he has to say will affect us. I understand that parents are “looking out” for their children but we need to decide that if our Commander in Cheif that we elected wants to speak to us about school we should listen.
Lanore Garrett • Sep 11, 2009 at 9:52 am
I don’t understand why they are making it such a big deal. Everyone needs to know what is going on today in the political world. I feel that even though you may feel that you will disagree with something the president has to say, you should still give him a chance because you might at the end of the day find what he has to say agreeable.
Sherry • Sep 10, 2009 at 9:52 am
I totally agree. People are not taught to respect authority in the world today, including principals, adults, the elderly or even our commander in chief.
Rita • Sep 9, 2009 at 12:59 pm
Does it seem inconsistent to anyone else that we are fine with military recruiters coming into our schools for the sole reason of talking our students into military service with the lure of a college education, but don’t let our commander in chief give them a pep talk.
Jackie • Sep 9, 2009 at 12:18 pm
I don’t see how there is any problem with with this speech since they released the text of the speech on Sunday. Parents could have read the text for themselves rather than listening to ‘rumors of hidden agendas’.
I think students should be able to watch the speech in school, and in any class, not just the social studies classes. My speech teacher wasn’t allowed to show the video since Comm. App. isn’t a social studies class.