Hoekstra opposes federal government entering US schools

albertacowpoke, thank you for reading, commenting, and for the recommendation! I can understand how this topic could perplex!

As I have stated elsewhere, I think the President is addressing the wrong group. President Obama and/or U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan should be sending a message to the nation's "school officials" on how to provide a Safe Learning Environment. One in which ALL children can learn.

And now I can add that I also agree with Congressman Hoekstra, that President Obama should be encouraging parental involvement and collaboration in children's educations, rather than establishing the content and how it is to be presented in the classroom.

This action alone is far from harmless for the reasons stated here by Congressman Hoekstra.

If the President can't speak to the nation's students and inspire them, then the Corporations and Advertisers should not be allowed near the schools either. More hypocrisy. Shouldn't you be more outraged at the No Child Left Behind clause that gave all of your children's private information to military recruiters.  

Eric Bischoff, thank you for reading and commenting. However, even though No Child Left Behind legislation has a clause that references what information can be provided to military recruiters, parents are not mandated by this as they were given the option to "opt-out", which I did in the case of  both of my sons. See: Policy Guidance: Access to High School Students and Information on Students by Military Recruiters.

Ah yes the fine print. And if the pain-in-the-ass, liberal, independent, progressives hadn't been vigilant and noisy, you never would have known about this either. 

The schools must provide the military with this info and then alert parents that they have done so or they will lose federal funds. They must also once, somewhere, disclose something about Opting Out. If they don't disclose the Opt out, they still have to give the info to the military. So many people don't know about it and haven't and or are afraid to opt out. I guess you are OK with that.

So are you saying that the President should not be allowed to address students? Everyone else can but he can't? Other Presidents have but he can't? Corporations can but he can't? And what is your reasoning behind that? As the leader that puts up the most money for our children to go to school and as the democratically, majority elected leader of the free world, shouldn't he have the right to speak to the American children?

Are you afraid that he might give them truths too scary to handle?

These are desperate times and we need strong leaders to motivate, inspire and lead us out of this giant mess. We've screwed this up royally and I believe that the new students are our best hope for survival. I hope he inspires a few of them.

I will add one more thing. I think we should me more concerned with our society's flawed model of mass marketing of untruths and propaganda, a model reaches deep into our schools. Think of the massive amounts of money spent on trying to sell us crap we don't need, products that harm us and the environment, and flawed solutions and ideas. I think we need to rethink and reshape the model to educate us instead of constantly selling us. Shouldn't we be more concerned with truth in advertising? Something that is never enforced!

Rhonda, you have it just right about this.

Those fine points matter a lot in the context of a presidency in crisis with a president addressing kids? To what end?

Alternative, our culture, in the West and throughout the world, is in a state of crisis that will need a spiritual and psychological housecleaning that be reminiscent of Hercules cleaning out those stables.

I didn't know he had sent lesson plans to go with his speech, that might be a bit much I think - I'm sure the teachers could come up with that on their own.

AH, well it all depends on the content spouted by politicians I suppose, as long as their are enough barf bags to go around to the kids

Barry, you certainly have a way with words!:) Thank you for reading, commenting, and for the recommendation!:)

Interesting post......hmmmmm

Yes, Rhonda has hit an "Enlightenment Cartesian Homer", and put that ball clear out of sight.

Context is the problem here. Content gets judged in context, and the "accessories" are a big part of the context of that speech and how we infer intent.

The Obama administration immediately backpedaled, but the problem is the why and wherefore of so many faux pas in such a brief amount of time by Obama and his entire team.

The answer is that they have no one on board that disagrees with them. They don't need to listen to the opposition. The opposition is only intransigence.

This is called narcissism.

I am really disturbed about this anti-Obama talking to children thing. I worked with very poor, abused, and neglected children for many years as a pediatrician. They need these little bits of inspiration and encouragement wherever they can find it. I think it is outrageous the way this is criticized when all he's doing is providing the kids a little bit of encouragement, hope, inspiration, and a message that everyone cares about them. Lesson plans are a convenience provided for the teachers IF THEY CHOOSE to take advantage of them. There are no mandates here! 

It is also so hypocritical to criticize Obama, but to bombard the kids with messages from advertisers, recruiters, etc. etc. etc. Are you all living on another planet?