Oh, no, he's been talking to education theorists!

The text of what President Obama will say tomorrow:

"Hello everyone – how’s everybody doing today? I’m here with students at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia. And we’ve got students tuning in from all across America, kindergarten through twelfth grade. I’m glad you all could join us today.

I know that for many of you, today is the first day of school. And for those of you in kindergarten, or starting middle or high school, it’s your first day in a new school, so it’s understandable if you’re a little nervous. I imagine there are some seniors out there who are feeling pretty good right now, with just one more year to go. And no matter what grade you’re in, some of you are probably wishing it were still summer, and you could’ve stayed in bed just a little longer this morning.

I know that feeling. When I was young, my family lived in Indonesia for a few years, and my mother didn’t have the money to send me where all the American kids went to school. So she decided to teach me extra lessons herself, Monday through Friday – at 4:30 in the morning.

Now I wasn’t too happy about getting up that early. A lot of times, I’d fall asleep right there at the kitchen table. But whenever I’d complain, my mother would just give me one of those looks and say, "This is no picnic for me either, buster."

So I know some of you are still adjusting to being back at school. But I’m here today because I have something important to discuss with you. I’m here because I want to talk with you about your education and what’s expected of all of you in this new school year.

Now I’ve given a lot of speeches about education. And I’ve talked a lot about responsibility.

I’ve talked about your teachers’ responsibility for inspiring you, and pushing you to learn.

I’ve talked about your parents’ responsibility for making sure you stay on track, and get your homework done, and don’t spend every waking hour in front of the TV or with that Xbox.

I’ve talked a lot about your government’s responsibility for setting high standards, supporting teachers and principals, and turning around schools that aren’t working where students aren’t getting the opportunities they deserve.

But at the end of the day, we can have the most dedicated teachers, the most supportive parents, and the best schools in the world – and none of it will matter unless all of you fulfill your responsibilities. Unless you show up to those schools; pay attention to those teachers; listen to your parents, grandparents and other adults; and put in the hard work it takes to succeed.

And that’s what I want to focus on today: the responsibility each of you has for your education. I want to start with the responsibility you have to yourself.

Every single one of you has something you’re good at. Every single one of you has something to offer. And you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is. That’s the opportunity an education can provide.

Maybe you could be a good writer – maybe even good enough to write a book or articles in a newspaper – but you might not know it until you write a paper for your English class. Maybe you could be an innovator or an inventor – maybe even good enough to come up with the next iPhone or a new medicine or vaccine – but you might not know it until you do a project for your science class. Maybe you could be a mayor or a Senator or a Supreme Court Justice, but you might not know that until you join student government or the debate team.

And no matter what you want to do with your life – I guarantee that you’ll need an education to do it. You want to be a doctor, or a teacher, or a police officer? You want to be a nurse or an architect, a lawyer or a member of our military? You’re going to need a good education for every single one of those careers. You can’t drop out of school and just drop into a good job. You’ve got to work for it and train for it and learn for it.

And this isn’t just important for your own life and your own future. What you make of your education will decide nothing less than the future of this country. What you’re learning in school today will determine whether we as a nation can meet our greatest challenges in the future.

You’ll need the knowledge and problem-solving skills you learn in science and math to cure diseases like cancer and AIDS, and to develop new energy technologies and protect our environment. You’ll need the insights and critical thinking skills you gain in history and social studies to fight poverty and homelessness, crime and discrimination, and make our nation more fair and more free. You’ll need the creativity and ingenuity you develop in all your classes to build new companies that will create new jobs and boost our economy.

We need every single one of you to develop your talents, skills and intellect so you can help solve our most difficult problems. If you don’t do that – if you quit on school – you’re not just quitting on yourself, you’re quitting on your country.

Now I know it’s not always easy to do well in school. I know a lot of you have challenges in your lives right now that can make it hard to focus on your schoolwork.

I get it. I know what that’s like. My father left my family when I was two years old, and I was raised by a single mother who struggled at times to pay the bills and wasn’t always able to give us things the other kids had. There were times when I missed having a father in my life. There were times when I was lonely and felt like I didn’t fit in.

So I wasn’t always as focused as I should have been. I did some things I’m not proud of, and got in more trouble than I should have. And my life could have easily taken a turn for the worse.

But I was fortunate. I got a lot of second chances and had the opportunity to go to college, and law school, and follow my dreams. My wife, our First Lady Michelle Obama, has a similar story. Neither of her parents had gone to college, and they didn’t have much. But they worked hard, and she worked hard, so that she could go to the best schools in this country.

Some of you might not have those advantages. Maybe you don’t have adults in your life who give you the support that you need. Maybe someone in your family has lost their job, and there’s not enough money to go around. Maybe you live in a neighborhood where you don’t feel safe, or have friends who are pressuring you to do things you know aren’t right.

But at the end of the day, the circumstances of your life – what you look like, where you come from, how much money you have, what you’ve got going on at home – that’s no excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude. That’s no excuse for talking back to your teacher, or cutting class, or dropping out of school. That’s no excuse for not trying.

Where you are right now doesn’t have to determine where you’ll end up. No one’s written your destiny for you. Here in America, you write your own destiny. You make your own future.

That’s what young people like you are doing every day, all across America.

Young people like Jazmin Perez, from Roma, Texas. Jazmin didn’t speak English when she first started school. Hardly anyone in her hometown went to college, and neither of her parents had gone either. But she worked hard, earned good grades, got a scholarship to Brown University, and is now in graduate school, studying public health, on her way to being Dr. Jazmin Perez.

I’m thinking about Andoni Schultz, from Los Altos, California, who’s fought brain cancer since he was three. He’s endured all sorts of treatments and surgeries, one of which affected his memory, so it took him much longer – hundreds of extra hours – to do his schoolwork. But he never fell behind, and he’s headed to college this fall.

And then there’s Shantell Steve, from my hometown of Chicago, Illinois. Even when bouncing from foster home to foster home in the toughest neighborhoods, she managed to get a job at a local health center; start a program to keep young people out of gangs; and she’s on track to graduate high school with honors and go on to college.

Jazmin, Andoni and Shantell aren’t any different from any of you. They faced challenges in their lives just like you do. But they refused to give up. They chose to take responsibility for their education and set goals for themselves. And I expect all of you to do the same.

That’s why today, I’m calling on each of you to set your own goals for your education – and to do everything you can to meet them. Your goal can be something as simple as doing all your homework, paying attention in class, or spending time each day reading a book. Maybe you’ll decide to get involved in an extracurricular activity, or volunteer in your community. Maybe you’ll decide to stand up for kids who are being teased or bullied because of who they are or how they look, because you believe, like I do, that all kids deserve a safe environment to study and learn. Maybe you’ll decide to take better care of yourself so you can be more ready to learn. And along those lines, I hope you’ll all wash your hands a lot, and stay home from school when you don’t feel well, so we can keep people from getting the flu this fall and winter.

Whatever you resolve to do, I want you to commit to it. I want you to really work at it.

I know that sometimes, you get the sense from TV that you can be rich and successful without any hard work -- that your ticket to success is through rapping or basketball or being a reality TV star, when chances are, you’re not going to be any of those things.

But the truth is, being successful is hard. You won’t love every subject you study. You won’t click with every teacher. Not every homework assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right this minute. And you won’t necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try.

That’s OK. Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures. JK Rowling’s first Harry Potter book was rejected twelve times before it was finally published. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team, and he lost hundreds of games and missed thousands of shots during his career. But he once said, "I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

These people succeeded because they understand that you can’t let your failures define you – you have to let them teach you. You have to let them show you what to do differently next time. If you get in trouble, that doesn’t mean you’re a troublemaker, it means you need to try harder to behave. If you get a bad grade, that doesn’t mean you’re stupid, it just means you need to spend more time studying.

No one’s born being good at things, you become good at things through hard work. You’re not a varsity athlete the first time you play a new sport. You don’t hit every note the first time you sing a song. You’ve got to practice. It’s the same with your schoolwork. You might have to do a math problem a few times before you get it right, or read something a few times before you understand it, or do a few drafts of a paper before it’s good enough to hand in.

Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Don’t be afraid to ask for help when you need it. I do that every day. Asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of strength. It shows you have the courage to admit when you don’t know something, and to learn something new. So find an adult you trust – a parent, grandparent or teacher; a coach or counselor – and ask them to help you stay on track to meet your goals.

And even when you’re struggling, even when you’re discouraged, and you feel like other people have given up on you – don’t ever give up on yourself. Because when you give up on yourself, you give up on your country.

The story of America isn’t about people who quit when things got tough. It’s about people who kept going, who tried harder, who loved their country too much to do anything less than their best.

It’s the story of students who sat where you sit 250 years ago, and went on to wage a revolution and found this nation. Students who sat where you sit 75 years ago who overcame a Depression and won a world war; who fought for civil rights and put a man on the moon. Students who sat where you sit 20 years ago who founded Google, Twitter and Facebook and changed the way we communicate with each other.

So today, I want to ask you, what’s your contribution going to be? What problems are you going to solve? What discoveries will you make? What will a president who comes here in twenty or fifty or one hundred years say about what all of you did for this country?

Your families, your teachers, and I are doing everything we can to make sure you have the education you need to answer these questions. I’m working hard to fix up your classrooms and get you the books, equipment and computers you need to learn. But you’ve got to do your part too. So I expect you to get serious this year. I expect you to put your best effort into everything you do. I expect great things from each of you. So don’t let us down – don’t let your family or your country or yourself down. Make us all proud. I know you can do it.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America."

Note that he repeatedly invokes "no excuses" and "work hard," both of which are themes that currently are being studied by education researchers. Basically, it looks like kids who work hard to overcome adversity continue to work hard once the adversity is gone and they are more successful in school, life, and work. Amazing.

so, I haven't updated in a while

It's not that I don't have anything to say or that I've stopped having strong opinions. It's more to do with the fact that the news has turned into a parody of itself and my personal life is at a point where there's not much that I can discuss publicly.

On the personal front, my wife has had our second child (two months ago) and, like much of the country, I'm under-paid for my family's needs. Professionally, I'm still teaching and now working mostly as a Social Studies teacher. I've taken on a Government class, which means that I get to instill my obsession with US politics and governance in a new generation of learners. That's actually pretty exciting, and if I had time to do it the right way, this would be an absolutely incredible class. As I don't have that time, it'll likely be a good class.

Here's my newest rant (not that you haven't read it already in a hundred other places):

What kind of supposedly responsible parent would keep a child out of school on Tuesday?

What good can possibly come of keeping your kid from hearing President Obama speak? I've read of places where schools are starting to realize that they will lose money by not having kids in school. I've read numerous accusations that this speech is an attempt to force socialism on our kids. I've read numerous paranoid assertions that this is unconstitutional or in some way a failure to separate politics from education. Folks, here's the reality of it. It doesn't matter if Obama is a socialist (he's not) or if he wants to indoctrinate your kids (he may) or if he's not separating politics from education (his speech is on staying in school - not sure where the politics are there). What matters is that this is a great opportunity for students to hear the President of the United States of America address them directly and begin a conversation that should continue in the classrooms after he has finished speaking.

Seriously, now. We show kids video of Hitler and Hussein, give them transcripts of Churchill and Roosevelt, and have them study maps of Waterloo and the Somme. We expect them to analyze forms of government around the world and assess various political ideologies for their strengths and weaknesses. Surely, their fragile little minds can handle one speech encouraging them to take their education seriously. I don't care about the fact that GHWB and Reagan both addressed students like this. I don't care that most schools fail to teach adequately the things that I've listed above. What I care is that this is a great opportunity for students to actively learn how our government really operates, and they are being taught all of the wrong lessons in far too many places. Ironically, timing and technology may keep me from being able to show it live to my Government class, but I certainly plan to get it recorded and use it as soon as possible.

Building the deficit

President-elect Barack Obama just announced that he, acting upon the advice of economists from both sides of the aisle, will be spending more money than budgeted for as much as two years in order to keep us out of a depression. This brings to mind government salaries.

I don't know about the readership of this little journal (in fact, I don't know if there is a readership of this little journal), but I know that its author would love to make federal pay. The members of the President's Cabinet all will make nearly $200,000 a year for as long as they serve. The President himself will make $400,000. Many other officials in the various branches will top $100,000. To be fair, many of these people are taking significant pay cuts from their private sector jobs, but that leads to my thought: their savings are safe. In the case of our President-elect and our Vice President-elect, they will have their room, board, transportation, utilities, and even entertainment paid for as perks of the job.

It would merely be a symbolic gesture, but what a gesture it would be if all members of the Obama administration voluntarily donated part or all of their federal salaries to the rescue efforts going on. For a President elected because he was truly of the people, it would be a great symbol of how he was still connected to the people and not above their suffering. It wouldn't change the fact that Obama, like many of his advisers, is worth over $1 million. It wouldn't change the fact that none of them will need to worry about foreclosure or bankruptcy in the near future. It wouldn't even make a discernible dent in the amount of money that will be poured into this deficit spending.

As I said, though, it sure would be one hell of a gesture.

On the brink...

At first it was barely thinkable. Then it became a remote possibility. Subsequently, it was increasingly likely, believable, probable, and, finally, inevitable. Now that it appears to have happened, I'm still in awe of the way that this country seems to have come together -- truly come together in a historic way, with more registered voters participating than ever before -- and done something that was unthinkable not so long ago. Now, I just hope that he doesn't let us all down. It would be a worse tragedy than any other this electoral season if so many new voters stepped up to the plate and entrusted one man with their hopes and dreams only to then become disillusioned with the whole process.

First!

Here is the thought that gave birth to this journal*:

I wish that I made enough money for Barack Obama to want to raise my taxes.

I've been teaching long enough to have substantial debt. I know that there are many, many people with more debt than I have, but I really have no desire to think about their debilitating finances when I have my own with which to grapple. I graduated from college owing a couple dozen millibucks to Nelnet, picked up a car that costs me $454 a month, then got married. Then had a child.

We have subsequently run up enough credit debt that we have virtually no credit left, even though we are working as hard as we can to pay it all down. Having both of us in school again really isn't helping with the finances, even though it means that my student loans go on hold for another two years. Here's the big problem, though. I make $30,000 a year**. Sure, I don't need to pay for room and board because of the nice deal where I work, but I make $30,000 a year. This is before tax, to support a family of three with a car payment and credit cards.

I'd like to break down where that $30,000 goes. If I actually were to receive every cent of it, I'd get $1153.85 every two weeks, adding up to $2307.70 each month. After taxes and Social Security and whatever else, though, I actually bring home $996.93 every two weeks, $1993.86 each month, and $25,920.18 in a year. Once our car payment, insurance, and Netflix are gone, we have about $1325 left for our other monthly bills. Meeting minimum payments on our phones and credit cards reduces our monthly income to about $900. Driving is not something that we view as a luxury any more, nor do we go out to eat much, but the child needs diapers, the animals need food, the cat needs litter, and we do need to keep a certain amount of milk and cereal in the house. With the cost of gas as it is, this brings us into the range of $750 a month for anything extra that our family wishes to do. This would include investing in our future, investing in our child's future, fixing the car, buying unexpected necessities or extra treats, and maintaining basic courtesies like sending gifts to people. If we were capable of being truly disciplined and actually setting aside half of that $750, we would be able to save $4500 a year.

We aren't able to save that kind of money, though, because we have family obligations that keep us driving a few hundred miles a month or flying 4000 miles a year. We do indulge in extras (eating at IHOPplebee's instead of McDonald's) and we do even get the oil changed in the car occasionally. We are putting money into the bairn's account, but we keep losing money in our own because of overdraft fees (here's an area for federal oversight: why should someone with a $5 balance be charged $105 for purchasing three items that all cost less than $10?). When everything is taken into account, I think it's pretty remarkable that we are managing to do as well as we are on $25,920.18 (tip of the hat to the wife/financial wizard)! If we had ten times that amount pre-tax, I think we could stand to eat 5% more in payments to the federal government.

Hell, if we had ten times that amount pre-tax, I might eventually be able to retire.

*Call it what you will, but I still don't like "blog".
**My wife makes a small stipend as well, but spends her time being a full-time student and a full-time mother. Any income that she could bring in by working more hours would be more than offset by the money put out for child care expenses and, to be honest, neither of us is willing to turn our child over to someone else for rearing. We shouldn't need to be.