President
Obama on Friday visited the innovative Brooklyn high school he praised
in his State of the Union address this year, to deliver a message about
the urgency of education reform in the global economy.
Mr.
Obama, dressed in shirt sleeves, was showered with cheers by the
visibly energized students and a cadre of New York politicians as he
took the podium at Pathways in Technology Early College High School.
“Hello Brooklyn,” he said, before starting into his argument for
creating more schools like the one he was visiting, casting them as
essential in preparing the next generation for competition in a
shrinking world marketplace.
“This
country should be doing everything in our power to give more kids the
chance to go to schools just like this one,” the president said, calling
the school, known as P-Tech, a ticket into the middle class.
“In
previous generations, America’s standing economically was so much
higher than everybody else’s that we didn’t have a lot of competition,”
he added. “Now, you’ve got billions of people from Beijing to Bangalore
to Moscow, all of whom are competing with you directly. And they’re —
those countries are working every day, to out-educate and outcompete
us.”
Mr.
Obama’s wish list included preschool availability for every 4-year-old
in the United States, access for every student to a high-speed Internet
connection, lower college costs, redesigned high schools that teach the
skills needed in a high-tech economy and greater investment in teachers.
Some said they heard in his words a boost for the new, more rigorous
academic standards that have been adopted around the nation, known as
the Common Core, as he praised Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and others as having
courage for raising standards for teachers.
“We should stay at it,” he said.
President
Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan visited Pathways in
Technology Early College High School in Brooklyn on Friday. Gabriella Demczuk/The New York Times
At
one point, Mr. Obama zeroed in on Congress, imploring it to “do
something” on education. One way to start, he said, was by “passing a
budget that reflects our need to invest in our young people.”
He
made a few sharper comments as well, referring to the recent government
shutdown as a “manufactured crisis,” and suggesting that every member
of Congress come to Brooklyn, to see P-Tech and to meet its students.
“If you think education is expensive,” he said at one point, “wait until you see how much ignorance costs.”
The crowd applauded.
Mr.
Obama made his way to the school, in the borough where he once lived,
after Marine One touched down in the shared outfield of a series of
baseball fields in Prospect Park, kicking up a large cloud of dust and
debris, and at least one gray T-shirt. Senator Charles E. Schumer,
Democrat of New York, was there to greet the president, and the two rode
together to the high school, in the Crown Heights neighborhood.
President Obama and Bill de Blasio stopped by Junior's Restaurant in Brooklyn on Friday to pick up some cheesecakes. Gabriella Demczuk/The New York Times
In
his State of the Union address, Mr. Obama had said, “We need to give
every American student opportunities like this.” It was a reference to
the way P-Tech’s students are given both high school and college
curriculums in a six-year program that is tailored for a job in the
technology industry.
When
the first of those students graduate, in 2017, they are expected to
have associate degrees in applied science, computer information systems
or electromechanical engineering, having followed a course of studies
developed in consultation with I.B.M.
In
2012, five P-Tech-styled schools opened in Chicago, in collaboration
with companies like Microsoft, Motorola and Verizon. This year, two more
schools modeled on P-Tech opened in New York City, with three more
expected to open next year.
After
his speech, Mr. Obama stopped at a Junior’s restaurant, on Flatbush
Avenue, entering with Bill de Blasio, the Democratic nominee for mayor,
and shaking hands with employees and patrons. “Do you know your next
mayor here?” the president asked, before ordering two cheesecakes, one
plain and one strawberry.
All
the excitement of a presidential visit aside, the education historian
Diane Ravitch said the day’s events perhaps concealed a subtle truth:
The federal government has “never had a large role in public education,”
and provides a razor-thin portion of its overall revenues.
In
fact, Ms. Ravitch pointed out that the federal Education Department “is
prohibited by law from interfering with curriculum or instruction.”
On the streets around P-Tech, though, no one seemed to note that fact.
Hours
before Mr. Obama arrived, the signs of preparation were in evidence:
Streets scrubbed clean, stray cars towed and metal barricades erected.
And Kiambu Gall, 16, was wearing brand-new shoes.
“Man,
Obama’s coming,” Mr. Gall said as he stood with a half-a-dozen
classmates on the corner of Albany Avenue and Bergen Street outside the
school.
“Who
else can say that?” he asked, displaying gleaming, blue-and-gray
leather boat shoes. “What other students can say, ‘He came to our
school.’ ”
It
was roughly three hours before Mr. Obama came to make his pitch, from a
lectern in the gymnasium. But Mr. Gall and his fellow 11th-graders,
among the lucky students picked to meet the president in a math class,
were recounting their preparatory drills.
Radcliffe Saddler,
16, was assigned to introduce the president. (He had a haircut for the
occasion and got a hug from Mr. Obama, at the podium.) Leslieanne John,
16, who plans to become a lawyer and who was chosen to sing the national
anthem, was reciting her mother’s advice: “Set your eyes on one point
and don’t mess up the words.”
Spencer Jones, 15, still wondered what to say to Mr. Obama.
“Something like, he should make more schools like ours,” he said.
Hours
later, at a fund-raiser in Manhattan, the president was still talking
about his afternoon at P-Tech and the optimism he saw among the
students. “That’s what Washington should be about every single day,” he
said.
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