View Full Version : Kansas families complain about Michelle Obama giving high school graduation speech
BMT (RIP)
04-20-2014, 06:40
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/04/19/kansas-families-complain-about-michelle-obama-giving-high-school-graduation/?intcmp=latestnews
I agree with the families!!
BMT
Interesting situation
Some of the kids were thrilled at first - and then the realization set in that is was a political operation that would sideline "their day".
Having been to a few graduations the ticket issue is huge.
Also most graduation speeches I've listened to (from both sides) had a few political zingers but still the majority of the speech was on "You young adults go forward..." stuff.
Awfully small auditorium for a 5 school combined grauation ceremony with/without a guest speaker like the FLOTUS.
Richard
There is a number of internet stories on this. Most just state the same stuff.
But a couple of tidbits - it is a combined graduation because the First Lady is coming to speak. They don't normally do that.
And the other graduations being separate it was basically bring everybody. But one story has this quote "...Worried parents who called the district said they learned each student would receive a mere four tickets each..."
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2014/04/19/michelle-obama-wreaks-havoc-across-topeka-with-last-minute-decision-to-speak-at-graduation/#ixzz2zR6YeTSH
Yeah, I could see a number of families being upset with 4 tickets.
Lots of laarge high schools in the DFW area and arenas to handle graduations were in high demand. High school graduations are still a big deal in America, and even a smaller school like Highland Park HS in Dallas graduating around 450 students will use a facility like Moody Coliseum at SMU and fill its 7k seats with family and friends. Seating limitations forced many schools there to limit offering 6-8 tickets per family, but schools also coordinated a system where families who determined they would not use all the tickets could give up unused seats for reallocating them to families desiring more. Not everyone was always happy with it, but it generally worked and was helped somewhat by having the events streamed live over community channels and recorded on DVD.
I can appreciate what the School Board was trying to do, but IMO they're the ones who mucked this one up by not anticipating the need for a greater seating capacity or having a contingency for offering something like several combined graduations (e.g., 3 schools w/FLOTUS speech + 2 schools w/FLOTUS speech) to offer more seating for families for an event like this one.
But then I surmise there would be controversy with that, too - and so it goes...
Richard
Surely the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education can be commemorated on another day. I would think that in most instances a school would be honored to have the POTUS or the FLOTUS attend and speak at their graduation. Give it it's own day to be reflected on.
I love it when people mention small schools who are only graduating 450 students, there were 53 kids in my class.
Oldrotorhead
04-20-2014, 11:50
Somebody gave a speech?
No It WOULD have been more like a lecture. I hope she can handle rejection well, and I hope it happens more often, But that's just me.
Michelle pullin out the stops to get that approval rating up!
Dear First Lady;
Whatever you do - don't mention your school lunch program.
Pete