York visit senator's 46th town hall forum
Friday, April 14, 2006
Printable FormatELMHURST PRESS
By John Barrett
He's met with international leaders, visited Hurricane Katrina evacuees and gave the keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention.
And the southpaw threw the ceremonial first pitch before a Chicago White Sox playoff game.
But U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., who recently finished his first year in national government, spent part of April 12 at York Community High School.
However, this was not the first time a sitting U.S. senator spoke at the Elmhurst school. John F. Kennedy did so in October 1960, just before he was elected the nation's 35th president.
Before taking questions, Obama said he holds these kind of meetings (this was his 46th) because in Washington there is a tendency over time to get out of touch and get absorbed in what he called "the partisan food-fight."
He then spoke on diverse issues like the war in Iraq, getting young people involved in politics and health care.
He also talked about education, raised when a York student asked about American student test scores in math and science dropping in relation to the rest of the world.
"This is a huge problem -- to be better prepared and more innovative you would think our No. 1 priority would be to invest in education particularly in math and science," Obama said. "We need to emphasize the training of those teachers and get them into the classrooms, plus we have to do something about financing basic research, which the president's budget is calling to cut for the second straight year.
"But we also have a general attitude in this country that education is somehow a passive endeavor that should be fun instead of an active endeavor that should be challenging," Obama added. "So some of the burden is on our young people."
Before he walked into the York gym with more than 2,000 people in it, Obama spoke with a small group of students.
York Principal Diana Smith, who helped orchestrate Obama's visit, was impressed by the senator's interaction with those select teenagers.
"He is as comfortable talking to young people as he is to anyone else," Smith said. "He spent a lot of time listening to them and had a great deal of respect for what they had to say."
Smith said it was a complete effort with Obama's visit. To accommodate the crowd, York students and staff agreed to park off-site and be shuttled to the school from 5:30 a.m. onward.
Dan Parker, a senior at York, was impressed.
"There's only 100 U.S. senators, so it's not very often you get to see one in person," Dan said. "I thought he was a good speaker."
During the question-and-answer session, Shelly Ruzicka, a senior at Elmhurst College, asked Obama about immigration. She had heard Obama speak before but was excited to get another chance.
"From what I know about him he seems to be a really honorable, respectable senator who's trying hard not to get caught up in the D.C. culture," Ruzicka said. "I don't have political aspirations, but he is kind of a hero to me and my hope for the U.S. Senate."