President Obama Tells Students to Try Hard in School

By Charles Bassett, NEWS 9

OKLAHOMA CITY -- President Barack Obama addressed millions of students across the country on Tuesday, and while some schools refused to show the speech, others, including one in the metro, decided to use it an educational opportunity. 

About 20 students of David Chandlers' Millwood High School's English-Literature class watched the President's speech.

"I decided to show the speech because I personally feel it's a monumental speech. It's not many times you have a President of the United States challenging students to do better," said David Chandler, Millwood Public Schools.

For about 30 minutes, the students listened to President Obama talk about the value of a good education and the student's responsibility to do their best in school.

"Every single one of you has something to offer, and you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is," said President Obama in Tuesday's speech.

The President's message seemed to resonate with the students at Millwood.

"I believe the president is just telling us that we need to buckle down and get focused and stop letting all the outside and the worst just take us down," said Tyler Tuggle, Millwood junior.

Despite the controversy surrounding the speech, the school said they had no complaints from parents and left it up to individual teachers to show it.

"Twelve out of our 14 teachers did participate and aired the speech in the classroom today," said Millwood High School Principal Avery Gilliland.

The students at Millwood who watched Tuesday's speech said they heard nothing from the president that was controversial.

"I think it was great to let the President of the United States tell kids our age that education is the best," said Ciera Hatchett, Millwood junior.

Chandler said he will now use the speech as an educational tool for his classes.

"This I will use to stimulate discussion to show we now have a president that's pushing education," Chandler said.

The teachers who didn't show the speech at Millwood said they had other things going on such as testing but plan to show it later.

Other school districts in the metro did not report any huge absences that can be attributed to the speech.

More on News9.com:
Parents, Schools Divided Over President Obama's Speech | Read the Text of Obama's Speech to Students