No Scholar Left Behind

WASHINGTON—Let this serve as fair warning—good news rarely entertains.

Recently, the 2004 U.S. Presidential Scholars gathered in the nation’s capital to be honored by the President of the United States. With two students from each state and a handful at large, these were some of the nation’s brightest and most accomplished high school students, selected through lengthy review by the Department of Education. I had the lucky job of working as one of the students’ advisers during the weeklong recognition event in D.C.

Amid the great anticipation of scholars, President Bush seized the opportunity to publicly promote the virtues of education in a heartfelt, inspiring (and grammatically-correct) speech. It was a message of hope and celebration; it was proof that a shared priority of education could strengthen our nation and even transcend the boundaries of partisanship.

Well, not exactly. Unfortunately, this noble action was no more than the figment of an imagination waxing pathetic. In reality, President Bush, despite repeated appeals from the Department of Education, simply could not be convinced to attend. A similar fate had arisen the previous year, when I was a scholar: Bush found time to meet with NCAA athletes in the White House just days before he was due to meet the Presidential Scholars, but when the scholars’ moment for recognition came, he never showed.

So enter the political foe—John Kerry, perhaps, or Ralph Nader, if that’s your thing—who smartly identifies this as an opportune moment to present his own vision for American education, a foil to Bush’s stale and recycled rhetoric. He points out the obvious: that true education isn’t just about leaving no child behind, but about moving all children forward—about actively encouraging a culture of excellence.

Needless to say, none of this happened, either.

And really, one might be tempted to ask, who could blame Bush or Kerry for what amounts to relatively benign neglect? It is, after all, election year, and there are far bigger fish to fry. Yet it is precisely this mentality that reveals one of the most troubling contradictions nestled within our culture: the demand for and expectation of excellence, coupled paradoxically with indifference when excellence is attained.

The Presidential Scholars program, in recent years, has suffered under the hand of this paradox. Created in 1964 by President Lyndon B. Johnson to both honor a select group of students and “symbolically [honor] all graduating high school seniors of high potential,” it historically has served to celebrate outstanding achievement and, more importantly, promote the values associated with the pursuit of noble aspirations.

But good news is hard to sell—it’s always been this way. Our culture thrives on sensationalism, on grotesqueness and intrigue. Teen idols and school shootings captivate far more easily than stories of increased volunteerism among young people or displays of exemplary leadership. The implicit message is clear: Money, fame or quick glory may turn heads, but quieter excellence simply doesn’t entertain.

So I probably shouldn’t have been surprised when Bush failed to make an appearance, even considering that it was an election year. I did think that he would be hungry for opportunities to bolster his campaign, or at the very least buff his public image a bit before the voting booths went up. What I forgot to factor in was the reality that what attracts the media, and voters in turn, determines what politicians emphasize in their quests for popularity. And who was I kidding? Bright, enthusiastic, cancer-curing, symphony-composing 18-year-olds don’t usually make for very exciting headlines. In a faceoff against the NCAA for the president’s attention, it’s no wonder they didn’t stand a chance.

And of course, it wasn’t Bush’s physical absence itself that was so troublesome, but rather the general complacency and indifference that his neglect, in a way, epitomized. Many of the scholars actually disapproved of Bush’s presidency; but each, regardless of political persuasion, also expected him to uphold the sacred traditions that had been respected by every president since the program’s conception. Though I reasoned flippantly that scratching the ears of Bush’s dog Barney, whom we happened to encounter on our White House tour, was really just as exciting as shaking the hand of George W. Bush, in my heart I couldn’t blame the scholars for finding the whole thing just a bit disappointing, or just a tad disrespectful.

But perhaps such a bleak outlook is slightly hyperbolic. Even without Bush’s presence, the Presidential Scholars program continues to be a dynamic and determined force of hope. And after spending a week with the scholars, shuttling them around D.C., bonding over Frisbee and sharing dreams for the future, my optimism can’t help but overwhelm the aspect of disillusionment. I’m still confident that the gap between what society passively expects (a good education) and what it actively values (a good time) will eventually be bridged. We will finally learn that while no news may be good news, the converse is certainly not true. And even though it may be that only after society itself undergoes a revamping of values will our trustworthy politicians follow suit, I still contend that it’s not too naive to hope for a leader with enough vision to take initiative in what he believes is right—even if the cameras aren’t clicking away, and even if his good deed doesn’t automatically translate into an extra stash of ballots.

Rena Xu ’07, a biochemistry concentrator in Eliot House, is an editorial editor of The Crimson. She was grateful for the opportunity to confirm firsthand that the president’s pet is not, in fact, an exuberant purple dinosaur.