I watched President Obama’s State of the Union Address and I was very much impressed at what he had to say and what he had to offer to people. I know he harped on the Iraq way and the killing of Osama Bin Laden alot by Seal Team 6. The one thing I got was that he wants to bring jobs back to America and get Students to Graduate on time and working in the work force. Their are several things I want to highlight from the State of the Union Address and I will put the link to the full text of the Speech below.
The first thing that Obama highlighted was putting more money into America’s community Colleges and talked about turning them to Reemployment centers and highlighted this in the speech;
Jackie Bray is a single mom from North Carolina who was laid off from her job as a mechanic. Then Siemens opened a gas turbine factory in Charlotte, and formed a partnership with Central Piedmont Community College. The company helped the college design courses in laser and robotics training. It paid Jackie’s tuition, then hired her to help operate their plant.
I want every American looking for work to have the same opportunity as Jackie did. Join me in a national commitment to train two million Americans with skills that will lead directly to a job. My Administration has already lined up more companies that want to help. Model partnerships between businesses like Siemens and community colleges in places like Charlotte, Orlando, and Louisville are up and running. Now you need to give more community colleges the resources they need to become community career centers – places that teach people skills that local businesses are looking for right now, from data management to high-tech manufacturing.
And I want to cut through the maze of confusing training programs, so that from now on, people like Jackie have one program, one website, and one place to go for all the information and help they need. It’s time to turn our unemployment system into a reemployment system that puts people to work.
These reforms will help people get jobs that are open today. But to prepare for the jobs of tomorrow, our commitment to skills and education has to start earlier.
For less than one percent of what our Nation spends on education each year, we’ve convinced nearly every State in the country to raise their standards for teaching and learning – the first time that’s happened in a generation.
The one thing I like about that part is that he’s finally seeing the value in America’s community colleges and demanding that Congress fund them to help put people unemployed back to work with the skills the workforce needs. It also helps expand America’s Community Colleges and helps students get to work and a college degree as well.
The part of State of the union Address I liked the most when he touched on high education such as what he said about students who have mounting student loan debt and demanding congress to fix it. It high time he got that fixed and said it here
When kids do graduate, the most daunting challenge can be the cost of college. At a time when Americans owe more in tuition debt than credit card debt, this Congress needs to stop the interest rates on student loans from doubling in July. Extend the tuition tax credit we started that saves middle-class families thousands of dollars. And give more young people the chance to earn their way through college by doubling the number of work-study jobs in the next five years.
The final thing I want to harp on that President Obama said in the State of the union speech tonite is that Universities and colleges are not doing enough to help students finish college quicker. President Obama tonite has put colleges and universities on notice and told them “If you can’t stop tuition from going up, the funding you get from taxpayers will go down. Higher education can’t be a luxury – it’s an economic imperative that every family in America should be able to afford”. President Obama is right that taxpayers should not subsidizing colleges and universities that don’t help students graduate on time and that don’t redesign courses that help get students to graduate on time and into the Work force. Congress should be forcing colleges to get graduation rates up and those that don’t should have their federal funding pulled from them and reward colleges that do get college students to graduate on time.
As far as the State of the Union Address is concern, I felt it was more like part speech, part campaign speech. I was very happy that he spoke about getting Americans back to work and getting more money for community colleges and putting universities on notice as well for not getting students to graduate on time. I think this is the time we need to see some action out of Obama and I will be watching to see he delivers as promised
Full text of the State of the Union Speech :http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/25/us/politics/state-of-the-union-2012-transcript.html
