SEED School of Maryland Grand Opening
October 21, 2008
[As Prepared]
Good morning! This is a good day. Turn to your neighbor and tell them this is a good day in Baltimore.
You’re looking at all the people at the SEED School who have done such a terrific job for so many years in Washington, D.C., and now we’re going to have one of these in our own State.
I’m especially proud of the young people who are here in the first class. We’re counting on you guys. We’re very proud of you, we love you and we need you, and I hope that you get that sense from all the people who are here today for this great grand opening.
I know many of you saw the movie “The Boys of Baraka.” We had our whole cabinet watch that movie down at the Charles Theater. But do you remember the scene that takes place after the boys had their experience cut short and have come home? It was nighttime and you could hear the sound of sirens blaring in the background, and one brother says to the other brother “Why can’t we have a school like the Baraka School here in Baltimore?” And so many years later, that’s what you all are doing.
The most important thing in this world is the relationship that one person has with another person. And the relationship that you are forging and you are creating for this next generation of our State is really a calculated strategy.
So we have come together as a State to make a record $5.3 billion investment in K through 12 education – the largest investment in our public schools that we’ve made in our State’s modern history.
We’ve committed an historic $741 million in school construction to get our kids out of those temporary learning shacks and into modern classrooms.
We’ve held the line on college tuition for our families for the third year in a row, and we’ve been able to increase funding to community colleges by almost 40% more than what our predecessors were willing to fund in the comparable period in their administration.
And because of the delegates who are here today, because of Speaker Busch, because of the senators that are here, even in tough times we’ve invested $2 million dollars in the SEED School – because we believe in progress, despite these tough times.
98 percent of SEED graduates have been sent to college. 62 percent of alumni from SEED schools are on track to complete college. This is a tremendous thing that we are doing together.
The writer Toni Morrison said, "I am a teller of stories and therefore an optimist, a believer in the ethical bend of the human heart, a believer in the mind's disgust with fraud and its appetite for truth, a believer in the ferocity of beauty. So, from my point of view, which is that of a storyteller, I see your life as already artful, waiting, just waiting and ready for you to make it art."
To the young people of Maryland, we are all very, very proud of you. We need you, we are depending on you, and we are investing in you. Because we know that you will be able to do the right things for our country, whatever walk of life you choose in the future – doctors, nurses, lawyers, business people of our State. Most importantly, you are going to bear that most important title of all, and that is American citizen. We love you guys, we’re counting on you.
Thank you.
