EAG: WASHINGTON, D.C. – D.C. Public Schools wants to give all students studying a foreign language a free trip abroad, starting with 400 eighth- through eleventh-grade students who received all-expenses-paid trips this summer.
Chancellor Kaya Henderson told The Washington Post the district spent $2 million to fund student trips abroad this summer – to Central and South America, Europe, Africa and Asia – for a total of 19 group trips to 13 countries. The money for the trips came from the D.C. Public Education Fund, which uses private donations, and the focus is to make students – many from low-income families that can’t otherwise afford the trips – more worldly and culturally competent.
“I’ve been dreaming of this my whole entire life,” Henderson said of the new program. “To have the ability to make it a reality is the ultimate.”
Henderson told the Post her experience studying in Spain in high school and Venezuela while at Georgetown University, “completely changed my life.”
“I know what the power of language and study abroad can do for regular little neighborhood kids like me,” she said.
“If our children can master standardized tests but they can’t operate in the world, then we haven’t done them a service in terms of their education,” she said. “So this is as important as anything they do in a classroom.”
The reality is, however, that children in D.C.’s public schools are not mastering standardized tests, or even basic academics. more
“Weaken America Anyway Possible”
Looting the Treasury anyway possible is simply one of their tactics.
19 Trillion in debt and counting proves they are throwing money to the four winds as fast as they can!
http://img.pandawhale.com/152513-little-rascals-Obama-throwing-pJdR.gif
She has been dreaming of a way to get the taxpayers to fund her vacations her whole life.
Considering the average race of a DC student wouldn’t ENGLISH be a foreign language?
Bus them to Juarez
They will get the lingo soon enough
That’s a lot of money spent to polish turds. A polished turd is still a turd.
Shame they had “return” tickets …
izlamo delenda est …
Actually in terms of pissing away money this one probably returns more then most. First it comes from private donations (at least the article says that) and it gives these kids a taste of what life could be like if they studied harder and stayed away from gangs. Hell, if even a quarter or a tenth of them used this experience to lever themselves out of the drug and gun play rich environment they currently live in then the trips where worth it and the donors money well spent.
“Okay kids! Our first stop is Castro Street!”