Name: Obama Speaks At Syracuse, NY High School About Education - Full Speech
Uploaded: 2014-10-05T13:18:48.000Z
Duration: 26 min 30 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

To-infinitive

Hello, Syracuse! (Applause.) It is good to be in Syracuse! (Applause.)

Modal verbs - A2

Can everybody give Emilio a big round of applause for a great introduction? (Applause.) I think

Emilio's parents are probably here. Where are Emilio's parents? Wave your hands. There

they are right there. He did pretty good, didn't he? We're very proud of him. We might

In addition to Emilio, I want to mention a couple other people. You already heard from

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, who's doing a great job every day. (Applause.) You've

got Mayor Stephanie Miner here. (Applause.) There she is. Attorney General Eric Schneiderman

is here. (Applause.) Your Congressman, Dan Maffei, is here. (Applause.) The superintendent

of the Syracuse City School District, Sharon Contreras, is here. (Applause.) Your principal,

Robert DiFlorio, is here. (Applause.) And most importantly, a bunch of students are

My understanding is there are students from all five Syracuse high schools here. You got

Corcoran in the house. (Applause.) You got Fowler in the house. (Applause.) Nottingham.

(Applause.) The Institute of Technology. (Applause.) And our host, Henninger, is here. (Applause.)

Now, I especially want to thank the students because I know that you're still on summer

vacation. You've got a few more days. So taking the time to be here when you've still got

a little bit, that last little bit of summer break, that's a big deal, and I'm very honored

I am on a road trip -- by the way, if people have seats, feel free to take a seat. I'm

going to be talking for a while. If you've got no seats, then don't sit down -- (laughter)

-- because you will fall down. (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT: I love you back. (Applause.)

So I'm here on a road trip through New York into Pennsylvania. This morning, I was at

the University at Buffalo. Tomorrow, I'll be at Binghamton University and Lackawanna

College in Scranton. But I wanted to come to Syracuse -- (applause) -- because you're

doing something fantastic here, with programs like "Say Yes" -- (applause) -- Smart Scholars

Early College High School -- these are programs that are helping Syracuse kids get ready for

college, and making sure that they can afford to go.

And this is a community effort. All of you are coming together and you have declared

that no child in the city of Syracuse should miss out on a college education because they

can't pay for it. (Applause.) And so we're hoping more cities follow your example, because

what you're doing is critical not just to Syracuse's future, but to America's future.

And that's what I want to talk about briefly here today.

Over the past month, I've been visiting towns across the country, talking about what we

need to do to secure a better bargain for the middle class and everybody who's working

hard to get into the middle class -- to make sure everybody who works hard has a chance

And we all understand that for the past four and a half years, we had to fight our way

back from a brutal recession, and millions of Americans lost their jobs and their homes

and their savings. But what the recession also did was it showed this emerging gap in

terms of the life prospects of a lot of Americans.

What used to be taken for granted -- middle-class security

-- has slipped away from too many people. So, yes, we saved the auto industry. We took

on a broken health care system. (Applause.) We reversed our addiction to foreign oil.

We changed our tax code that was tilted too far in favor of the wealthy at the expense

of working families. And so we've made progress. Our businesses have created 7.3 million new

jobs over the last 41 months. (Applause.) We've got more renewable energy than ever.

We are importing less oil than in a very long time.

We sell more goods made in America to the rest of the world than ever before. Health

care costs are growing at the slowest rate in 50 years. Our deficits are falling at the

So there's good news out there. And thanks to the grit and the resilience of the American

people, we've been able to clear away the rubble from the financial crisis, and start

laying the foundation for a better economy. But as any middle-class family will tell you,

THE PRESIDENT: No, no, no, that's fine. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. We're okay. We're

okay. That's okay. Hold on a second. Hold on. Hold on. Hello, everybody, hello. Hold

on. Hold on a minute. Hold on a minute. Hold on. So, now -- hold on a second. (Applause.)

Can I just say that as hecklers go, that young lady was very polite. (Laughter.) She was.

And she brought up an issue of importance, and that's part of what America is all about.

But what America is also all about is making sure that middle-class families succeed, and

that people who work hard can get into the middle class. And what I was saying was is

that we're not where we need to be yet. We've still got more work to do. Because even before

the most recent financial crisis, we had gone through a decade where folks at the top were

doing better and better; most families were working harder and harder just to get by.

And we've seen growing inequality in our society and less upward mobility in our society.

The idea used to be that here in America anybody could make it. But part of that was because

we put these ladders of opportunity for people. And, unfortunately, what's happened is it's

gotten tougher for a lot of folks. So we've got to reverse these trends. This has to be

Washington's highest priority -- how do we make sure everybody gets a fair shake. That's

Unfortunately, you may have noticed that in Washington, rather than focusing on a growing

economy and creating good, middle-class jobs, there's a certain faction of my good friends

in the other party who've been talking about not paying the bills that they've already

run up; who've been talking about shutting down the government if they can't take away

health care that we're putting in place for millions of Americans.

Those are not ideas that will grow our economy. They're not going to create good jobs. They're

not going to strengthen the middle class -- they'll weaken the middle class. So we can't afford

the usual Washington circus of distractions and political posturing. We don't need that.

What we've got to do is to build on the cornerstones of what it means to be middle class in America

-- a good job, good wages, a good education, a home, affordable health care, a secure retirement.

That's what we need to focus on. (Applause.)

And we've got to create as many pathways as possible for people to succeed as long as

they're willing to work hard. That's what's always made America great. We don't judge

ourselves just by how many billionaires we produce. We've got to focus on our ability

to make sure that everybody who works hard has a chance to pursue their own measure of

And in that project, in that work, there aren't a lot of things that are more important than

making sure people get a good education. That is key to upward mobility. That is key to

a growing economy. That is key to a strong middle class. (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: Love you back. (Laughter.)

Now, everybody here knows that. That's why you're here. That's why a lot of your families