Although President Obama's 'Back to School Speech,' [Derived Headline]

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Although President Obama's "Back to School Speech," delivered to the students at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Va., and Web cast to the nation's schools, ignited some controversy, politics aside, the message that "you shape your own destiny, no matter what hand you're dealt," that it takes hard work and determination to succeed and that one never knows what events and choices in our life may shape our future, is one that our children need to hear and believe. As I listened to his speech and re-read the full text, one line in particular struck a chord ... "Maybe you could be a good writer -- maybe even good enough to write a book or articles in a newspaper, but you might not know it until you write a paper for an English class."

It took me back to fifth grade, at the urging of my teacher, entering The Voice of Democracy essay contest and an old photograph in the New Haven Register of me accepting a $50 U.S. Savings Bond as the winner of the contest. Although, of course, as a 10-year-old, I never thought of that experience as a defining moment in my life, here I am writing a column for this same newspaper.

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Although President Obama's 'Back to School Speech,' [Derived Headline]

I also thought of another fifth-grade student, who sat in my elementary classroom that I was teaching, and volunteered to be the "weather girl" in a program that the P.T.A...

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