Students at Manhattan Charter School peppered Secretary of State Hillary Clinton with questions this morning during her visit to introduce the president’s education speech.
Clinton is one of several Cabinet members dispersed at schools across the country today to remind students to work hard in the upcoming year, no matter the personal and economic obstacles they face. She exhorted the audience of rapt elementary school students to draw inspiration from President Barack Obama’s life story.
“Ultimately, how much you learn, how you feel about yourself, is really up to you,” she said.
For the bulk of her hour-long visit, Clinton fielded questions from the students, who had come prepared with handwritten notecards they waved in the air, sat on, or curled in nervous palms.
“If you had become president, what changes would you have made?” asked one student, while another wondered if the Secretary has ever walked her dogs in Central Park (she hasn’t).
A first grader who asked about the Secretary’s favorite books was rewarded with the most detailed answer. Clinton, naming books she’d read in elementary school, listed the Nancy Drew series and Little House on the Prairie.
“Who is your boss?” bellowed one student, to laughter. “My boss is Barack Obama,” Clinton said. “At the State Department, I’m the boss.”