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Obama Made the Right Choice to Speak at the First Black High School in Memphis

Booker T. Washington High School beat out over 450 other schools to get President Obama as a commencement speaker.

\n\n\n\n\n Congratulations are in order for Memphis, Tennessee's Booker T. Washington High School. The school is the winner of the 2011 Race to the Top High School Commencement Challenge. President Obama will head there later this spring to deliver the graduation speech.

Booker T. Washington opened its doors in 1873 and was the first public high school in segregated Memphis that black students were allowed to attend. As the school's finalist video details, in recent years the 500-student campus has overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles—98 percent of students live in poverty and 20 percent of student's homes were lost when a housing project was demolished—and increased the graduation rate from 55 to 82 percent.

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Help Decide Which High School Gets Obama as a Commencement Speaker

Six high schools are competing for the President to be their graduation speaker, and it's (partially) up to a public vote.


As part of the "Race to the Top Commencement Challenge," some lucky high school is going to have President Obama speak on campus on graduation day. A public vote, happening this week, will take the current pool of six finalists down to three semi-finalists, and then the President will choose the final winner himself.

Each of the schools—Booker T. Washington High School (Memphis, Tennessee); Bridgeport High School (Bridgeport, Washington); High Tech High International (San Diego); Pittsburgh CAPA 6-12, School for Creative and Performing Arts (Pittsburgh); Science Park High School (Newark, New Jersey) and Wayne Early Middle College High School (Goldsboro, North Carolina)—made brief videos and wrote short essays spotlighting what makes them unique—whether its diversity, overcoming poverty, or an innovative curriculum.

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Which High School Kids Will Obama Brainwash This Year?

The Commander in Chief will give the commencement speech to one of these six high schools.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7axARaXyMxM&feature=youtu.be

High school graduations are just around the corner. Thanks to the Race to the Top Commencement Challenge, for the second year in a row, one outstanding (and lucky) public school will host the Commander in Chief as its commencement speaker. Hundreds of schools across the country entered by answering essay questions and providing data showing how they're "promoting college and career readiness for all students while establishing a culture of student success and academic excellence." Today the White House announced the six finalists:

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