Remarks at the Presentation Ceremony for the Presidential Scholars Awards

Thank you all, and welcome to the White House. Ronna, you're in charge of keeping the rain off. [Laughter] Secretary Cavazos and Ronna Romney and members of the Commission, sponsors, guests, distinguished teachers, and Presidential Scholars: Let me officially welcome you to the White House.

You know, that great English leader, Benjamin Disraeli, once said: "Youth of a nation are the trustees of posterity." And the poet James Lowell was moved to write: "If youth be a defect, it is one we outgrow only too soon." Well, as this year's Presidential Scholars, you remain the trustees of our posterity. And I hope you'll accept some counsel from one who is a little long in the tooth, maybe. If youth is a defect, treasure it as many years as you can.

We meet here on the 25th anniversary of the Presidential Scholars program, and to honor some of the best and the brightest students in American education. This marks the highest scholastic honor that a President can bestow, and I am honored to bestow it. For while already you have done much, I know you will do more, and not for yourselves alone but for nation and neighbor -- learning, caring, helping education lead the way.

I believe in education. And so do you, for the evidence is your lives. And you come from backgrounds of every race and creed, and from all 50 States, the District of Columbia, U.S. territories, and families living abroad. And you've excelled in the classroom and outside it, through leadership, character and, yes, community service. You know, as I do, how education can unleash your talents. Take Presidential Scholar Eben Hewitt, of Muncie, Indiana -- he started a Shakespeare Club at his high school; or another scholar, Clarity Haynes, of Washington, DC's Ellington School of the Arts -- she is fluent in Portuguese and Spanish. I'm a little jealous -- some say I'm not even fluent in English.

Education can be the great uplifter -- individually, and for America. Perhaps Meath Bowen, a Presidential Scholar from Anchorage, Alaska -- I think I see her -- put it best: "An educated person," she said, "has choices, alternatives, and can exercise freedom of mind in all areas of life."

Now, I know what you're thinking: It won't be easy. And you're right, there'll be roadblocks along the way. And I'm reminded of how once, marking an examination paper written shortly before Christmas, the noted scholar teaching at Yale, William Lyons Phelps, came across this