Summary

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA delivers remarks to members of the Business Roundtable and answer questions Business Roundtable Headquarters, Washington, DC ABC POOL LIVE Part 2 QUESTION: Mr President, again, thank you And I know a topic near to your heart has been education for young folks, and you've spent a lot of time on this And many of us have done things private- public partnerships And you recently made a comment about computer science for all high school kids, which I think is an important point, because technology is such a broad topic It will infiltrate all jobs in the future So maybe a chance to make some comments about how you envision something like that actually taking root over the long term that we could make some progress with it -- on scale 11:44:31 OBAMA: Well, first of all, I want to commend Ginni and IBM because you guys have done some terrific work Anybody who wants some inspiration, go to the high school that IBM is participating in in Brooklyn where kids -- a collaboration between the public school system, the city colleges of New York, the CUNY system and IBM And you've got kids from -- most of them, parents never went to college A lot of them immigrant kids And they are marching through STEM education, pre-engineering education They're getting essentially college credits by the time they're sophomore or juniors in high school They're able to save money because in five years in high school, they come out with an associate's degree They then either are transferring to a four-year university with those credits, or they're starting to work with IBM because they've been apprenticing and the curriculum design has given them confidence that if they do well, they're going to be able to get a job That model is something that we're actually looking to try to duplicate all across the country And the good news, as I mentioned at the top, is because of the strong work that Arne Duncan has done, the strong work that a lot of governors and local communities have done to increase accountability, creativity, have high expectations for kids, bust through some of the old bureaucratic obstacles We are seeing highest reading scores, highest math scores, highest graduation rates And part of our goal here is to improve STEM education generally A critical element of that is understanding this computer age that these kids are immersed And I don't want them just to know how to use their phone to play video games; I want them to know how that phone works, and potentially code it and program it And what's remarkable -- I'm about the age where -- I think my high school just had, like, the first coding class when I was maybe in seventh or eighth grade But this is what -- you had, like, those cards, and it was -- and the punch cards And now, the way these -- the tools and resources that are available for kids starting in first, second grade -- we have these science fairs and these little Girl Scout troops come in and they've coded, they've designed their own games, and -- or simulations of entire towns with people and all kinds of scenarios that they've figured out And so it's actually something that they naturally gravitate to We just have to start early It's almost like a foreign language, where rather than try to catch kids when they're in tenth, eleventh, twelfth grade, they get part of the broader curriculum and incorporate it into how you're teaching math and how you're teaching science and how you're teaching social studies That seems to be the way in which kids get most engaged 11:48:35 So we're doing a lot of work with many of you individually as companies on this STEM education issue We hope that you will continue to participate You've been great partners on that front I'll just say in closing, it's always a pleasure to be here I want to just reiterate, as we enter into the silly season of politics, that the primary thing that is holding back a lot of potential growth, jobs, improved bottom lines, greater stability is well within our control right now, and are things that traditionally enjoyed bipartisan support -- Ex-Im Bank, getting TPP done, financing and executing on an infrastructure policy I've had conversations with folks like Larry Fink and others about if we're open to looking at new, creative ways of financing it, but the notion that we're not doing that right now makes absolutely no sense -- investing in research and development These are not partisan issues There are some areas where there have traditionally been legitimate arguments between Democrats and Republicans There are some issues -- like on environmental regulations, or financial regulations, where Jamie and I may disagree, or Nick and I may disagree And we can have those arguments, and we probably won't convince each other on some of these things But what I'm looking at is the low-hanging fruit that are no- brainers and that nobody here would argue with And the notion that we're not doing them right now because -- primarily because a faction within one of our parties has gone off the rails and sees a conspiracy around everything, or simply is opposed to anything I propose even if they used to propose it, that's a problem And I think it's very important for all of you to just step back and take a look at it, because you still have influence on at least some of those folks And challenge them Why wouldn't we do things that everybody knows make sense? 11:51:18 Thank you, everybody (Applause)