Photo courtesy of Samantha Nelson.
Laura Bush
Laura Bush speaks at Samford University.
Former First Lady Laura Bush, who spent many years in Texas as a teacher and librarian before going into the White House, paid homage to important role of teachers on Thursday night, March 26 at Samford University.
In a powerful speech that started out with jokes, Bush then got serious and applauded teachers for the role they play in shaping society and stressed the importance of reading. She was speaking in Samford’s Wright Center as keynote speaker in its fifth-annual Tom and Marla Corts Distinguished Author Series.
“I believe that every child in America should learn to read,” Bush told a packed audience. “I believe that books have the power to shape our journey.”
Author of the book Spoken from the Heart, the former first lady’s appearance was hosted by Samford’s Orlean Bullard Beeson School of Education. As first lady from 2001 to 2009, she became a champion for key issues in the fields of education, healthcare and human rights.
She founded the Texas Book Festival and the National Book Festival in Washington, D.C. Today, as chair of the Women’s Initiative at the George W. Bush Institute in Dallas, Texas, she continues her work on global healthcare innovations, empowering women in emerging democracies, education reform and supporting America’s military veterans.
Her visit will begin a series of events to celebrate the centennial year of teacher education programs at Samford. The Distinguished Author Series was established in 2011 to honor the late Thomas Corts, who served as Samford’s president for 23 years, and his wife, Marla Corts, a former high school English teacher.
Corts had ties to the administration of Bush’s husband, former President George W. Bush. After his retirement from Samford in 2006, Corts served as coordinator of the President’s Initiative to Expand Education and as coordinator of Basic Education in the Office of the Director of Foreign Assistance in the U.S. State Department.
Several members of Corts family were in attendance. Westmoreland had all Samford education majors to stand and applauded teachers for their contributions to society.
Bush was already familiar with the White House from the presidency nearly a decade earlier of her father-in-law, former President George H.W. Bush. But nothing prepared her and her husband for the challenges they faced during his first year in office, she said.
“When George was elected president, we believed the challenges facing the country from within were going to be more urgent than the challenges we faced from outside,” she said. “The Cold War was over, the Berlin Wall had fallen and Germany was reunited. Russia was no longer our enemy. Global terrorism had yet to emerge as a threat to our nation or society.”
Bush said she was already preparing to make education and fighting illiteracy a top priority during the first year of her husband’s presidency. But that was put on hold on Sept. 11, 2001. On a day known as 9/11, Muslim extremists hijacked several planes, using them as weapons to attack America on its own soil, killing nearly 3,000 people. Two jets crashed into the Twin Towers in New York City, another into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and a fourth crashed in a Pennsylvania field.
Bush gave a behind-the-scenes account of what it was like in the White House after 9/11, explaining the agony she and her husband went through as President Bush realized the tough decisions he had to make in response to terrorists attacking the U.S.
“I saw first-hand the tears of my husband, as he described what it was like to meet family members who lost loved ones on that horrible day. I was no longer speaking out about illiteracy. I also began to speak out about the terrible conditions of women under the Taliban in Afghanistan.”
In her memoir, Spoken from the Heart, Mrs. Bush writes about joining one of America’s most prominent political families, life with her husband and twin daughters, and the post-9/11 period that transformed her role as first lady.
After her speech, Bush did a one-on-one interview with Samford President Andrew Westmoreland, answering questions about life in the White House and the importance of education.
Proceeds from the lecture benefit the Samford education school, which will continue its 100-year anniversary celebration with various events this year.
