Recapturing Ronald Reagan's Shining City on a Hill in the Summer of Freedom

GOPUSA | June 13, 2005 | Kevin Fobbs

[KevinNuPac]

Recapturing Ronald Reagan's Shining City on a Hill in the Summer of Freedom

By Kevin Fobbs

June 13, 2005

As school children leave hurriedly from their classrooms and the shadows of their school year melt into the background of their memories, parents must keep this summer as a reminder that a year ago we lost a great president, in Ronald Reagan and it is important for school students, parents and teachers to not only remember the legacy of this man, but more importantly, over the summer months help them to learn the truth of the impact he had on this nation and the world.

Why is this so important for the children of America to re-learn over the summer months? Well, as historians begin to evaluate and reevaluate the legacy of this man, the future historians of tomorrow are in the homes of our nation's elementary and junior high and high school students' today. These students need to be taught that the driving force in this real life drama was a plain speaking man, who was more than a celebrated hero on the Silver Screen from an age that only their parents and grandparents may completely remember.

But why summer? Well summer is when families spend more time together. Summer is filled with a lot of quality time as well as quantity time. We must use the time to mean more than just un-planned fun. Let's also mix in the fun with finding ways to honor a man who made all of us feel like we could do more, strive for more and touch the hearts of our fellow Americans because we all shared and embraced unselfish values like volunteerism?

Before school lets out for the summer, teachers have an excellent opportunity to help the parents develop reading assignments rich and replete with examples of patriotism, acts of valor, and movies with themes that will enable parents to help their children understand that Reagan helped us to embrace the belief that all of us had a right to be judged by our merit, by our initiative and by our achievement. Those were unique values that actually had been embraced 20 years before Reagan by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his famous and eloquent 1963 "I have A Dream" speech in Washington DC.

As I begin to outline my suggestions, let me first say that you have the ability to help make this an exciting and wonderful journey of discovery for your children and a way to hammer home some important values that your children will be able to share with their friends, and class mates when they return to school in the fall. Just imagine when the teacher asks students to write down what they did during their summer vacation, your child or children will write down proudly, how they learned about a man who was our president and how he helped Americans to recapture their belief in themselves again and that our best days are still ahead. But they will also be able to share the richness they and their family discovered about our nation and why freedom and the defense of it are so crucial:

1. Parents should set aside a special part of the day once a week with their children and truly discuss what freedom, what cherishing the values of family and faith mean in real life examples. Try to relate the examples to when you were a child. Use one or two examples and use those examples as the theme for the week. For example: Turn off the television set and share with your child an experience about perseverance. How did you overcome something as a youth, and tie it into a value a Revolutionary War hero may have used to overcome some adversity. Perhaps you have a member of your family who was a soldier who survived the military conflict. What were the values that kept him focused on winning and surviving? Ask your child what they would do in a similar situation and why? You may even consider role playing. Make it a family fun game. At the end tie it in why perseverance was important to President Reagan to stand up to the challenges that he spoke about, as president.

2. Celebrate the Culture of Life with your Children and emphasize once a week in home discussions why our founding fathers chose to build our nation upon the foundation of One Nation Under God, and why the family values that Reagan stood for, that our founding fathers cherished and some died for, are still central to our religious faith and our national principles today. For example, use examples from your life that your child may understand. A grand parent who has taken ill, a young friend or neighbor who is handicapped, or a young baby who is in a neonatal unit in the hospital provide good examples about valuing life. Emphasize by example how dangerous it can be to begin to select who will live or die based upon a person's personal appearance or tasks they cannot perform due to illness, or age.

Again, it is a good idea to role play, maybe include this as part of the church or place or worship where your child may be attending summer school religion classes, or better yet, start a role-playing club on your block or in neighborhood. Remind your child in the playful skits about the central theme by using key examples from our nation's past. For example, heroes who used faith in God to overcome health challenges like Helen Keller who was both deaf and blind. Under today's death culture standards, many courts would have ruled that she would be a candidate for "legal" state murder, because her "quality of life" was not what the state, i.e. liberal judges would have deemed fitting to still be kept alive.

3. Neighborhood organizations should plan trips to historic settings around the region as well as taking day trips to local civic and community organizations that are making a difference in the lives of the residents of their community. In addition, your block club could create a weekly game for the kids to first define what exactly is a "Shining City on the Hill". Rotate the summer morning game between houses on the block that way everyone plays and every parent is involved in some way as well. Ask them who lives in this city and what are the people like? Why not get the PTA parents involved as well. The children should be encouraged to volunteer at least twice during the summer with a program that provides services to the needy. This equips the child with the ability to develop Christian compassion, which is a key element in the social character of our nation.

For example, when my daughter was in elementary and junior high school in several of her classes she and her fellow classmates were able to volunteer in senior citizen centers, or help younger students learn to read, or organize food drives and clothing drives for the homeless. . Our children must learn to give back to the community and the nation, which has given them and their families so much. By engaging them in this activity during the summer, children will learn that all Americans, young and old have a right to take occupancy in Reagan's Shining City on a Hill.

4. Civic organizations can do their part by sponsoring Summer of Freedom Fairs where crafts, artwork and even neighborhood oratory and writing pieces can be shown, demonstrated or displayed. Between some of the fun fair-like rides can be half-time activities and prizes given for art contests which seek to portray the ideals of freedom, of traditional family values and of what a universal colorblind society truly is represented by.

5. Independence Day is right around the corner and can be used as a tremendous tool for giving young kids the opportunity to learn about what their town, or state or region may have done during the Revolutionary War. Take them on a field trip to a local historic site, or get a bus trip together on the Summer of Freedom road to historic discovery. You can help them to truly embrace a freedom day and find freedom heroes.

You could even get the local newspaper involved by asking that they co-host a contest for the kids to go on a Freedom Hero Scavenger Hunt where they attempt to find a dozen or so examples of people, places or things that represent their ideal of freedom. Let the younger children find examples from a selected story from the bible. Since Independence Day is about our nation's freedom, perhaps the children and family may even discover something new about a person who lives right down the block or the next farm over whom they had not quite thought about being a freedom hero, but who has given something special in war or peacetime for their community and their nation.

6. Video store selections of movies that highlight examples of morality, traditional family values, are another important tool which can be used in order to help children understand the strong timeless values President Reagan stood for. There are several websites that highlight family viewing. One of them is Hollywood Hero where you can find a list of patriotic movies as well as some recommendations for family viewing and listening. Another website is (web site). This website provides parents with reviews of movies, TV viewing, games and books and is rated for age appropriateness. This presents a great opportunity for the whole family to have a relaxing summer viewing films remembering and honoring our great men and women who defended our freedoms at home and abroad.

7. Remind your children that as they go through this summer season they should develop a sense of personal honor and pride about being an American. They should be like Reagan, showing great fortitude for your family's traditional values be it on the summer playground, or with friends who they are playing with in their own backyard. Help your children to understand that if their playmates are sour on our country and our President, they should not be blamed, but rather educated about the examples of goodness, of greatness, of courage that our nation and our current and past freedom heroes lived and died for. Perhaps some of this may rub off on their historically and perhaps values challenged parents.

Lastly, as Reagan was riding into the sunset of his final years, in 1994 he wrote his Farewell letter to America. This should be shared with America's children. It showed Americans that even in the twilight of his life Reagan still maintained a firm control over who he was and the greatness he valued in our nation after being diagnosed with Alzheimer's.

He said, "In closing, let me thank you, the American people, for giving me the great honor of allowing me to serve as your president. When the Lord calls me home, whenever that day may be, I will leave with the greatest love for this country of ours and eternal optimism for its future. I now begin the journey that will lead me into the sunset of my life. I know that for America there will always be a bright dawn ahead."

Parents, there are some wonderful fun experiences you can share with your children this summer. Let the summer weeks also be an entertaining discovery of what the values and principles our nation's freedom is based upon. Arm them this summer with knowledge, beliefs, and mix in a good sized portion of Reagan's legacy of honor, pride, courage and resolve. With those lessons intact and reinforced throughout your child's summer, they too will learn how to reach for the bright dawn of new horizons that are found in the Shining City on A Hill.

----------

Kevin Fobbs is President of National Urban Policy Action Council (NuPac), a non-partisan civic and citizen-action organization that focuses on taking the politics out of policy to secure urban America's future one neighborhood, one city, and one person at a time. View NuPac on the web at www.nupac.info. Kevin Fobbs is a regular contributing columnist to the Detroit News. He is also Outreach Communications Vice Chairman of the Michigan Republican Party and daily host of The Kevin Fobbs Show on News Talk WDTK - 1400 AM in Detroit as well as co-founder of the Jackson, MI-based American Conservative Values Television Network. Listen to The Kevin Fobbs Show online at www.wdtkam.com daily 2-3 p.m., and call in toll-free nationwide to make your opinion count at 800-923-WDTK(9385).

--------------------

[Jeff Head]

Teaching the correct and accurate history of the United States to our children would go a long, long way.

[mr_hammer]

Ping