[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1998, Book I)]
[March 28, 1998]
[Page 464]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



[[Page 464]]


Interview With Johnathan Rodgers of the 
Discovery Channel in Johannesburg
March 28, 1998

African Education Initiative

    Mr. Rodgers. Mr. President, I was in Uganda when you announced your 
African education initiative. It was very, very impressive. Is there a 
role for foundation and the private sector in helping us?
    The President. Oh, absolutely. There's no way that just through 
Government aid from the United States and other countries we can do all 
this. And a lot of operations like the Discovery Channel can even more 
efficiently hook up these schools, give them the basics that they need, 
a television set, a satellite, the VCR's. Then eventually we'll be able 
to come in with the computers, and we'll be able to have interactive 
access to the Internet and even interactive communication across 
national lines.
    But we have to begin to put in place a technological infrastructure 
in these schools. And since we can now leapfrog a lot of the early 
investments that schools would have had to make 10 or 20 years ago, we 
can actually do it more cheaply. In other words, they won't have to have 
a thousand volumes in their library that they could never afford if we 
can do enough through educational television.
    Mr. Rodgers. You also talked about the relationship, in this case, 
between one school, I believe it's in Silver Spring, Maryland, and a 
school in Uganda.
    The President. That's right.
    Mr. Rodgers. Are there other things American kids can do to help 
here in Africa in terms of education?
    The President. Oh, yes. First of all, I think it's important to set 
up as many partnerships as possible. And if the children have access to 
the Internet in the African schools, if we can get that done, then they 
can actually communicate directly through the Internet.
    But there are lots of other things we can do. If we have 
partnerships--children in American schools, for example, could have book 
drives and send books to children--a lot of children in African schools 
don't have access to any of the books that American kids take for 
granted. Then they could write back and forth and talk about the books 
they're reading. Or they could make sure they have a television and 
access to some of your ``Discovery'' tapes, and then they could write 
back and forth and talk about what they'd seen together. I think that 
this is the kind of thing that we want to promote more of.
    Mr. Rodgers. Great. And the last question, Mr. President: I think a 
lot of Americans would be surprised that in many of the African 
countries boys are treated differently than girls. Do you see a change 
coming there?
    The President. Yes, we're working hard to support that. But you see 
this in a lot of developing nations around the world, where boys and 
girls have a different role in traditional society and where girls have 
not traditionally been educated. Now, as they move to a more modern 
society, young girls have the same aspirations: They want to develop 
their minds; they want to go out and live their lives. And we've worked 
very hard to support education for young girls.
    One of the things I like best about the Ugandan educational 
initiative is that they want universal primary education for all their 
children. And they're going out and recognizing the schools where the 
enrollment and the graduation rates are just as high for girls as for 
boys.
    That's a big priority. But it's a big change for Africa, but Africa 
is not alone in that. That's a worldwide issue we have to keep working 
on.
    Mr. Rodgers. Thank you very much, sir.
    The President. Thank you.

Note: The interview began at 2:12 p.m. at the R.P. Maphanzela Primary 
School. Johnathan Rodgers is president of Discovery Networks, U.S. A 
tape was not available for verification of the content of this 
interview.