Could a British teacher ever do this?

This is an inspirational and moving video. It's about students at the Bronx High School of Performance and Stagecraft in New York responding to Barack Obama's speech on racial reconciliation in America. It was created following a request from their teacher, Jackson Shafer, to the Obama campaign.

"He makes me care, and he makes me want to believe and he makes me want to get up and go and do something with my life," says one of the kids, Sylvia Bonilla.

"People say that South Bronx kids will never amount to anything, but I say, ‘Yes We Can.’", says another, Anna Boateng.

Of course the answer is no to whether a British teacher ever do this, or anything like it, and put it on YouTube. And the amazing New York teacher and the Head of the School apparently broke some rule and will probably be pursued and punished.

But I love this response.

Principal Mark Sweeting, who could receive a disciplinary letter in his file, acknowledged that the video shoot violated school regulations. Still, he said, he remains "in awe" with what took place inside the classroom.

"The bottom line is I have a senior Hispanic female student that is now interested in politics. I have a male African-American student that is being raised by a single mother that is now in tune with what a superdelegate is," Sweeting said. "That to me is outstanding. That to me is inspirational."

Watch it and weep that stupid, blind bureaucracy and fear of it would ensure that nothing like this would ever be allowed in the UK and would therefore keep UK teens in schools in similar deprived areas from expressing themselves and being inspired/inspiring others in a similar way.

Postscript: Shane from Gallomanor has suggested I not be so bleak!

He points me at I'm a Councillor get me out of here!, a Hansard Society Project, Student Question Time, and Podminions.

There's a video on Podminions which was pretty good (but it's not on YouTube), because it sounded like young people talking for themselves.

Doing a YouTube hunt, Respect had some ranty stuff from youth but I found some pretty good stuff from the British Youth Council, like this:



Low view numbers though.

And UK Youth Parliament had some good stuff:

But this is the sort of thing I was really looking for - how young people are using YouTube to politically express themselves - and it's powerful:



And another one:



And another one, on the same subject:



With a few video responses already:



Here's another one (nb: 'sorry for the robot voice :/'):



Who knew that Lord Goldsmuch had so many fans! These previous vids have higher view numbers than 'official' ones, including some of the Labour YouTube channel! Please, egovers and edomocratites - get this onto your radar!