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The first lady watched school kids coloring in Tulsa. The Turks saw links to terrorism.
Source: Washington Post
The first lady watched school kids coloring in Tulsa. The Turks saw links to terrorism.
By Emily Heil March 6 at 4:31 PM
The visit by Melania Trump to a charter school in Tulsa on Monday seemed to be a picture-perfect success for the first lady. She complimented pre-K students on their crayon skills and observed middle-schoolers conducting science experiments. She made small talk and warned a second-grader who had complained about her homework that it was “very important.”
But the first lady had just stepped into a zone fraught with potential diplomatic peril with her stop promoting her Be Best initiative that aims to improve children’s well-being. The Dove School of Discovery, a Tulsa charter institution that focuses on character education, is believed to be part of a network of schools in the United States and abroad linked to the Gulen movement, a secretive religious movement inspired by a 77-year-old Turkish Muslim cleric.
Turkish media and observers of the Turkish-U.S. relationship professed surprise that Melania Trump would visit a school identified with cleric Fethullah Gulen, whose network the Turkish government calls a terrorist organization.
“Melania Trump visits FETO charter school in Oklahoma,” read the headline on TRT World, Turkey’s state-run broadcaster, following Trump’s visit. Turkish authorities refer to Gulen’s movement as FETO, an acronym for the Fethullah Terrorist Organization.
Stephanie Grisham, a spokeswoman for the first lady, said the site was “both recommended and vetted” before the visit and shrugged off any suggestion that there was significance to the choice besides the school’s achievements. “The school was recognized with the 2018 National School of Character award,” she said, citing an accolade given by Character.org, a nonprofit group that certifies and promotes character-development programs. “It was chosen because of their excellent academics and commitment to character education. Their diverse staff and student body should be celebrated.”
-snip-
By Emily Heil March 6 at 4:31 PM
The visit by Melania Trump to a charter school in Tulsa on Monday seemed to be a picture-perfect success for the first lady. She complimented pre-K students on their crayon skills and observed middle-schoolers conducting science experiments. She made small talk and warned a second-grader who had complained about her homework that it was “very important.”
But the first lady had just stepped into a zone fraught with potential diplomatic peril with her stop promoting her Be Best initiative that aims to improve children’s well-being. The Dove School of Discovery, a Tulsa charter institution that focuses on character education, is believed to be part of a network of schools in the United States and abroad linked to the Gulen movement, a secretive religious movement inspired by a 77-year-old Turkish Muslim cleric.
Turkish media and observers of the Turkish-U.S. relationship professed surprise that Melania Trump would visit a school identified with cleric Fethullah Gulen, whose network the Turkish government calls a terrorist organization.
“Melania Trump visits FETO charter school in Oklahoma,” read the headline on TRT World, Turkey’s state-run broadcaster, following Trump’s visit. Turkish authorities refer to Gulen’s movement as FETO, an acronym for the Fethullah Terrorist Organization.
Stephanie Grisham, a spokeswoman for the first lady, said the site was “both recommended and vetted” before the visit and shrugged off any suggestion that there was significance to the choice besides the school’s achievements. “The school was recognized with the 2018 National School of Character award,” she said, citing an accolade given by Character.org, a nonprofit group that certifies and promotes character-development programs. “It was chosen because of their excellent academics and commitment to character education. Their diverse staff and student body should be celebrated.”
-snip-
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/the-first-lady-watched-school-kids-coloring-in-tulsa-the-turks-saw-links-to-terrorism/2019/03/06/aceabb0c-3f99-11e9-922c-64d6b7840b82_story.html
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