First Lady Returns to Queens: Praises School District 25

Exactly three months to the day when First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton visited Queens and wowed an overflow audience at Colden Auditorium at a Louis Armstrong tribute, she returned to the borough today (Wed., March 3) to applaud a local school district’s arts program.
Clinton’s second visit to a Borough with a large Democratic enrollment in such a short interval further fueled speculation that the First Lady is seriously considering a run for the U.S. Senate seat from New York being vacated by Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan.
The First Lady’s visit to the auditorium and classrooms of Intermediate School 25 at 34-65 192 St. in Flushing, was to congratulate the students and teachers of the school for their arts curriculum, but also to spotlight School District 25 for being recognized by the President’s Committee On The Arts and the Humanities and its Arts Education Partnership for the District’s overall arts education program. District 25 was one of only eight other school systems in the nation to be cited in a presidential report called Gaining the Arts Advantage: lessons form School Districts That Value Arts Education. It is the first national study to examine the success strategies of school districts in building and sustaining strong district-wide arts education.
Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who created Right Arts, considered one of the leading programs in the country for restoring arts education in the schools, was invited but declined saying he would be in Washington, D.C. for a House hearing on Wednesday. His attendance at the Flushing event would have been a political extravaganza because of rampant speculation about a possible Senate contest between Giuliani and the First Lady in the year 2000.
The Clintons have both visited queens numerous times over the years. The President has made appearances in Forest Hills, Bayside, Flushing, Fresh Meadows and most recently last November in Woodside. In addition to last December’s visit to Queens College and the Louis Armstrong House in Corona, the First Lady visited York College in Jamaica in 1992, and St. Mary’s Hospital for Children in Bayside in 1995.