FYI

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From an article entitled "Founding Fathers," by Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, for The Wall Street Journal:

"No matter how devoted, the Founding Fathers were not inclined, as today’s parents are, to lavish their students with praise. ‘Good job’ was not in their vocabulary. ‘Take care you never spell a word wrong,’ Jefferson admonished his younger daughter. John Adams said it best in a letter to Abigail: ‘The education of our children is never out of my mind… fire them with ambition to be useful and make them disdain to be destitute of any useful or ornamental knowledge or accomplishment. Fix their ambitions upon great and solid objects.' The nation's Founders called for passing on the passion for freedom, educational excellence and civic virtue."

Fast forward 225 years – from a more recent article in The Wall Street Journal:

The Koh brothers, "Harold and Howard, are the sons of Korean immigrants and new additions to the Obama administration. Harold Koh, and international lawyer, a diplomat and former dean of Yale Law School is now legal adviser at the State Department. Howard Koh, a physician with board certification in four medical specialties and a professor at the Harvard School of Public Health, is now assistant secretary for health at the Department of Health and Human Services. Says Harold Koh, ‘To be honest I never had a teacher who was as rigorous as my parents.’ Howard says, ‘I guess, like any immigrant parents, they wanted their kids to succeed in this new country.’ His parent’s mantra, he says, was ‘It’s one thing to get a great education and do well in school, but its not important if you can’t ultimately use it to help other people.'"

Questions: One -- Is there a message that we can take from these stories? Two -- Does that message stand the test of time? (like maybe 225 years)?