President and First Lady Obama are preparing to exit the White House and the power couple is leaving a few words of wisdom behind. The Obamas share their thoughts with ESSENCE.
“I can unequivocally say that America is better off now than we were when we came into office,” the president says. “By almost every economic measure, we’re better off,” he added. “But having said that, we still have a lot of work to do.”
Some of the “work” has to do with race relations. “I think when it comes to Black kids, it means something for them to have spent most of their life seeing the family in the White House look like them,” Mrs. Obama shares.
She further explains, “All the future work that Barack talked about, I think over these last few years, we’ve kind of knocked the ceiling of limitation off the roofs of many young kids; imaginations of what’s possible for them. And as a mother, I wouldn’t underestimate how important that is, having that vision that you can really do anything—not because somebody told you, but because you’ve seen and experienced it. I think that will be a lasting impact on our kids.”
Check out President and First Lady Obama’s full interview with ESSENCE during the collector’s edition of the editorial that will be available on newsstands nationwide on Friday, September 9, 2016.