President Barack Obama is offering support and comfort to Memphis area families affected by the Mississippi River's high water.
The president met privately with families and local officials and emergency personnel forced to confront the highest waters since 1937. En route to the Cook Convention Center, Obama's motorcade went by the river, where the water was high but contained.
His session was held ahead of Obama's commencement address to seniors at Booker T. Washington High School.
The two-pronged day will allow the president to draw attention to his education agenda while also attending to the latest natural disaster - the snow melt and rain that have sent a torrent of water down the Mississippi, topping levees and forcing flooding along its path.
Obama will give the commencement address to graduates from Booker T. Washington High School, the winner of this year's White House Race to the Top High School Commencement Challenge. After implementing educational innovations and adding variety to its curriculum, the school saw its graduation rate jump from 55 percent in 2007 to nearly 82 percent in 2010. Changes at the school include separate freshmen academies for boys and girls and a greater choice of advanced placement classes.
The school was selected before high waters struck at some of the most poverty stricken communities along the Mississippi. The river crested at Memphis last week, just inches short of the record set in 1937. Some low-lying neighborhoods were inundated, but the city's high levees protected much of the rest of Memphis.
The river is now aiming at the Mississippi Delta, forcing officials to open a Louisiana spillway and flooding Cajun country to protects the cities of Baton Rouge and New Orleans.
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