Michelle Obama was in Austin on Wednesday as the keynote speaker for South By Southwest Music 2016 to continue her push to empower women.
The First Lady joined Missy Elliott, Diane Warren, and Sophia Bush in a panel discussion moderated by Queen Latifah. The initiative was to raise awareness for the 62 million girls around the word who are not currently enrolled in school.
“People think that you gotta be the President of the United States or you look to the President and he’s gotta do everything,” Obama said, “but the truth is the change that happens, happens on the ground, it happens from the bottom up.”
Mrs. Obama told the packed audience at the Austin Convention Center that she is launching the second phase of her global campaign “Let Girls Learn”.
“It’s just a sign of what a group of women can do together,” Obama said about the new song she released on Wednesday called “This is For My Girls”.
Obama admitted she doesn’t sing, so instead she recruited nine performers to contribute their vocals to the anthem, including Missy Elliott, Kelly Clarkson, Kelly Rowland, Lea Michelle, and Zendaya.
“GDP’s go up in country’s where women go to school,” Sophia Bush said Wednesday, “and for every year of education a woman’s earning power goes up 10 percent. Every year of secondary school education it goes up 25 percent.”
The First Lady also answered a few questions about what she will miss about being the first lady.
“It’s the young people—you’re going to make me cry–that I interact with every day,” Obama said. “I will miss that as First Lady, but I’m gonna keep doing it for the rest of my life.”
However, one this Obama made clear is that she has no plans of running for president in the future.
“I will not run for president,” Obama told the audience. “No no, not going to do it.”
The First Lady is scheduled to appear at several political fundraisers in the Lone Star State before heading back to Washington D.C.
Michelle Obama’s trip comes five days after her husband, President Barack Obama, traveled to the state’s capital.
President Obama kicked off the entire South By Southwest festival on Friday. This is the first time in the festival’s 30-year history that a sitting President and First Lady both made an appearance.
