I saw another group of former students last week. After a few stops and starts, we finally managed to coordinate our schedules and met at a Tasty Burger in the city. I’d taught these students during their senior year, a year that was illustrative of most of my experiences teaching students: it began with adversity and ended in some sort of respectful relationship between us…eventually. The kids would probably tell you that they balked because I put the screws to them: largely, I said–blatantly–that because they were behind academically, we needed to cover seven years of education in as many months. In retrospect, if I was them and I heard my teacher say that to me, in the fall of my senior year in high school, I’d have pushed back, too. But, I always like to know what I’m up against, and why I have to work hard, so I don’t tend to treat kids any differently, in that respect. I (and my awesome co-teacher) also assured them that if they stuck with me, I was going to work as hard as I could to make sure that they would make it through their freshman year in college.
We actually modeled our class after a freshman comp class. Yup, we rigored and vigored that year UP!
Of the kids that I met the other night, three are in college (and about to start their junior year–WOW), one is working and the other is a full-time mother. At this moment, I think they are all exactly where they want to be. Not where I, as their teacher and as someone invested in their future, need them to be, but where they, as young people making their way in the world, need to be.
This is a difficult position for me to admit. I wanted them all to be collegiate stars, wanted them all to have experiences that prepared them to make good choices, to think critically and deeply, to do something with themselves. Again, they’re all in the process of doing that. And sure, one of them is a Gates Scholar, a couple of them went on study abroad trips, another of them decided to be brave and transfer schools…and a couple others decided to try school and then do something else, maybe return, while another had a kid and is doing all she can to be the best mom she can be.
Success on varying levels, right?
What impressed me, too, was how savvy they are to understand the divergence between what adults want for them and what they want for themselves. They spoke quite candidly–and somewhat bitterly–about the high school they’d attended, about how they knew they were the “trained seals” for the school, trotted out to brag about where they attended school. But they said they didn’t feel prepared for college, that they felt the school had failed them in many respects.
If we, as school personnel who laud their achievements, revel in their successes, I contend it’s just as important to acknowledge the feedback and the kids who live up to our expectations, or challenge our expectations, or make us rethink our expectations entirely. If these kids are the stars, then shouldn’t we listen carefully to the messages they’re sending? For every Gates Scholar, there’s an entire class of students that didn’t even make it through the 4+ years required to graduate.
No big shocker: the kids know the odds, know the stakes, know the reality of the situation. They don’t buy the smoke and mirrors, that if you work hard, you can be successful, because, for some, that success isn’t what they need at that moment. I still think that a college education is an important investment, but we cannot devalue the kids who choose different paths, who get there on their own timelines. They count for something.
Don’t they?
Dr. Kimberly N. Parker 