Poor writing plus questionable advising equals a sad situation

In local publishing controversies, the above opinion article, published in the Regis Jesuit HS "Elevate" magazine in December, led to retraction of the commentary, the firing of two full-time teachers (the adviser and assistant adviser of the publication), embarrassment for the author (I have removed her name), and incredible pressure on school administrators from the Archdiocese of Denver.

As is often the case, everything about this situation is complicated -- and few will ever know all the details and context that produced the controversy.

But let's start with the content of the writing, and an observation about the headline. The word "out" should be "our" and that is a simple typo. But the credibility of the magazine is immediately damaged when the largest type on the page was not properly proofread. An irony of proofreading is that headlines are often assumed to be correct -- after all, they are so large and someone likely typed them directly into InDesign.

A "forest for the trees" situation.

The subhead (or deck) is puzzling. Who is "confronting" and did the author really mean "reconciling" or "balancing" or something else that might be looking for some common ground?

Persuasive writing is best when there is a clear answer to "why am I reading this right now?" and the lead to this article doesn't provide anything timely as an answer. THAT should have prompted a conversation between editor or adviser and the writer in hopes of sharpening the argument. 

The last sentence of the opening graf is "Abortions aren't uncommon. Up to 1 in 8 women get an abortion in the U.S." But the opening sentence of graf 3 states: "By the age of 45, up to 35 percent of women in the U.S. have had an abortion." A reader could be forgiven for being confused. I certainly am. 

These two figures do NOT add up, with the two statistics, neither of which is attributed to any solid source, widely different. That makes readers wonder what else in the essay might be nonsense or poorly thought out, or poorly researched

The second graf is the one that struck me as potentially the beginning of a moving human story about choice and lack of choice and how one woman struggled with childbearing decisions. You can read it yourself, but notice that the first sentence is missing any sort of explanation or follow up. Was the writer claiming that she knows someone who chose an abortion before giving birth to two children? 

In my next post I hope to grapple with the more global questions this commentary raises, particularly about how ethics, the law, audience, and "community interest" intertwine. And on Wednesday I plan to explore what makes a good informal essay, or personal commentary.

But one way to sum up the entire situation is as a mess for all involved. 

Approaching the end of another semester that did not go as planned

One of my favorite statements about teaching and life comes from "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," the 1939 Frank Capra movie that ends with an example of how the "standing, talking filibuster" really COULD produce something positive. The lost causes line comes much earlier in the film, when Jimmy Stewart's character, who had been appointed to replace a senator who had died suddenly, is commiserating with an old family friend.

That friend reminds him of what his father used to say: "Lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for."

Famous lawyer Clarence Darrow evidently said something like that long before the movie, but like most quotes from a less curated past, there is confusion about origins. The author is not nearly as important as the sentiment.

I am constantly reminded about this sentence, with the latest prompt being this column in the New York Times, written by a journalism teacher at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. She asks the rhetorical question, "Will My Students Ever Know a World Without School Shootings?"

Her column is more descriptive than a direct answer to the question in the headline but we all know that the most logical response to her question is "no." That is both a bit depressing and a bit cynical, but it is difficult to see that answer changing any time soon in an America that prefers extreme positions.

The positive spin, for me, is that despite the unlikely chances of significant gun safety laws or more general compromises among the population, making schools safer is clearly a worthy goal. For our nation, this is as much of a reach as world peace. Still, increased gun safety is worth pursuing.

In teaching, a much less fearful lost cause is education itself. We will never get everyone up to the "proper" reading level and we will never even get all students to see the difference between "its" and "it's." We will never see the day when all deadlines are met, no matter how reasonable. We will never attend a truly worthwhile faculty meeting (sorry for that snarkiness, but any teacher knows what I mean). 

We all have our lost causes, of course, but they mostly produce humor and self-deprecating jokes, not depression and cynicism. Educators start each year thinking THIS will be the semester when lesson plans really click, when students become self-motivated learners, and we handle all the tricky situations bound to occur in a diverse classroom with perfect balance and wisdom.

By the end of first hour, those dreams are dimmed. 

But we go back second hour and try again. 

It's the ultimate form of idealism: the "cause" is too important to abandon, no matter how unlikely any changes are.

Checking in with myself and with 'ghostly' readers

Today will be my only blog post this week as we travel to Seattle to enjoy food, rain, and cold, but (most important) family time. I did want to note that this is #202 in my little personal blogging experiment, which reminds me that life, progress, change, learning, and so much more tends to happen over time. Sometimes we need to look back to even realize what has been going on that brought us to wherever we are.

I tend to write about 450 words per post (and I know I should write tighter and leaner... but I am the first audience for my blog and each morning that number of words basically fills one screen on Blogger. That's as good a reason as any to settle on a particular length.

So my first 201 posts weigh in at about 90,000 words. That's at least one novel (though without a clear plot, characters, etc.). 

I have come to appreciate the satisfaction of writing five days per week, with no particular pressure to perform or to meet expectations or to argue some point of view. 

My hope for my writing students is that their fluidity as writers can change as they write more regularly but without the pressures of so many high stakes assignments. I have often wondered if I could teach a writing class based on the idea of writing 300-400 words per day, five days a week, with the instructor (me) simply responding to each post and focusing on one or two strengths or areas for improvement.

It is important to practice correctly, of course -- otherwise we are simply cementing in place bad habits -- and consistent practice may be the key to long-term success.

The more we write, the more we forget to consider the pressures of writing and the difficulties of getting what is in our heads onto a screen or page. I had a few college classes in which my entire grade was determined by a midterm and a final exam (they involved "blue books" that we tried to fill up since we all suspected that the poor grad students doing the marking would be impressed by sheer volume). 

Two tests determining a grade for an entire term automatically created pressure and stress. And that strategy continues today, I am sure, in classrooms around the globe. 

But you don't become an accomplished pianist by practicing once ever two weeks for six hours. And you don't become a great cook by only creating Thanksgiving dinner each year.

Writing is thinking made visible, and we should be thinking every day, and lots of times per day. 

A group of people I meet with each week was discussing core values this morning and I now realize that regular practice and regular reflection are part of some core value of mine.

Now I need to think about exactly what to call that core value.