What students want: freedom, safety, and sincere conversations

I brought back a few observations concerning the state of the high school student mind, not to sound overly pompous. I spent something like 24 total hours working with 8 girls and 3 guys during the workshop and that time together means opinions were shared and questions asked.

To a person (11 of 11), the Roe reversal was upsetting and puzzling. When it came time to write a personal commentary draft, many chose to vent a bit about how they resented the loss of a freedom while steaming about six judges in far-off D.C., evidently blasé about upending lives.

None of them may have had to confront unintended pregnancies -- I honestly don't know -- but everyone understands having a right suddenly taken away. Radical Republicans should not count on their votes any time soon.

Another observation: kids have shifted their thinking from "if" there is school shooting in their building to "when," and that was startling. Again, they were an equal mix of angry, confused, and fearful when the topic of gun violence came up.

America is pretty good at simply shrugging and getting on with it after even the most horrific shootings, and that means nothing will be done anytime soon. Same with the virus and its many variants. We are all fatalistic at this point, which means vaccination rates will remain where they are and unnecessary suffering will continue. Voices of reason need some leaders to change the momentum here.

A third observation: each student valued having someone they could trust (or at least tolerate) talk with them about their writing. I was disturbed by how many of these bright students volunteered that no one ever really discussed their writing with them, offering suggestions and support and asking questions. 

We could all agree that something is wrong with education and that no one was satisfied with how school works or how learning is supported. Everyone desires more time to simply talk with a teacher about their work, and everyone agrees that school is not structured to provide more time for such activities. 

I began our day on opinion writing by showing the famous clip from the 1976 film "Network," and the "I'm mad as hell and I'm not gonna take it anymore" scene. We had some fun chanting it, over and over. It was cathartic, though, just as in the movie, what we should do with our anger is not entirely clear.

I encouraged them to make a list of what makes them "mad as hell," and to then start thinking about how to chip away at the injustices or poor design or ill-considered policies and rules. Simple anger provides us with a short rush of adrenaline but we need to morph that adrenaline into action of some sort.

To be a student journalist requires energy and motivation, and anger can get those started. The key for those students this coming year is to create strategies and techniques that they can use to make a difference in the world, even if that difference is quite small.

For the radical right, the Roe reversal has provided new energy. If you can impose your will on an entire country in one case, why not try some more restrictions? Authoritarians and fanatics will never be satisfied. No abortion in my state? Hoorah! But now, let's talk about the neighboring state." 

If life is a game, the radical CINOs are in the midst of a good stretch for them. But fortunes can change, and I could sense a lot of energy coming from more progressive directions and thinking. 

The kids are all right. Or can be.

Progressives support 'circular firing squad' far too often

Today's "much ado about nothing" news story that demonstrates the lengths people will go to attack opponents involves a speech from Jill Biden, where the first lady praised the diversity of the community, saying it was “as distinct as the bodegas of the Bronx, as beautiful as the blossoms of Miami, and as unique as the breakfast tacos here in San Antonio.”

According to one of the 1,500 Latinos attending her speech to the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, most in the room applauded and laughed at her series of three similes. But some people just have to find something to attack and to get a bit of attention, so a few complained on social media about being compared to tacos... and thus demonstrating that their grasp of how figurative language works is a bit weak.

Of course we know that actual Hispanic people, no matter their backgrounds and origins, are not actually bodegas, blossoms, or tacos. The series of three examples are meant to demonstrate range and comprehensiveness. Torturing the language to make this an insult is a stretch. 

We might try our own series of three similes, this time describing the diversity of Irish immigrants:

"The community of Irish immigrants is as distinct as the cozy pubs of Brooklyn, as beautiful as the view of the Atlantic from the Ring of Kerry, and as unique as U2 compared to The Wolfe Tones."

I suppose some overly sensitive souls might object to being "cozy pubs, a view, and a band," but they would simply be missing the point. It's a series, and uses the "magic" of three examples, and implies that Irish culture is both well-known and diverse. Perhaps not diverse enough, but how exactly do we measure "enough" diversity?

While the Christians in Name Only rally to impose their will about abortion and about the secondary status of women on the nation as a whole, more progressive voices seem more interested in performative virtue and showing themselves to be purer than you and me.

Sure, Mrs. Biden mispronounced "bodega," and YouTube rejoiced. There is nothing more human than enjoying celebrities being embarrassed or slipping up. If you do any public speaking, there will be stumbles and mumbles, tripping over phrases and even skipping a key word. Want to avoid all speaking errors? Don't talk. Someone like Mrs. Biden might be credited with showing up and trying to connect. The fact that she doesn't connect with everyone is just reality.

There are many important issues for Democrats (or perhaps Dems in Name Only?) to discuss and analyze and argue about. 

It's not that those criticizing Mrs. Biden's simile choices are wrong from their point of view... and their insights into why they resist easy stereotypes are valuable.

But every time this sort of silly dispute becomes a headline, the CINOs rejoice, the bigots give thanks, and the greedy radical right politicians rake in more cash.

Those same critics will be shocked when progressive candidates are defeated at the polls -- should that occur -- all while disavowing any responsibility. They mostly want to be "right."

After all, who would have guessed that the Republican radicals were not keen on diversity? Both parties are equally bad, you say? See last month's Supreme Court decisions for the results of not caring who is in power.

Where are the strong and sustained attacks on the excesses and ugliness of Republican politics? Why must Democratic politicians attempt to build consensus despite all evidence that their opponents could care less?

Dems need to focus.

Beware of old people arguing about 'the golden age' and outdated policies

President Biden was born Nov. 20, 1942, making him seven and a half years my senior, and the voices calling for someone else to run for president in 2024 are rising. There's not an opinion site or page in the country that doesn't have something on how he is already our oldest president and that he would be in his eighties should he win a second term.

The smart money is on Mr. Biden continuing to claim that he will run for re-election until past the midterms this fall... when he will finally change his mind. That would be my preference.

Everybody likes Joe Biden personally, but they are not so sure about his performance in office. He promised to bring "normalcy" back to politics, but that clearly has not happened. Sure, it's better by far than the chaos his predecessor created every day. 

But the pandemic hasn't really gone away, though we have basically decided that we are over it. Ukraine is being tortured by a rival nation we can't afford to go to war with (mostly because of the possibility of the end of civilization as we know it). Gas prices are slowly decreasing but inflation remains high, mostly due to a combination of pent up demand for goods and travel along with effects of the Russian invasion.

No one thinks the nation is on the right track, and no one honestly has any idea of how to get America and the world back on track. Most people don't know what the "right track" even would look like. 

It's a confusing time, but one thing I am less and less confused about is aging. There comes a time when we all need to think hard about putting most of our government's decision making power in the hands of people over 70 (and often well over 80).

Our "gerontocracy" (government by the elderly) is mostly my age and older. I'm not sure the country has fully come to grips with what having so many older leaders means, but the occasion of turning 72 has gotten me thinking more deeply about it all.

Sitting at a bar near the Drake campus last Friday, I found myself, somehow, sharing the story of how much child care cost us back in the 1970s as we were starting our family, after returning to Iowa City. The university still had vestiges of a lab school sponsored by the College of Education in the old University High School. 

By sheer luck and good timing, we got Lesley into the Early Childhood Education Center (ECEC), part of the College of Ed., on the last day for enrollment, sometime in 1974. There were numerous students working as well as Masters and PhD students in early childhood education to take care of the kids. There was even a full-time nurse on duty. The monthly cost was $75.

ECEC guaranteed that younger siblings would be admitted and both Sara and Phil became "students" at about age two months. The school eventually closed down -- the 1980s began the squeezing of university budgets -- and we soon had to find Phil more traditional arrangements, but by then we were on a bit stronger financial footing.

Kathleen and I often wonder what we would have done without ECEC. Parents today need not wonder.

To them it must sound like a mythical time, and those 30- or 40-something parents listening to my story must have considered the entire tale science fiction without exploding planets or space battles.

The danger is in thinking that experiences I had in my 20s and 30s (or 50s, for that matter) will be coming back at all, much less becoming common once again. ECEC is not coming back. Government is too stingy and costs have risen astronomically.

Should every state provide something like ECEC at an affordable price to all parents? Of course! 

Will that happen? Not a chance.

We need leadership that is more closely tied to life NOW as opposed to decades ago. People my age have stuff to contribute and wisdom to share and money to spend.

We just don't have to be the nation's leaders.

The hard reality of knowing when to back away

I was off in Iowa last week, teaching at MediaNow, a high school journalism workshop on the campus of Drake University, and didn't find the time to blog. That is just in case anyone noticed my absence from the blogosphere.

BTW, the workshop is called MediaNow because it focuses on cutting edge technology and how it can make student media more accessible and exciting. It doesn't neglect more foundational journalism skills, including writing and reporting, which is what I taught, or photojournalism, though the technology has certainly changed over time.

On the other hand, I couldn't help thinking that this almost 72-year-old was a bit more "MediaThen." One speaker presented ten trends or software or hardware that should be really exploding in the next year or so. One of them was about "selfie drones," which evidently are a thing if you want to spend $250 for the device and which (I guess?) will upgrade our selfie game and make us all go viral.

I did realize that I was taking notes on the presentation in a reporter's notebook with a pen. Most of the students at the workshop did not know what a reporter's notebook was and many appeared unfamiliar with taking notes, period. They rely so much on their phones and recording interviews, etc., that there would be real issues if their devices were to be confiscated and they were forced to use traditional notetaking.

That observation about my being so NOT part of Generation Z, not to mention not being Generation X or Millennial, plus some other weirdness last week reinforced my decision that MediaNow would be my "last hurrah," so to speak. 

Everything was handled well. They put instructors in a nice hotel right across the street from the Drake admissions building. The organization was sharp and efficient. The kids were smart and engaged and open to new ideas. The organizers are long-time friends and talented advisers and media people, so it was fun to hang out at lunch or in a local bar and solve world problems.

But I was the oldest person involved by about 20 years and the whole "travel hundreds of miles, leave my wife to fend for herself, never quite be comfortable" thing just didn't feel quite right. I got paid, of course, but the money is not enough to offset the negatives.

I can still teach, and writing still lies at the heart of everything in media, so what I was focused on was important. I had several students tell me that they appreciated me just talking with them about their drafts. It was clear that back in their home schools, they were solid writers and that their advisers were fine with whatever they wrote.

But when they saw how much more focused and effective their writing could be with a second draft, at least, after a conversation with a coach, they realized that what they really wanted was what we all want: real interactions and real conversations about their ideas and their rhetorical choices.

It comes down to "I COULD keep doing this sort of summer workshop," helping a few kids become better thinkers and writers, as opposed to "time to take a further step back" from that almost frenetic teaching, trying to cram years of learning into three days. The latter choice is stronger.

It's a bit sad to realize that I just don't have the fire anymore to travel the country challenging young minds, but there does come a time...

Never say never, I guess, but if that was my final summer out-of-state workshop, I can "retire" knowing I did my best and left it all on the field, so to speak.

Time for some younger, more energetic advisers to pick up the baton.

Hear that, Mr. Biden?

 

We all need to examine the myths that motivate us

Last week hundreds of thousands of Avs fans flocked to downtown Denver to celebrate the team's NHL championship. 

Kathleen said that she was worried about the possibility of a mass shooting during the event, with that many people all crowded together. The chaos and the horror/terror that could be created was almost unimaginable. Nothing happened, but the idea that a shooting COULDN'T happen would have been beyond naïve.

Granddaughter Grace joined a throng of women of all ages downtown last week at a rally to protest the overturning of Roe v. Wade, which made us proud but also prompted her mother to instruct her to run as fast she could the other way should anything happen... away from possible violence, likely involving guns. Nothing happened, but the idea that a shooting COULDN'T happen would have been beyond naïve.

If I were a school official, I would be spending the bulk of my time trying to figure out how to keep children and teachers in schools as safe as possible... and we are only a month away in Colorado from most teachers reporting back to work. So much for that whole "you get three months off... lucky you" argument that the ignorant make about teachers.

Schools are in crisis, and that's without the constant threat of random and mortal violence looming over every building. Little time is left to really think hard about how to improve education itself, how to support kids who are confronting an increasingly angry and divided world, or how to retain and support so many teachers who feel stressed and frustrated and unappreciated.

A school official might think that the school has never had a shooting or any sort of mass violence, and the odds are still quite good that nothing will happen like that this coming school year. Nothing happened yet, after all, but the idea that a shooting COULDN'T happen is beyond naïve.

Even the most extreme gun nuts must be thinking that there is something horrible eating away at the country and that our out-of-control gun culture won't be the cure. The person carrying a concealed weapon, just in case, is irrational and living in some myth where the "good guy" will be able to quickly and accurately assess the situation, be in the right position, and then do what we have all seen too many times in movies and TV shows... defeat the bad guy.

Highland Park, Illinois, is a wealthy suburb, but a 4th of July parade became a killing ground for one nutcase. Boulder, Colorado, is a liberal enclave, but a nutcase could show up at a King Soopers and murder anyone not fast enough to run away. Both of those mass shooting sites featured victims who assumed they would not be targeted. After all, what would be the point? 

We can't be paralyzed by fear, of course, though it's a strong urge. One way to deal with that urge is to repeat to ourselves that the odds are very much in our favor that nothing horrible will happen to us, or our loved ones or our neighbors, today. 

Those Avalanche fans who jammed downtown are living in a myth, as well, connecting the achievements of well-paid athletes who aren't from their neighborhood or even their state with their own lives that are lived far from national championships and far from often unimaginable riches. Most of those fans have never played a moment of hockey.

The myths we tell ourselves are powerful and motivating. They are not always bad. They are called "myths," however, because they are not real.. they are not factual. They get the sentiment right, perhaps. They can help us understand themes and connect us.

I am flying to Des Moines to teach writing as a journalism workshop today, mostly motivated by the myth that I can truly help some students become better writers in the span of about three days. We will likely have some fun and perhaps a few students will leave with some ideas to build on in the coming school year.

But the reality is that I am just a "consultant," brought in for some "dog and pony show" stuff -- hey, kids don't spend several days at a journalism workshop because they are completely focused on the intricacies of great narrative writing or argumentative writing. They want some fun. They want to meet some new friends. They want to get away from their home for a few days. And, yes, they vaguely want to be better thinkers and writers, but that's the task of years of education.

The teachers who work with them in the coming year... they are the educators that have a solid chance of helping kids become better citizens, better journalists, better people.

The reality is that change in students comes from years of slogging it out, stumbling into and out of strategies and tactics, and becoming more and more confident in what they do and who they are. 

Another reality is that, at age 72 (next Tuesday) I am so far removed from these high schools students that I will be more a unicorn in their lives than someone they can connect with. The reality of the education game is that there are only the tiniest number of educators working in schools who are my age. 

There's a good reason for that, but I will keep alive the myth of my being able to quickly make some difference in some kids for a few more days.

A good day to reset some national expectations

It's Independence Day today, the 246th year of America being, well, America, at least in some form.

It hasn't been a smooth 246 years, and right now we are a long way from a "more perfect union," as Lincoln said. Our national angst has hobbled the presidency, paralyzed Congress, and politicized the Supreme Court. 

I was reminded today that Prohibition, a Constitutional Amendment driven mistake in trying to regulate basic human instincts, ended after 13 years, with yet another Amendment. The nation managed to "right the ship," so to speak, replacing one national referendum with another. 

Unfortunately, there is no specific law to respond to, since many of the "rights" of the past 50 years basically grow out of court interpretations of statutes and the spirit of the Constitution. Right now, it appears the six radical right wingers on the Supreme Court are feeling full of themselves and eager to repay the investment radical Republicans made in them.

The deluge of 6-3 decisions, many in open opposition to popular opinion and preferences, has just begun.

The Court is supremely independent and I hope the Sick Six are enjoying their BBQ today, protected by power and location and police from the majority of their fellow citizens. 

My hope is that Democrats can shed their doomed devotion to bipartisan solutions and embrace the struggle between being a democratic republic and being an autocracy/theocracy. Yes, it will be nice to see inflation drop a bit before midterms and yes, it would be great to see the former president indicted for clear crimes.

But the majority needs to step up and battle complacency and power imbalances. 

Perhaps California governor Gavin Newsom is the guy to galvanize the majority. He is already taking on wacky Florida politicians with campaign ads that stress real freedom. Check this video. 

Time to stop crossing our fingers and chanting, "This is not who we are. This is not who we are."

Time to recognize that "we" -- a solid 40 percent of the nation -- really are exactly as we seem to be.

That needs to change, and July 4 seems like a good day to commit to that.

We can't enjoy a life without a bit of humor

I have been trying to put together a quick "how to advise student humor writing" lesson, and therefore was drawn to this week's Frank Bruni blog featuring some light-hearted sentence examples, though several of his samples seemed more "dark humor" than we might wish. That's consistent with the mood of the world, I guess.

The first example is an example of a writer using hyperbole and personal opinion to comment on a famous couple, with no clear intention of harming the couple's reputation or creating true conflict. I was thinking this might be a nice example of the sort of humor writing that would not cause too much upset in a school community.

Dan Kois wrote in Slate about a soda machine in Ben Affleck’s home that apparently dispenses both Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi. “Why would you create this unholy monstrosity, this horrific hybrid, this affront to nature?” Kois wrote. “Look, I am not naïve. I know that some tragically misguided individuals prefer Diet Pepsi, the devil’s beverage, to Diet Coke, the elixir of life. But who drinks both?”

Of the possibility that Affleck prefers one while his fiancée, Jennifer Lopez, likes the other, Kois observed: “Scientists tell us that, unfortunately, there are no documented cases of successful cross-cola marriages in human history. Happy, buoyant, cosmically satisfied Diet Coke people cannot coexist with miserable, unhealthy Diet Pepsi people.” 

A teaching point here would have to be that this "commentary" is much more about the writer than the celebrities. The vociferous ranting is so clearly over the top that readers quickly realize the purpose of the passage is simply to make them smile.

In The New Yorker, Andrew Marantz wrote: 

“Even Trump’s putative allies will admit, in private, that he was a lazy, feckless leader. They wanted an Augustus; they got a Caligula.” 

This is a sentence that relies on the reader knowing a tiny bit, at least, about two Roman emperors and a high school adviser might want to discuss such references with a student writer. Will such references connect with their main audience -- students -- and is it OK if they don't? Maybe the point will be to get readers to fire up their search engines and learn a little history.

Commenting in The Guardian about the nervousness and cowardliness of Boris Johnson’s aides, Andrew Rawnsley wrote: 

“A shiver is going around members of the cabinet looking for a spine to run down.” 

The sentence above is a form of satire along with clear exaggeration, using the "spine" as a metaphor for courage, but there is also a nice use of "shiver" and "spine" that sounds just right.

Also in The Guardian, Arwa Mahdawi noted that the Supreme Court, in the same week, 

“ruled that states don’t have the right to pass their own gun-control laws but do have the right to pass their own women-control laws. Time to get uteruses reclassified as assault rifles, I guess.” 

This is also satire, based on reaching for an absurd effect to illustrate the writer's observations on some seemingly contradictory rulings by the now radical court. 

And in The San Francisco Chronicle, Kevin Fisher-Paulson wrote: 

“Parenting really is a heartache business. At the end of the day, there is no end of the day.”

I was thinking this clever syntax might inspire a student writer to explore subbing in another noun for "parenting," like "high school" or "teaching" or "coaching." The "heartache business" might not always work, but could in some cases. 

A writer might rewrite to something like, "Teaching is tough. At the end of the day, there is no end of the day."  

That is a great example of a provocative claim that just begs for support examples, and I would imagine some writers might opt for taking observations and anecdotes heard in class to illogical, exaggerated conclusion. 

A classroom "trick" is to come up with some common starting point and then help individual students explore wherever they want to move in their reactions to that starting point. 

I plan to use some form of this final "no end of the day" starter with my first in-person summer writing workshop group next week in Des Moines. I'll let you know how it goes.