This I Believe

Teens Who Were Smarter than Their Schools, Taught Me

My beliefs are shaped by kids who sat in my high school classes in an urban Canadian school, back in the 70’s. That’s when I taught them English and writing and they taught me lessons in living, laughing, and actions I still value today. I was in my 20s at the time, and I saw in teens a zest to run against other’s time in gym and then run for others in a pinch. Once we visited a senior citizens homes, when my teens interviewed residents about their yesteryears. Humorous one-liners, high fives and quick wit filled that cafeteria, as the kids taught enthusiastic elders how to throw darts, draw horses, and relive stories from their past.

Nothing seemed to hold these teenagers back for long and they always seemed more to give away than most of them had themselves. One family was evicted and moved into their car for a month in my first year there. Another boy went to jail for shooting his father and others were torn apart by alcohol, drugs and lack of jobs. But many teens had minds to make it and they took on projects that turned disadvantages into lessons and a zest a zest for life. What started with debates in class, snowballed into victory in a national tournament, and ended up with action against an organization that delivered beer and wine to senior’s doors for hiked-up rates. One teen suggested we “blow up the joint” but others took these problems to the press, met in teams to brainstorm ways to accomplish more, and cleaned one alcoholic’s home.

Teens taught me how to live through giving back, I saw that I too could accomplish more if I sidestepped tests, and triggered actions that accomplish more good from facts than conventional schools sometimes do.

It’s a pleasure to remember back and see dreams ready to be realized in teens. They brought beliefs into shape for me that continue to guide my life today. William Blake described it best when he said: “I must create a system or be enslaved by another Man’s. I will not reason and compare, my business is to create.”

Because these teens taught me to create, I returned to school to earn a doctorate, so I can understand their minds and help them achieve their dreams. What I sensed back then, I since have learned: Teens are far smarter than their schools.

“You go learn ’em,” one boy teased, and yet I wrote books and curriculum from what they taught me. Their beliefs affirmed my beliefs, and research proved that secondary schools today can offer more. So when an engineering firm and leaders I respect, recently suggested we create a “brain friendly secondary school,” I jumped at this creation because of my belief in teens and in all they taught me.