Kids at Hope

Dear Mom,

I have been in education for 13 years. I have worked in two school districts during this time. The district and city I currently work at embrace a philosophy dreamt up by Rick Miller. These kids live in this low socio economic city and once upon a time would have been considered Youth at Risk. Rick Miller saw an opportunity to change the perspective. Instead of believing these kids had the potential to fail he opened up eyes all over the country to show how these kids had the potential to succeed, just like any other kid in America in any neighborhood.    

I have always had similar beliefs and now I have a package for them, a box I fit into, but I also believe in kids with other challenges not just socio economic as an obstacle. We know there are ways to overcome socio economic obstacles and we view these triumphs as a hurdle won and conquered. What about the kid who can’t escape their situation? The kid who will have to overcome their obstacles time and time again. A kid with anxiety or depression or ADHD who will grow up to be an adult with anxiety or depression or ADHD?

We medicate them and teach them to function through side effects. We possibly limit them and their true potential. Are we giving them the tools to really succeed for the next 80 years? Are we giving them the same sense of hope for success. Can we see the greatness inside? What would happen if we showed them their true potential, the genius that lives behind the medication? I’m not saying it will be easy but I know it is worth it.

Let me tell you about a mom I met this week whose son was diagnosed and medicated from the time he was 5 years old. He has been on these medications for 7 years. Doctors most of the time won’t even consider diagnosis or medication until a child is 9 years old. I first met this boy about 6 months ago at an art show where his work was on display. He had never met me before but he was excited to show me his talent. I spent nearly an hour talking to this mom and her son. At the time two other children of hers went to my school but not this particular boy. Since then he has enrolled in my school and I have already seen him twice for discipline issues each time he has been very polite and very apologetic.

Yesterday in my office as I talked with him and his mother I saw it again, that greatness.  I saw his potential and I saw his obstacles. I knew he would have to work hard for his life to be successful an I knew I had to be something more than just a Dean at that moment. I asked him to step out of the room for a minute so I could talk to his mother. I told her that I was about to be myself with her, that I was going to share my struggles. I wanted her to know my experience with substance abuse and mental illness and that I was a grown woman who had been part of the adult world that tries to live life one obstacle at a time. I’ve seen what happens when men and women never learn or are never given the tools to succeed and instead they self-medicate. Then their choices and freedom are taken away.

I explained to her that this is part of my purpose one of the reasons I choose to be a mom in education, to stop the cycle. There are other ways to reach these kids. Her son has been stunted from his medications. The side effects have been worse than the condition and they are both desperate to find new ways. At 12 years old he is already steeling money and making choices based on the struggle in his mind. She told me she doesn’t know what to do anymore. She doesn’t know how to help him. I told her tell him the truth, talk to him. Show him how his choices will affect his future. Then I said, “ask for help”. I explained to her that we are out here. There are people who are here to help him develop good habits in times of struggle and frustration. There are people who can help him discover his triggers. Once he finds these triggers he can discover how to use them to his advantage. These are the moments artists create, we create poems and paintings and songs, these are the moments we can see life in  ways no one else can.

By this time, he was back in the room and I looked at him and I said, “It’s not going to be easy, every day you will have to work at resetting your brain, you will have to make conscious decisions to create greatness but the more you practice, the easier it will get and the greater you will be.

I know because I have been practicing for 40 years.