Future You Memo No. 7
First, some numbers:
30 - Texas school shooting marks the 30th shooting at K-12 schools in 2022. 1
90% - of students at Robb Elementary are Hispanic. 81% are economically disadvantaged. 2
2 - Tuesday’s shooting came with just 2 days left before the summer break.
The Unique Challenge of Raising Teenagers Right Now
I can no longer honestly tell my kids that everything will be okay. - Writes Molly Jong-Fast in the immediate aftermath of Texas today.
Soon after coming home from covering the Conservative Political Action Conference in late February 2020, I got an email from the organizers saying that I had been exposed to a new coronavirus. I wrote an email to the nurse at my older son’s school. Almost immediately, the phone rang; it was her. “We obviously can’t tell you what to do, but it would be a huge help if you’d keep your son home for a few days just until …”
It quickly became clear that neither of us had any idea how that sentence should end. I went into my eldest son’s bedroom soon after to explain to him why he had to stay home from school. Then I said what I always say when telling my kids something kind of scary: “I’m sure this is not a big deal. I’m sure everything is going to be fine.” I suspected that I was lying but I thought I was practicing a sort of normal parenting deception—the kind you do when you just need a kid to go to sleep or do their homework. Sure, you’ll use algebra in real life. Yes, skipping gym class is bad.
Then the unimaginable happened. Today, I can’t tell my teenagers that everything will be all right with a straight face. I don’t have answers for my kids, or for yours. As parents, we are tempted to pretend—to be brave for our kids—but I’m not sure that serves anyone anymore.
Read the entire article at The Atlantic
My College Students Are Not OK
I was teaching writing at two very different universities: one private and wealthy, its lush lawns surrounded by towering fraternity and sorority houses; the other public, with a diverse array of strivers milling about its largely brutalist campus. The problems in my classrooms, though, were the same. Students just weren’t doing what it takes to learn.
By several measures — attendance, late assignments, quality of in-class discussion — they performed worse than any students I had encountered in two decades of teaching. They didn’t even seem to be trying. At the private school, I required individual meetings to discuss their research paper drafts; only six of 14 showed up. Usually, they all do.
I wondered if it was me, if I was washed up. But when I posted about this on Facebook, more than a dozen friends teaching at institutions across the country gave similar reports.
Read further at NY Times
* Read the letters in response - Why Many College Students Are Struggling
Till next time….
Take care of yourselves.
https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/24/us/uvalde-texas-elementary-school-shooting/index.html
https://txschools.gov/schools/232903103/profile