Category: Education

No Excuses

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

no-excuses-300x200A life is touched by what is happening on the worldwide stage and what is happening inside the privacy of a home. Each of us evolve from the basics of our DNA through the millions of great and small interactions that we have with life outside of our own bodies and souls. Whether our existence is isolated or played on a global stage we become unique individuals based on everything that happens to us and the way in which we choose to adapt to our circumstances. Our destinies are driven both by our free wills and our circumstances. How we view life and react to its challenges is influenced by what we have seen and heard but ultimately each of us has the capacity to direct the ways in which we face down difficulties. Nobody is immune to troubles but many learn to deal with them with courage and optimism.

One of the highlights of my career as an educator came when I worked for a KIPP Charter School. Much like humanity it was not a perfect system but it got most things right. The founders liked to use slogans, something that is usually a bit annoying to me. There was one, however, that spoke loudly and clearly to my soul, “No Excuses.” I had based most of my life on that very concept and I had found it to be a saving grace. When I spoke to my students of overcoming difficulties I was not just some middle class maven from the suburbs attempting to sacrifice myself to kids from harsh circumstances. I had walked in their shoes. I understood what it was like to grow up with economic and social challenges. I knew them, not from books and theories but from my own story. What I also understood was that they didn’t have to be trapped in a forever world of poverty and want. I had used my talents to escape from the cycle that had daunted my family for generations and I knew that they had the power to do so as well.

So many of our leaders are kind hearted souls who only imagine what life is like for the have nots in our society. They generously work to improve conditions for people but have never known the feelings that come from want and dysfunction. They went to plush doctors’ offices as children rather than sitting for hours in a public clinic or a hospital emergency room because their parents had insurance and the funds to pay deductibles. They don’t possess any real concept of the fears and the troubles that so many children in our society endure on a daily basis, but I do.

Long ago I went to a movie with my husband when we were still dating. I can’t recall much about the film but there was one scene that has stuck with me forever. The hero of the story was a poor boy from quite sad circumstances. He had earned a scholarship to a renowned university where he managed to pose as someone from a successful family by dent of his intellect. He met a beautiful and well to do young woman and the two of them fell in love. She was anxious for him to meet her family and so in time she arranged for the two of them to spend a weekend at her home. When he saw the luxury in which his girlfriend had lived for all of her life he was suddenly overwhelmed. In one scene he opened the refrigerator to see a cornucopia of plenty. He was mesmerized by the sight of fruits and vegetables and snacks of every variety all there for his taking at any time of day. His girlfriend was unable to understand why the sight of a full larder had so affected him, but I knew exactly what was happening in his mind. I had never seen such a vision of edible riches either. In fact, there were many times toward the end of a month when the inside of the refrigerator in my home was almost bare. I momentarily shifted nervously in my theater seat as I watched the movie unfold because I realized that my date, who would later become my spouse, had experienced a far more comfortable existence than I had. I related far more easily to the poor of all races than with the white middle class.

As a child I was driven by both fear and determination to use my talents to ultimately loosen the grip of poverty and uncertainty that had so often dogged my family after my father died. As an adult I made it my vocation to show young people the way out of economic want. I had learned that excuses about my past only proliferated my problems. I took command of my destiny and worked my way out of the difficulties that had stalked me and my ancestors for generations. I realized that I lived in a time when there were far more opportunities for success than there were excuses for standing still.

I learned much from my mother and my teachers about hard work and diligence. I was often slammed by circumstances but I watched and learned and kept moving forward even when it was painful and I was exhausted. I used my wits and my hard work to achieve a lifestyle that is comfortable and secure. For decades I attempted to teach my students the same skills and attitudes and many of them have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. I suspect that they accepted my advice because they somehow knew that I was real when I told them that I understood.

It is laudable for the wealthier classes to work for the good of the less fortunate but they so often underestimate the gravity of dire situations and the pride of those who endure economic challenges. It is painful to hear someone pontificating about parents who have been unable to provide for their children. It does little good to publicly point to the obvious. Kids in difficult circumstances want to be shown the way to improve their lot without attention being placed on the things that they lack. They also desire a bit of understanding and compromise when they struggle to meet expectations.

I recall a young man who needed to work each summer to add to the family income. The school insisted that he participate in a formal internship program that provided mentoring and experience but no money. He stood his ground and asked that he be given credit for doing his job. The hapless administrator was unable to see that the knowledge and skills that he gained in securing employment, clocking in each day, and saving his funds for a rainy day was in reality as valuable as the internship that she had designed. Sadly she demonstrated to this student and his family that she was clueless about the reality of their lives.

I saw many such situations play out over and over again. Teachers were often ignorant of the juggling acts that students had to endure just to exist. So many of our kids quietly attempted to work at low paying jobs in the evenings and still keep up with the assignments from their teachers. They often existed on fewer than four hours of sleep. Their health declined and so did their grades. They were unwilling to share their stories with adults who seemed unable or unwilling to understand their dilemmas. Instead they became known as slackers who quietly bore the brunt of insults about their character. Adults from a different socio-economic world often were unable to comprehend the challenges that their students faced.

Those who struggle in our society do not require our pity. In fact they rarely want it. Instead they need someone to show them how to escape from the ravages of want and need. It is fine to give them some financial assistance but we can’t just write a check and then leave. Through our schools we can teach the poor how to navigate in a world of plenty. We can show them how hard work and determination are the keys to ending their pain. We must help them to channel their toughness and let them know that the journey will indeed be difficult but well worth the effort. The KIPP schools are making headway but they only reach a small number of students in the grand scheme of things. There are still far too many children who are being sent through their childhoods like widgets on a conveyer belt. The real key to social justice lies inside classrooms across the country. The changes that people need are made one child at a time by adults who are willing to make the effort to build true relationships with our youth. That takes understanding and time. Those things cost very little but will return profound dividends. Of this I am certain because it is the story that I have lived. We have no excuses for ignoring what we must do to begin the process of eliminating poverty.

Don’t Throw the Baby Out With the Bath Water!

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

153679054-620x4131Last school year one of my grandson’s called me using Skype so that I might help him with his seventh grade math homework. It was an unusual request from him because he is generally quite mathematically inclined and is even taking Algebra I this year in the eighth grade. I learned that he had a long term substitute teacher who wasn’t especially equipped to teach math and so he was not grasping concepts during class the way he normally does. In addition the homework assignment didn’t appear to match the information that he had been given during regular school hours. Even worse was the fact that it was over four pages long with a total of about eighty problems. He caught on quickly and managed to complete the assignment with little help from me but it took well over two hours and he was almost falling asleep as we worked to beat the clock. I suspected that perhaps he had been given the worksheets earlier in the week and simply chose to get them completed just before they were due but he insisted that it was a one night deal. Since he is generally quite honest I had to believe that the situation was one of those travesties that students must sometimes endure.

There is a great deal of discussion regarding homework these days. There are pros and cons regarding its impact on learning but virtually everyone agrees that in some cases there is way too much of it, particularly for younger children. I have a feeling that much of the homework trend is being driven by the tightly packed curriculum that literally does not allow for any breathing room in the teaching cycle. Educators today are pressured to introduce an impossible number of concepts during the school year, sometimes more than one new idea during a single hour. It is a race to get everything done and often assigning homework is the only way to provide the practice that students need. The problem of homework is brutally complex and needs to be addressed but not in isolation. Unless the entire issue of scope and sequence, skills and knowledge and testing is addressed the fixes may be quick but inadequate.

I taught math. I knew for certain that the vast majority of my students needed infinite amounts of practice before they mastered concepts. I tried to direct teach and then provide lots of in-class time to try out the new ideas while I walked around guiding those who were struggling. I managed to cleverly work in short periods of practice when students had to demonstrate understanding without assistance from anyone. I gave homework Monday through Thursday with regularity. I learned that ten problems worked as well as fifty for reinforcing learning so I tried to keep my intrusion on my students’ home life as short as possible. I generally found that I needed to work the problems myself before giving them to my kids because I had to see how much time they actually took to solve. I also checked regularly with those of varying skill levels to find out how long it took them to do my homework. I adjusted whenever I learned that they were having to work for more than forty five minutes. I tried my best not to give assignments on the weekend or before holidays. I wanted my students to have family time and to come back rested.

Some teachers and parents are suggesting that there should be no homework at all. I find that such ideas are akin to throwing the baby out with the bath water. Instead of attempting to adjust the situations that worry us we tend to use one size fits all strategies and as an educator I am certain that it is never a good idea to do so. When I was a student I needed homework because I was always too distracted inside a classroom full of other people to adequately absorb the information that my teachers were presenting. I needed the quiet of my home to go over my notes and study examples. I tend to die in group settings. Even in college I had to avoid the library because I was constantly losing my attention because of the distractions of the sounds of people walking, turning pages, shifting in their seats and so forth. Teamwork projects were just an extra burden for me because I always had to later go into my quiet little lair and study in my own way to master concepts.

Educators need to bear in mind the many different learning styles that make their students tick. One of the best ideas I have ever seen is giving students choices regarding how to reinforce their learning. Allowing them to select activities that correspond more closely with their innate learning styles just might be a great way to reduce the stress that universal homework assignments create in so many kids. They might for example have the opportunity to stay a bit longer once school is out so that they can participate in group study settings, especially if that is a better way for them to learn. For those like me who lose all focus in a crowd a private room might work or even the chance to just go home to do the work in solitude and familiar surroundings. Until we begin to assist each student in building on the strengths that they already have we will almost always find problems.

Another way of dealing with the homework problem is to have teachers from the different curriculum areas communicate with one another. I wanted to know when science fair projects or research papers were due so that I might shorten my own assignments or even eliminate them entirely. When every teacher is piling on huge amounts of work students become overly stressed and little learning is actually occurring. By working together to consider their needs it is far more likely that they will actually take care in meeting the demands from each class.

I think that high school students have to have homework or they will be totally unprepared for the rigors of college. They must learn how to manage their time but teachers should also bear in mind that few university students are held captive in classrooms for seven or eight hours. They instead have many extra moments during the day to complete their reading, papers, labs and studying. When high school students don’t even arrive home until five or six at night they have a very narrow window of time in which to get everything done. Sometimes they struggle to complete their work before midnight and then have to arise with only five or six hours of sleep to begin again. Little wonder that so many of them become unduly anxious and burnt out.

I advocate for continuing to assign homework beginning about third grade and slowly increasing its intensity as the student progresses through up the line. Perhaps first year homework assignments should be as little as  five or ten minutes in the main subject areas total while a senior in high school might handle as much as three hours total in a single night. All grades from the fifth grade on should have a summer reading assignment as well to encourage a lifelong habit of learning. Students can prove that they actually read the text in different ways such as writing a critique, analyzing characters, giving a speech or presentation, and so forth but not with a “gotcha” test over small details. Let’s face it nobody recalls such things and the literary experience should be as enjoyable as possible.

I’m glad that people are thinking about homework. We’ve gone way overboard of late and it’s well past time to begin a more creative way of insuring that everybody learns.

Hope Chests

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

art_61133_0-1a1a1achesthopettleadWhen I graduated from high school fifty years ago I received a coupon entitling me to a miniature Lane cedar chest. The idea behind the promotion was to get young ladies and their parents into the store where they would see the full sized models and consider purchasing one as a special gift. Back then coming of age for many girls meant owning a “hope chest” that they would begin to fill with special items that they might later use in a future home once they were married. In a sense it was a way of creating a kind of dowry.

I only took the freebie chest which I turned into a container for trinkets like campaign buttons and old pins but I dreamed of one day having one of the beautiful full sized wooden boxes with its enchanting interior cedar aroma. My dear sweet husband eventually bought me one when I graduated from college and to this day I use it to store blankets and seasonal items. It sits in one of my extra bedrooms looking as shiny and new as the day we brought it home and I hope that it will one day become an heirloom for one of my children or grandchildren. 

Most girls today would scratch their heads in confusion if someone were to ask them if they have a “hope chest.” The idea of storing away linens in anticipation of getting married soon after high school would sound quaint and outdated to them. Instead they dream of careers and putting first things first like getting an education and building a resume. Marriage is a distant goal that is way down on their checklist of things to accomplish. Besides, a registry at Bed Bath and Beyond will be sure to bring in all of the needed items when its time to think of settling down. At least in this country the “hope chest” has mostly gone the way of the buggy whip and arranged marriages. With a woman in contention for president it is doubtful that we will ever again see teenage girls lovingly accumulating linens for a future homey nest.

So much has changed over the decades. Raising girls is far different from the past. My granddaughter is as comfortable on a robotics team as she is getting a pedicure. When she speaks of the future the idea of husbands and babies is rarely mentioned. Instead she dreams of producing films or doing scientific research. She has enough confidence in herself that she would even consider running for political office. She has little idea that such goals were once thought to be beyond the grasp of women. She senses that the only barriers to fulfillment of her dreams might lie within her own heart but she is determined to stay strong and compete with her male counterparts on equal footing. She pushes herself to go well beyond expectations and proves time and again that she is made of steely stuff. Amazingly she is far from being alone. Women everywhere are accomplishing feats that might have been unimaginable back when I was her age.

There are now more women graduating from universities today than men. They are represented in virtually every field of endeavor. Women from the USA dominated the summer Olympics. They head multi-billion dollar corporations and hold the highest political offices in countries across the world. They have evolved quickly into movers and shakers. They are housewives if they choose or stock analysts if they prefer. There seems to be little territory that they are unable or unwilling to conquer and yet there are still vast swaths of the world where they are thought to be the inferior half of the human race. It is an enigma that their domination continues in some corners even as they rise above the forces that have traditionally held them down in others.

I can only hope that the evolution of women will continue in the places where their plight seems the most hopeless. There have always been pioneers among us who dared to go where no women had gone before. They were unwilling to accept the norms that were so irrationally used to define them. Marie Curie engaged in scientific research in a time when female thoughts and opinions were rarely considered. Amelia Earhart strode into a traditionally man’s world and demonstrated the potential of the future. Abigail Adams dared to engage her husband in political dialogue on an equal footing. Such women and the many others whose names we may never know pushed past barriers to create paths that today’s young girls take for granted. Hopefully there are people like them working to overcome prejudices in places where their rights are sorely limited.

As women chart new courses and eschew the old ways of doing things new questions and problems arise. Any woman who works understands how difficult it is to take care of business and a family. Time, resources and energy are stretched thin in a balancing act that is far more difficult than it may appear. With a generous income a woman has the option of employing nannies, maids, landscapers and other helpers to ease the load of responsibilities but most jobs don’t provide enough money to afford such luxuries. It falls on the women and their partners to shoulder the tasks together and studies demonstrate that the ladies are still doing much of the heavy lifting at home, especially when it comes to the children. It is up to us as a society to begin to educate both our girls and our boys in the new ways of doing things. 

I still believe that family is at the heart of society. Ultimately we need children to forge the future. In our enthusiasm for freeing women to develop all of their talents we also need to remember to honor their efforts to raise the next generation. As a society we cannot be guilty of underestimating the value of a happy and loving home. While the modern family may not look exactly like the one that grandma knew the basic needs and foundations are still the same. Today’s parents are quite busy juggling hundreds of objects in the air  and we need to consider innovative ways to make their struggles less difficult while supporting their choices as well.

Traditions come and go. Our daughters are still romantic and dream of finding true love just as in fairytales but they no longer see themselves as extensions of their soulmate’s dreams. They have become equal partners who support one another in reaching personal goals. If they were to have something as old fashioned as a “hope chest” today it would be filled with roadmaps to grand possibilities and adventures.   

Meh!

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

02062013_govworkers_articleAnother Labor Day has come and gone and I find myself once again going, “Meh!” I’ve never liked Labor Day. Like Pavlov’s dog I instinctively react negatively to the mere mention of it. I’ve always thought that it is misplaced on the annual calendar, coming as it does at the end of the summer. Instead of invoking a sense of celebration like other national holidays it seems to be an ill advised attempt to simply throw in one more long weekend before the days grow short and the nights long. I’ve always thought that it might be more appreciated if it were scheduled for March or April when there is often a dearth of downtime for those who work. Since I’ve been ruled by the school calendar for the majority of my life Labor Day signals an end to fun in my mind, not a reason to be happy.

Back when I was a kid the Labor Day holiday was a trigger warning that school was about to start. It was our last big day of freedom before returning to the grind of rising early, stuffing our bare feet into tight shoes and bringing home mountains of homework each evening. It told us that the lazy days of summer were over and it was time to get serious again. I always felt as though I was attending a wake when I gathered with our extended family for a final day at the beach. There would be no time for such frivolities in the coming weeks. We would all be busy with our over filled schedules and it would be many weeks before we got to rest again. Not even the promise of Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas assuaged the angst that I always felt on Labor Day.

As an adult I chose teaching as a career and the academic year usually commenced for me during the first weeks of August. Labor Day should have been a welcome respite from the rush of beginning my work anew but somehow it only seemed to interrupt the flow of the routine that I was attempting to establish in my classroom. I always felt that I would have appreciated a day off a bit farther down the line rather than so soon after my students had arrived.

Labor Day also marked a moment when a change of attire was in order. Thankfully the world of fashion is a bit less dictatorial than it used to be but there was a time when the arrival of Labor Day meant that white slacks and dresses had to be stored away with other summer gear. Sandals and shorts were frowned upon unless they were worn only inside the home. For those of us living in the hot humid conditions of the south the traditional fall fashions that debuted after the working man’s holiday were far too dark and heavy. Luckily we managed to come to our senses and now nobody seems to notice if we are still sporting our flip flops and capris deep into December. Today even school bands often have two sets of uniforms that include warm weather styles along with the more traditional looks.

For so long Jerry Lewis was to Labor Day as Santa Claus was to Christmas. His marathon for Muscular Dystrophy was bigger than the blitz of football games that now dominate the weekend. I never failed to get emotionally involved with the men, women and children struck down by that terrible disease and I opened my pocket to the kids who came to my door seeking donations as well as the firefighters who held out their boots at traffic lights. I was mesmerized by the tote board that registered ever higher donations as the hours wore on and Jerry Lewis appeared as though he was about to collapse from fatigue. The whole country was focused on securing a cure for Jerry’s Kids and we all hoped and prayed that it would be found in our lifetime. Eventually Jerry got old, the miracles that we expected didn’t happen and we all seemed to lose interest in spending hours watching celebrities doing little more than talk. Slowly but surely the annual program faded into nothing more than a memory, replaced by wall to wall football games and marathons of popular television series.

We definitely need to honor our working men and women but somehow the intent of the Labor Day holiday seems to have become lost in translation. It is just another way to have a long weekend filled with exciting sales on everything from washing machines to cars. There is something a bit empty about it these days. There are no special events that are designed to showcase the contributions of the men and women who leave their homes each morning to fuel the engine of our economy. We rarely stop to consider the many facets of work that keep most of us enjoying fairly comfortable lives. In our country we have rarely had to face a situation in which things fall completely apart because the jobs or the people who do them are gone. We tend not to take much note of places in the world where a sense of security has been shattered because few are able to find employment.

We often grumble when we are involved in the daily grind of work but deep in our hearts we understand that the alternative of being without a means of supporting ourselves and our families is frightening. Sadly many of the traditional sources of work are going the way of the dinosaurs. As I have traveled around the country I have noticed so many manufacturing plants that are shuttered and empty. In my own hometown there are people who worked for the oil industry who have been unemployed for well over a year. They seek jobs but are rebuffed at every turn. Coal miners and steel workers are becoming forgotten souls in the modern economy. Even college graduates are finding it difficult to move into professions in which they once might have been heavily recruited. They find themselves settling for work unrelated to their majors that pay barely enough to get by much less reduce the debt of their student loans. These are frightening and confusing times for many who want to be part of the workforce but can’t seem to find a niche.

I worked quite hard for a very long time and earned every hour of my retirement but I understand that my own security in the coming years depends heavily on the success of the young. If they can’t find decent work the whole system begins to collapse and we all go down with them. As independent as each of us may sometimes feel the truth is that we are all in this world together. What happens to one affects another.

The numbers of elk in Yellowstone National Park have been greatly reduced all because someone introduced lake trout into the spawning ground of a smaller type of fish. The more aggressive lake trout eat their mild mannered neighbors at a rate so alarming that the little ones have almost become extinct inside the lake. The bears who used to eat the tiny fish after hibernating each year have had to satisfy their dietary needs with baby elk now that their usual source of protein is no longer as available. Thus the herds of elk are greatly diminished which has a domino effect on other aspects of nature. Much like the symbiosis in nature, there is also a chain of events that occur whenever people lose their livelihood.

I’d love to see us take the Labor Day holiday more seriously. We all need to know more about the history of work in our country and the world. We need to be truthfully informed about employment trends. Our children require good information to be able to make decisions about their futures. If we did Labor Day right it might become an educational holiday that allows us to gain more understanding of how things really are in different parts of our country and the world. I suspect that ignorance of reality is rather dangerous in the modern era and it is far too rampant. Lest we one day awake to find ourselves scrambling for food in empty grocery stores like the people of Venezuela it’s time that we learned more about our own workforce so that we might continue to provide jobs for everyone who needs one. We all depend on filling our economy with worker bees each day. Maybe it’s time that we take a second look at Labor Day. It just may be the most important commemoration that we have.

Last Chance U

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment
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Last Chance U

It seems as though I have been watching a bit more television lately than I probably should. I suspect that it is because the daily rains have made me a bit more homebound or perhaps because I spent most of July on the road and now I prefer to hibernate at home for a time. Soon I will be traveling again to Colorado and then will resume my math tutoring at two different schools. I’m slacking off before getting back into a daily routine.

Last night I watched three episodes of the Netflix documentary Last Chance U. I’m not particularly enthralled by football as a topic but this series is really a kind of psychological and sociological study which of course fascinates me. It focuses on the football team of East Mississippi Community College, a school that won the Junior College National Football Championship the year before the story was filmed. It is a place where misfit athletes come for one last shot at a spot on a powerhouse university team or a job with the National Football League.

Most of the players have talent but for one reason or another have been relegated to the football ash heap. Some were once highly recruited high school players who got into trouble at the universities that gave them scholarships. They skipped classes, made failing grades, missed practices, ignored curfews or broke the law. Some did all of the above. All were summarily dismissed. Others demonstrated amazing athletic skills in high school but were unable to muster high enough grades or test scores to win admission to a major or even minor university. These young men came to East Mississippi hoping to get one more more opportunity to reach the big time. The coach there is well known for resurrecting hopes and dreams.

The stories of each of the players resonate loudly with me. I have seen so many young people with similar baggage. I have learned how difficult it is for some kids to succeed athletically when they have pronounced academic deficiencies. I often wonder where I would be today if I had been required to meet certain sporting requirements in addition to mastering the knowledge and skills of my profession. I suspect that I would still be working at a low level job without hope of ever earning a degree. Somehow it doesn’t seem right that a gifted athlete must also carry a certain average to remain eligible to play a particular sport. I understand the idea that a university is first and foremost a center for learning but what about those who truly struggle to learn but who have a very special talent to share with the world?

I once had a student who was a star in every sporting arena. Regardless of what he tried athletically he was a standout. It might be said that he was the athletic valedictorian of the school. Unfortunately he was a special education student with multiple learning difficulties. He struggled with reading and was never quite able to pass his senior year Exit exams. With great assistance he managed to earn a high school diploma but nothing about his academic credentials enticed a university to risk offering him a scholarship. He set his dreams of playing professionally aside and learned a trade after graduating. He has done well and I am quite proud of his efforts but I often wonder where he would be today if our society had a more realistic attitude about young people like him. What if someone had offered him the opportunity to do what he does so well without expecting him to demonstrate mastery of the things that baffle him?

Oddly I often saw this young man as being much like me. We both had enormous gifts and talents. Mine happened to be academic. His were athletic. We also had disabilities. I tripped over my own feet and he struggled to read. The difference was that I was allowed to follow my dreams without having to prove my physical prowess but he was barred from doing so simply because he lacked certain academic skills. There is an unfairness in that.

At East Mississippi Community College the coaches, teachers and an academic advisor work with the young men to help them through the challenges that have heretofore blocked their way forward. It is a place of redemption as long as the players are willing to put in some effort. They must attend all of their classes, complete assignments and ask for help when they need it. Four year colleges and pro teams scout them. Many of the former players at the school have found the success that had at one time seemed to be so elusive. The adults guiding them use a combination of tough love and encouragement to keep them motivated. Some of the young men make it and some burn out.

I wish that we had more adults to help struggling students to achieve their goals whatever they may be. Far too many of our youth come from environments that do little to encourage them. For example one of the players featured in the program witnessed his father killing his mother and then turning the gun on himself. He was only five years old when he endured this trauma and it is all too apparent that he continues to harbor abandonment issues that make it difficult for him to trust anyone. Another young man flunked out at his previous university. He is married and has a child. He wants to do the right things but he often becomes stressed and worried that he is wasting time when he might do better if he were to simply quit and get a regular job to support his family. Too many of the players come from high schools where the expectations were so low that they graduated without really learning much of anything. Their academic advisor definitely has her hands full but she is doing a yeoman’s job, something that we need more of in all of our schools.

Ultimately all of the players have to man up. Only they have the final power to make the efforts needed to change the directions of their lives. In the end their story is about salvation and whether or not they have enough drive to make their final chance count. The stakes are high and I find myself rooting for them not just on the field but as they navigate the world as well. It’s been said that a mind is a terrible thing to waste but then so too is it a tragedy to fritter away any kind of talent. In Last Chance U we watch young men from broken homes and economic uncertainty as they struggle to piece together the fragments of their lives. It is a high stakes game and one which I desperately hope that each of them will win.