How We Respond Is Our Choice

A couple of weeks ago I was working late one night clearing up a pile of paperwork on my desk that had sneaked up on me over a period of just three days.  As often happens to me when I am organizing my desk, I got sidetracked. I came across a stack of paperwork for early graduate students that needed to be signed and as I began to examine each student record closely, my mind wandered off a bit. Instead of rejoicing in the fact that these students had met the criteria for early graduation, my mind wandered to those students who over the course of the last couple of years and had given up and quit school. I quickly began to pull up their pictures on our student information system so I could look at their faces again. In doing so, it became personal to me. As their principal, I couldn't help but feel I had not done enough. After an hour or so of doing this, I sent out the following tweets.

There is not a single one of us who has not at one time or another hid behind the standard line, “I don’t have time to…..”  The hard truth is we determine what we have time for and what we don’t have time for. All of us can dig deep down far enough to find the time when something matters a great deal to us. In this case, our efforts netted five students returning to school beginning January 6^th.  Like the starfish story, we may not have reached all of them, but I am hoping it will make a difference with these students and they in turn impact our lives and inspire us to continue to reach out to those who have given up.

In our line of work, every day brings on new challenges. I was reminded again this past week when dealing with a student who wanted to quit school.  Here I was coming off the high of five students wanting to return to school and now I was in danger of losing one right back to the streets of lost hope.  I had recently read a quote by Thomas Paine so I decided to share it with this particular student who was conflicted – “The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph,” I told him.  I wanted him to see past his current internal conflict and help him believe that from this turmoil would evolve perhaps an experience from which to grow from in order to serve a greater purpose.  In the end, I explained to him that he had the power to determine which chapter he wanted to write to help him define his story. In other words, how he responded could help define his triumph.

Challenges like the ones I describe above are all too common in schools today.  Perhaps just as challenging is how we can help school personnel remain positive on a daily basis. We must start by recognizing that it is not our successes nor our failures which defines who we are, but rather it is the choices we make in how we respond which defines us.

Therefore, I challenge you today to CHOOSE to……

1.  Bring your best to work every day, whatever your best may be that day. Be grateful that you get the opportunity to make a positive impact on a child every day!
2. Give two minutes of your time to one student and one staff member every day. Be intentional with your time and then follow up with a quick word or note. The small things can make all the difference.
3. Be empathetic.  Taking the time to understand, share, and be sensitive to another person’s feelings is critical in building a culture of trust.  Every student and staff member will face some sort of challenge at one time or another.
4. Value the mistakes of others. Risk takers are born here. If you yourself make a mistake, own it, apologize, and work to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
5. Model forgiveness – if you want to be an effective leader, be willing to sincerely accept an apology and move on. Believe that most people’s intentions are good.
6. Understand you will not always see immediate results when working with kids. Be patient and think long term. Many are just testing a system which has failed them many times over long before you came into the picture.
7. Have high standards for all kids every day. Do not make excuses for kids based on race, socio-economic class, environment or poor parenting, etc. Believe in all kids all of the time (it also helps if you love them all of the time too!)
8. Acknowledge inappropriate behavior of kids. By not doing so we are sending a message that they are not worth it or we have given up. If we hesitate to correct poor behavior based on their response to us, we have become part of the problem.
9. Not be negative. Constant complaining and being negative about kids, staff, work environment, etc. without offering a solution says more about us than it does about those who we are complaining about.  Bring positive energy every day.
10. Take time to smile/laugh and encourage others to have fun. When it is no longer fun to go to work, it is time to do something else.

For me personally, the same things that keep me up at night are the same things that get me up in the morning charged and ready to go to work. Every day is a great day because I choose to make it a great day.   We are not going to be able to control everything that happens to us on a daily basis, but we can control how we let it affect us.  It is our duty to bring a positive voice to school every day.  It is our practical measure of our own excellence.

If we are doing the work worth doing, then how we respond begins and ends with us. 

“The moment you're ready to quit is usually the moment right before a miracle happens. Don't give up.”- Unknown