Teens Vs. BS is Not New News! This week, the internet is (understandably) suddenly loving teen students, because of their rallying cry against BS. Some of us have always known this is true about teenagers. I have always loved working with teens because their BS detectors are so strong. The teen years are about learning survival: fit in or perish. To get through middle and high school, you have to know the real thing from BS. Sometimes you yourself have to BS painfully in order to get by, as you figure out who you are and who you want to be. This is also, by the way, what school should be for. NOT relentless tests which call for projectile regurgitation of arbitrary knowledge. And definitely NOT for hiding under desks. Teens have the clues for us I know this to be true because my students write about this all the time, unsparingly, if you give them a chance. Adults so often assume teens are clueless, shame on us. I think the opposite is true-- teens are picking up ALL the clues. It's unrelenting. So teens sometimes have to act clueless because getting hit with what life is really like, and the BS people settle for, is sometimes just too much. The classic adolescent struggle--fit in or perish-- is supposed to be psychological, not literal. This week, like many weeks in the recent history of this country, it was also literal. At Parkland, the teens who survived their classmate's gunfire, refused to accept the BS condolences that didn't signal real, immediate tangible change in gun laws, gun access, and school safety. They used their superpower to say-- we don't want your BS, we don't want your prayers, we want things to be different. And we will make you listen. And this was somehow staggering, because who knew teens could call out BS when they saw it? (Writing teachers). Aim for transformation of BS in your college essays If what the Parkland teens said and did isn't adolescent bull-headedness turned toward the light, what is? They were unafraid Continue Reading …
Wisdom
Ask Dr. Mae Sakharov about the College Essay
Conversations with Experts Giving Context to College Essay: Dr. Mae Sakharov I've spent time this winter interviewing my mentors and other smart folks-- like Dr. Mae Sakharov-- about the difficulties and pleasures of the college essay writing process and working with teens. I do as I tell my students: if you keep showing up in the world-as-classroom with your pencils sharpened, and a sincere wish to do better than BS, life will keep giving you material, and teaching you what you need to know. I always want to know more. That's also why I love teaching students to tell their stories well! Here are some highlights from my conversation with Dr. Mae Sakharov, Ed.D, College, Graduate School and Career Counselor. Technically, we're competitors, but I'd tell you to go see her in a heartbeat for full-spectrum counseling and a wise, good-humored perspective. We were introduced by a freak media relations fairy who connected us on impulse and then disappeared; both of us care deeply about teens, authentic learning, and no BS compassion. She has a great beat on the college counseling industry- be not fooled, it's an industry!-- and has the creds, sweat hours, and lived experience to see every life in context. In our conversation over Google Hangouts, , the frame cut out the lower half her face, so I spent most of the time with a view of just her classy glasses and warm eyes. She looked like a hibernant checking to see if Winter was over-- no, no it's not. Talking to Dr. Mae Sakharov EI: What is the college essay really...for? Sakharov: First, I call myself more of a writing psychologist than a writing teacher. I don’t teach writing-- My background is in theater and literature, children’s literature and storytelling, and years and years of improvisational theater. When I started working on personal statements with kids it was not in structural way-- like an English essay, but more about finding out who a person was-- and bringing that out. Writing the college Continue Reading …
10 Senior-Year Conversation starters NOT about College applications!
Please Don't Make this conversation about College Apps! To make friendly conversation, it's tempting to ask seniors in high school how the college application process is going, or where they are applying. They MAY be tempted to strangle you, but they'll probably act decently about it and politely recite their list. Maybe even tell you it's going OK. What they really want to do is go to the closest room and scream so loudly that the Common App site crashes (or so they tell me, but it's kinda obvious if you just look closely at their faces). Think about it this way: if you were applying for a high stakes job that took many hundreds of hours and every time you saw anyone THAT WAS ALL THEY WANTED TO TALK ABOUT WITH YOU IN ALL CAPS. Arg. Ick. PSA, Care Elsewhere! This post is a PSA from someone in the industry, moi (I SEE YOU, TEENS!): if you are hanging out with high school seniors these days and strike up conversation TRY REALLY HARD NOT TO ASK THEM ABOUT COLLEGE/COLLEGE PROCESS. Like, AT ALL. I know you really care, but unless you're their guidance counselor, care about something else. Really, you will get so many cool points for not making the conversation about C-O-L-L-E-G-E. They need the mental break. They need to know they are interesting and valuable and very awesome BEYOND this demanding process. At this point in the fall, COLLEGE CRAP (that's how they are thinking of it) is all anyone asks about (Not you? Cool, you should run a tutorial for other adults!). It gets Teen-TEDIOUS. Branch out the conversation Rule of thumb: No college crap. While you are at it, avoid school generally. Ask them, like, what they had for lunch, or to tell you about something weird they noticed on the street. Here are 10 suggestions to start up a real conversation with a teen in the middle of college applications. What's the last thing that really got you mad? What's the last thing that made you feel completely relaxed? What makes you want Continue Reading …
Indelible Moment
King's "Letter" as Life-Changer I don't remember the moment when I first read Martin Luther King Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail," but I quickly became a groupie. I think it should be required reading before you can register to vote. Stick with me here-- your college essay connection comes later. The letter is particularly, though perhaps too cordially, critical of the white moderate. They/we, then as now, did not seize the historical moment. We who had the power to loudly and unequivocally announce opposition (with our very bodies) to ongoing hate crimes, despicable marginalization and economic exclusion suffered by blacks-- said nothing, or didn't say it forcefully enough. It was not the right moment. You have let my ass DOWN, he tells us. Your lukewarm support is worse than outright rejection. You can hear him talking-- everyone knows the sound of his voice. But are we lulled by it, or do we realize THIS IS OUR MOMENT TO BE OF USE? THIS is the moment to say something, this very one, flying by. Good writing stops you in your tracks. I teach the "Letter" this time every year to the 7th grade students at the TEAK Fellowship in my personal essay writing class. They munch Cheez-its while they parse his exquisite grammar and syntax, the nuances of his message. This is not an essay of the Dream. This is the essay of necessity. It is really about our current moment: the silence of good people is worse than anything. ... The best writing contains at least one moment that causes us to turn inward, and, if listened to, can change our lives. ... King's goodwill is admirable, his anger carefully packaged into bad-ass, stinging, argumentatively impeccable prose. If we look closely enough, we are indicted. We should not feel good reading the letter. We should have a moment when we shudder, and peel off a layer of denial. In the letter (I'll link it all over, in case you forget to click through) King explains the need for and Continue Reading …
How to make your college essay more meaningful
Here's what NOT to do if you want your college essay to be more meaningful False stabs at a meaningful essay go like this: Try to make your writing sound like someone else's, preferably that person you know who got into Harvard early. Write it with one hand the night before it's due while picking your toes and scrolling google for quotes by famous people that feel even marginally applicable. Flip out about it and decide that you have to write with overwhelmingly convoluted lyric sentences and complete absence of ego. OK, now we got that out of the way, go for a walk. Then-- Here's what to do if you want your essay to be more meaningful Remember that you matter. Period. Decide that being stressed out about one more thing purely because everyone else is or tells you to be is boring. Decide you will not treat your college essay merely as something to have completed. Do not aim to use fancypants vocabulary words you would not use if talking to a good friend about a complex movie you loved. Slow down the writing process a little. Ask yourself what you would write about if you knew you would be listened to and understood. Write in order to be listened to and understood. Ask yourself how many things that you do in life are meaningful to you personally. If the list is short, why? Ask yourself what the most true thing is at this moment for you. What makes you sit up, stand up, rev up, tear up? Challenge yourself to describe a scene from your life with skin-tingling presence. Don't check social media accounts while writing your essay. This correlates with spikes in incomplete thoughts, and dips in contentment levels. Share your work with people who don't HAVE to read it, and ask them if they are moved. Then, talk about what you wrote. Drink a hot beverage you love, and go find some grass to look at. Some insects are living out their whole lives in that grass, at this very moment, not giving a damn. Give less of a Continue Reading …
But are you a good person?
The Good-Person Trend? Am I a good person? That question made the rounds this week with this NYTimes piece by a Dartmouth admission's officer, who herself had been rejected from the school when she applied. The article focused on an otherwise-averagely-strong student who was accepted to Dartmouth largely on the strength of his recommendation letter. What set this letter apart, and got his unanimous YES vote by the admissions committee? It was written by the school custodian, praising the student's level of basic respect, friendliness, and awareness for all people--ALL People-- at the school, the custodian included. Wait, but-- Am I a good person? Well, if you have to ask... You could go all politician-semantics and say, "Depends on how you define good." But you could also just look at yourself and what you do, take some notes, and evaluate. The writer warned that she expected a rash of applicants to follow the publication of the article with letters of support from their local garbage man, their school security guard, and so on. She was fine with that, if that trend tipped the balance of behavior and values in favor of students generally being truly good. But the thing is, a truly good person is not good BECAUSE OF WHAT IT GETS YOU. A truly good person is just good JUST BECAUSE. A Good person is good material I'm lucky-- my husband is this type of person. The other day, I was having a moan-y morning, feeling inadequate (hey, it happens sometimes), when he stopped me in my yowling tracks. You are good and loving, he said. What more do you want? Oh, gosh-- too bad I already applied to (and long finished) college! This would have been GREAT MATERIAL! No, you see, I am only kidding. Not everything can be used. Because I doubt this featured student was thinking, "I know: I'll clean up classrooms for four years, greet the custodians in the hall every time...so I can look good on my college application!" Good people do stuff Continue Reading …