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 …
questions
Try to Understand
If you don't try, you may never understand. My new student, J, was in his bright red basketball jersey and shorts, and he was doing his best not to shiver. Starbucks was as cold as a meat freezer. But what he was saying warmed my mind. In the course of a short conversation, he'd already told me that as a kid he'd been pegged as "troublemaker." Or, even worse, proving the little words matter: "THE Troublemaker." You wouldn't know it now, from his composure even under the offensively strong air conditioning. But according to his teachers, he had "too much energy" and bounced around the room and, worst of all, Socrates be damned, he had too many questions. I'm like: "Hold the sauce. How is it possible to have too many questions IN A CLASSROOM?" Continue Reading …
Wrong or Right? A cautionary tale
Will You Get it Wrong? If wrong was a flavor of gum, I'd have stuck it ABC style under my desk chair long ago, hoping nobody caught me. I wouldn't want you to know it was ever in my mouth. But this week, wrong caught up with me. I have two colleagues at The TEAK Fellowship who would definitely win at Jeopardy. They are the kinds of people who know the kinds of facts you'd find in toilet-side books. And me? Put on Jeopardy, even on my best day in my best thinking cap and with a high dose of caffeine in my blood, I would still lose by a wide margin. So when I went into said colleagues' office, and Ne whirled around to ask, "Can you name five countries that have four letters?" I said "Nope!" before I even fully heard his challenge. Ni leaned forward in her chair, "C'mon, you're not even going to try?" I had dizzy visions of failing geography tests in high school; of my art history teacher asking us to draw a free-form map of the United States and being able to come up with only NY, CA, and FL locations. "Nope!" I said, confidently. "Educator much?" asked Ne, who is always ribbing people just a little. I stood there, nailed. And stood there. My mind was completely blank. I probably couldn't have told you my zip code, my middle initial, the last 4 digits of my social. Mental snow fell. This was what it felt like in third grade when I was asked to do the 7's on the multiplication table. I remembered 7 and 49 and not much else. Ears red. "Not even one?" Ni prodded. "Um...ok, Peru?" I tried. "Peru!" Ni said. "Yes!" "Ah....Mali?" I offered. OK, this wasn't so hard. I knew some countries. I felt my shoulders relax. Now that I'd gotten two I needed to try for at least three, more than half the challenge met. "Mali!" Ne echoed, glad. "Bali!" I declared. Ne and Ni nodded in unison. Wait, was I perhaps even GOOD at this? I had passed the halfway mark. Now it would be super-lame if I couldn't finish the list. Continue Reading …