"The Leader In Me" Doesn't Make Leaders

Transitioning to middle school is a nightmare. We all remember it. Horrible hair. Acne. Stinky, maturing bodies and being forced to shower after gym class.

A few nights ago, I went to a parent orientation for my oldest child, who is transitioning to middle school.  Hidden amongst other agenda items, such as getting the kids excited to use their cell phones during school, was the schedule. Three academic blocks per day, one leadership block, and two electives. That seems okay, right?

But wait a minute. Math. English/Literature. Science. Social studies. There are four main curriculum objectives and only three blocks. When I questioned the guidance counselor about this during the meeting, he explained that both Math and English/Literature each receive one block per day. However, Social Studies and Science share a block. The kids alternate between them.

I seem to be the only parent mortified by this. Leadership receives structured time during my child’s day. Every. Single. Day. But what is leadership? Leadership is  program called “The Leader In Me,” run by none other than FranklinCovey – a for-profit business. Businesses and civic groups in our area have gone together to purchase my child’s time to indoctrinate her with bad middle-management buzzwords.

The goal of this program is to instill children with self-worth and a social toolkit to work with. The problem is that self-worth isn’t found in knowing the definition of the word synergy. It isn’t found in tracking metrics of daily progress in which the child spends more time tracking progress than actually making any. Leadership is not a skill that is taught. Leadership is earned. It is earned by a person’s actions, in the way one approaches the world. In is earned with skill in a particular field, in the mastery of an idea, in an ability to communicate with others. And how does one learn to approach the world? How does one choose their particular field? How is one driven to master an idea and communicate it? Education.

My daughter is being screwed out of her science and social studies education by local businesses. She might be a geologist. She might be an art curator or a political science professor. She might hate all of it. I’m not saying she’s so smart that we need to design her special curriculum or that she’ll master every idea taught. I’m saying that, in a public school system, she’s being cheated out of the opportunity to even try by organizations that have nothing to do with education.

I vividly remember 7^th grade biology. We dissected a frog. I hated it to the point that I swore I’d never take another biology class that wasn’t required. And I didn’t. One of my criteria in choosing Chemical Engineering was that it didn’t require one biology class. So does 7^th grade science matter? Absolutely. Other people thrived on that experience. Many of them are friends of mine who are now physicians. But my daughter will only be exposed to half of the material I was exposed to, because instead she’ll be learning leadership.

What about social studies? So maybe the history of the world isn’t my favorite subject, but I believe my child absolutely needs to be exposed to it – now more than ever. The internet puts everything on the planet immediately within our grasp. Almost every large company is multinational. In order to understand other cultures, to conduct business with them, you must have a reference of their history. This is habit 5 – seek first to understand, then to be understood in action. Don’t teach my child the leadership slogan. Give her the education to actually practice it instead of preach it.

Who teaches leadership? I don’t believe there is a bachelor’s or master’s degree offered in the course, so who is qualified? Our school system has even changed their graduation requirements so leadership is required, unlike typing, a skill which would be highly beneficial in today’s society, even to those who don’t choose to pursue advanced degrees. This means even if I want to use that portion of my child’s day to educate her, I CAN’T. That isn’t required by the state, just my school system, courtesy of FranklinCovey. Parents would riot if their children were forced to flip fries for a portion of their day, sponsored by McDonald’s. Maybe when that becomes a graduation requirement, people will finally start to fight back.

I was so worried about this that I called the Ohio Department of Education to discuss curriculum standards. Those guys are worried – not just for me, but for the entire state. Since the funding for testing has been cut, there is no way to hold schools accountable for what they teach. In our pages and pages of laws and drivel, there is not one place that requires a certain amount of time or teacher contact hours for social studies or science. So sadly, there is no way to legally pursue a change for my school district. But why are laws and lawsuits required to convince schools to do their jobs? Shouldn’t their mission be to expose my child to the broadest range of topics possible, and provide enough depth for her to learn what her strengths and weaknesses are? Isn’t our goal to prepare her for competence in whatever her chosen field is, along with a social conscience to make her an engaged citizen?

If I had one wish, it would be for our school to conduct an anonymous survey and ask the children what they really think of "The Leader In Me." Most high school students use expletives to describe it, although they would never come forward to say that in a classroom because the pressure from the school system and our community is too high. My almost-7^th-grade daughter says it’s a complete waste of time. In her words, the kids who are doing well don’t need it because they already have those skills, and the ones who need it aren’t listening anyway.

I’m sure this will be an unpopular post. Almost everyone I know buys into “The Leader In Me” hook, line, and sinker. And I’m not saying the program doesn’t have some merit or things it can offer. To this point, my annoyance with it has been offset by the fact that I never felt it interfered with my daughter’s education. Yes, it’s agitating to fill out metrics and silly forms, but lots of us have to do that garbage at work either way so she might as well get used to it now, although if you really think about that statement, it is TRAGIC. Leadership as an elective? No problem. 

But leadership in the place of science and social studies? Think of that on a grand scale. What would happen to our country if that were a priority? Science innovation done mostly overseas. Other countries controlling American interests because we’re too culturally unaware of the world around us to know better. Wait. Maybe I’m the one who missed something. Maybe this school system IS preparing my kids for the world they live in.

I'm finally endorsed by medical science. It's about time.

I haven’t written in quite a while, partially because my life keeps pelting me with lemons and partially because I’m too medicated to think coherently most days. Six months ago, I herniated a disk in my back. The week I was allowed to return to the gym, my main mechanism for coping with life, I developed shingles on my face, and now I have something called postherpetic neuralgia, which is fancy way of saying a painful itch that may last forever. If you made it through this paragraph and are still reading, I’ll count you as a friend, because the truth is no one wants to hear a list of symptoms when they ask how I’m doing. Granted, you didn't ask. But I digress...

Pain is a funny thing. Everyone experiences it, yet we’re highly skeptical of it in others. We criticize people who we perceive as whining or drug seeking, yet medicate our own pain with ice cream or television or alcohol while simultaneously touting our high pain tolerance. And no, I’m not using this post to justify developing a drug habit, although it seems like a viable option. Most of the drugs I’m offered cause weight gain and while heroin isn’t covered by my insurance, its weight loss benefits would more than offset any inconvenience.

My friends and family tolerate my responses when they ask how I’m doing. Then, since they are not ill and are thereby experts in living, they gently offer tips so that I, too, can be well like them – relax, listen to calming music, do yoga, think positive, eliminate gluten, eliminate red meat, use sulfate-free shampoo, take supplements. Not one of my well-meaning family or friends suggested making it worse. Sometimes I wonder if they know me at all. Just the suggestion of positive thinking makes me break out in hives.

In a move that seems counter-intuitive, this week I decided to make myself more miserable on purpose. You see, relaxing and listening to calming music isn’t all that great. It’s boring, and since I’m bored, nothing distracts my mind from my extremely painful itch. When kids get immunizations, they’re generally offered candy afterward because pain is all about perception and kids are distracted by lollipops. I am too, but my jeans are already perilously tight from lack of exercise so I decided to try a different method. If I’m in more misery than my painful itch can supply, it by comparison will not bother me as much. So I cranked up Eminem's aptly-titled song Desperation and hit the gym, relaxation be damned. And it helped. Instead of sitting on the sofa relaxing (i.e. scratching), my gym time motivated me to do some research (i.e. text my brother, the anesthesiologist).

And to my surprise, I stumbled across a real medical theory that should be called making-it-worse-on-purpose (to make it easier to search on Google), but is referred to as the gate theory of chronic pain. This theory is simple: cause yourself so much pain that your nerves are incapable of producing enough of the pain chemical to keep up – essentially beat them at their own game. While the proposition sounds warped, I’ve actually considered burning my skin with an iron to stop the itching, so I’m open to suggestions, even from crazies on the internet. Yesterday I started frying my skin with capsaicin cream every few hours and the pain feels fantastic compared to that horrible itch. I feel so good that I’m awake at 4:00 am writing again for the first time in months. My husband winces when he kisses me and says I burn his lips, but he really should think positively – I can still make him tingle.

I already knew making things worse was cathartic. I do it every day. I complain about my husband, my kids, and my life and I make myself laugh so when it comes time to actually deal with my husband, my kids, and my life, I can smile. My warped approach is endorsed by medical science and clinical trials. Pain is all about perception. If you can make it worse and still live through it, in the end it’ll probably all be okay – well, after the hospital bills are paid off.

An Exercise in Frustration

At the beginning of November, I learned that I’m old. Maybe I don’t need a walker yet, but I’m rapidly approaching the age where I could use a bar to stabilize myself while shaving my legs in the shower. My only hope is that my husband is approaching an age where he soon won’t care if my legs are shaved or not.

Anyway, thanks to my insistence that I’m perfectly capable of jumping on a trampoline at the advanced old age of 39, I’m now one of those amorphous back pain whiners. The injury occurred while we were on a Boy Scout field trip, reinforcing my opinion that supervising children is inherently dangerous and should be avoided at all costs. I pretend to be an engaged parent for one day and *poof* three months in traction.

This chronic pain crap isn’t fun. It seems just mere weeks ago I could run a couple of miles and do back walk-overs. Actually it was mere weeks ago. Four weeks to be precise, because even after the injury, I tried to tough it out and keep going.

Lots of people avoid physical activity, citing it as unpleasant and painful, but I find it much less unpleasant and painful than being home with my family. The finer aspects of my gym membership more than compensate for any inconvenience or bodily injury I incur. Exercise is a guaranteed excuse to leave my spawn with my spouse at any given moment. Instead of cooking dinner, bathing my kids, or reading yet another Barbie bedtime story, I can hang out with a group of relatively attractive men. Plus, the guys provide the proper motivation for me to exercise intensely, ensuring my sweat will camouflage any incontinence issues that might crop up. Usually this energy expenditure is beneficial - unless I’m doing front-handsprings with a herniated disk, which apparently is not against my better judgment.

When the Orthopedist told me to quit exercising, I almost cried. He was quite specific that I need to find other outlets for my energy, so my new pastimes include yelling at my spouse and physical therapy.

I’ve always viewed physical therapy as something of a joke. It’s somewhere people who don’t care enough to work hard at the gym go. But since I’ve spent the last three months steadily re-injuring myself, gaining weight, and losing sanity, I decided to grab any rope that might right my sinking ship. Plus, it is covered by my health insurance.

However, I’ve learned physical therapy is no joke. I didn’t know it was possible to work so hard and burn absolutely no calories. If you have nothing better to do, try to lie still on your back in a flat, quiet area and clinch your multifidus muscle for 30 seconds without tensing any other part of your body. Never heard of that muscle? I hadn’t either, although it is the supposed key to my success with this program. It’s about as easy as looking in a mirror and trying to wiggle my ear.

I’ve spent an incalculable amount of time this week lying on my back and shushing my children as I attempt to contract a pretend muscle. There’s no measure of success. Half the time I can’t tell if I’m meditating, sleeping, or clenching because it takes me so long to isolate it. I promptly report that I’m doing my exercises at every appointment, but the truth is I might just be napping. I’m not sure I can tell the difference.

This dashboard for success makes me question the physical therapy profession as a whole. I wonder if my therapists are high-fiving each other in the break room, making up words that sound like body parts no one has ever heard of. If I can’t master the skill, I have to keep coming back until I do. They get to keep sending bills. They did their job. I’m destined to failure because I’m too stupid to work my multifidus. But that’s okay. I'm used to being a failure and it’s worth every penny to have an medical excuse to take a nap.

My 2013 Christmas Letter

I’m not sending Christmas cards or holiday letters. Glorifying my life on Facebook all year long is exhausting, so I won’t go out of my way to pay for stamps to emphasize more of the same. How about we discuss what really happened instead?

The year started out with a bang, as my book came back from the editor with my first round of edits on New Year’s Eve. I spent the next three months oscillating between glee and panic, trying to decide why I’d bothered to write a book in the first place. Instead of jumping for joy when it was released in March, I cried.

Our youngest daughter, 5, qualified for kindergarten according to the testing, but was held in preschool by the school system to continue her speech therapy, which really pissed her off. She cried through T-ball and swimming lessons, so we enlisted her in the latchkey program again because it’s the only way we can get her out of the house. She spent a good part of the fall getting into trouble in preschool and the rest of the time talking incessantly at home. Yesterday, she told us, “This candy cane tastes like wrapper,” so at least we won’t have to worry about a college education for that one.

Our middle child, a 9 yr old son, had a pretty good year except for his recurrent fungal eye infection. He is in 4^th grade, and his grades are weighted according to some method that even I don’t understand, so it’s a minor miracle that he maintains a stellar GPA. He’s learned to sandbag the AR reading points system so he can attend all the parties without adjusting his goals to be more challenging for the following quarter, so I think I’ve already succeeded in raising him for corporate middle management. Oh, and last week, he mastered the splits – I don’t know if I should be proud or mortified.

Our oldest child, 11, has become a premature teenager thanks to the Disney channel. Luckily, she appreciates capitalism as much as the next kid and is happy to act responsibly if we offer enough reimbursement. She broke her finger over the summer, which kept her from competing in gymnastics this fall and gave her lots of extra time to sleep in on the weekends. She’s matured to the point that she does her homework and studying on her own without complaint and has a perfect GPA, which indicates to me that she’s old enough to watch her brother and sister when I need a few minutes of peace and quiet (and possibly inherited perfectionist tendencies, although I'm not sure from where).

My husband is still gainfully employed, probably due to his ability to keep his mouth shut. I’ll take credit for teaching him that skill. He traded the Jeep and got a new car, his choice, as a reward for tolerating me another year.

So here I sit. What do I do? Laundry. A shit load of laundry. And I write silly things like this while listening to a Barbie cat’s rendition of EMF’s Unbelievable that my 5 yr old has cranked up on the computer next to mine because it keeps me sane.

Wishing all of you a better 2014, because just when you think it can’t get worse, it always does.