Hope for the Future
Working with young people is an occupation of hope.
Teachers, camp counselors, scout leaders, people who devote their lives to children and teenagers, are planting seeds for a better world in the work that they do. Those of us in this vocation want to nurture strength, understanding, curiosity, compassion for others, a sense of duty to contribute one’s gifts and talents to benefit everyone. Hope is oriented toward the future; we aspire for something to happen.
A sense of hope is not a given. Sometimes a grey heaviness moves in. It gets cold and dark. Empty. And yet nothing stops, the business of each day goes on, my work with students and teachers in the library continues. Demands and deadlines remain, a series of burdensome tasks that reach out into an endless, hazy horizon, all trivial and yet beyond my reach. Like parenting, working with students can be a mirror of one’s shortcomings. It is not always possible to be the kind, open, understanding, inspired adult that our students need. Occasionally, we get crabby, or fail to notice, or jump to conclusions and say the wrong thing. Still, we must keep at it, continue to press ahead, put one foot in front of the other and carry on. In this work it can be a consolation that there is a greater good: whatever nurtures/benefits these young people in our care is where our focus should be.
“Hope” is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops — at all -
— Emily Dickinson
There are external factors at work contributing to this sense of bleakness as well.
- Donald J. Trump was elected as our next President of the United States.
- My mother’s health is failing.
- I have no control over either of these things.
The demise of my 85 year old mother’s health has been going on for a while, but we didn’t really notice because we see her so often. She has lost quite a bit of weight in the past two years and she tires much more easily. Her feet tend to swell. The most alarming symptom of her decline is sudden shortness of breath where her oxygen levels plummet and we need to get her to a hospital right away. Today we learned that the disease, AL Amyloidosis, has invaded her heart. It is so, so, sad. It is a part of life and something that we all will face, but I never want to lose her. I cannot imagine my life without her.
She says, “You’ve got to die of something,” and “I can’t die young anymore.”
Somehow this is mixed up in my mind and heart with the election, the overt and perpetual bigotry and false news, the appeal to hatred and anger, the disrespect for women and for the laws and traditions of our democracy. It feels like an insidious disease has taken over our country, a scourge that we did not notice or acknowledge was so widespread until it took over completely on November 8th. “Electoral suicide” is what one blogpost dubbed it, giving shape in words to utter despair over the election and what it means for us as a people and for the future of our world, our species.
It is difficult to know what to do, how to be, in the face of this cataclysm. The microcosm of our school maps the fault lines in our country; emboldened and misguided boys chant “build the wall,” while staff make an effort to embrace and reassure fearful students, still carrying on with the business of educating them. Fortunately, our principal confronted the issue immediately by setting clear expectations in the school and quoting some of the more conciliatory words of our president-elect in his acceptance speech.
Is this how it begins?
“Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have the exact measure of the injustice and wrong which will be imposed on them.”
— Frederick Douglass
In her podcast titled “‘Play a Greater Part’ — Bodhisattva for our Times,” Tara Brach suggests that bearing witness to what is going on within ourselves may be the first step. There is uncertainty and fear. There is disbelief and anger. There are similarities to Elizabeth Kübler-Ross’ stages of grief in her work with death and dying. Brach goes on to say that we are all a part of this, we need to step away from the stories that we tell ourselves, to reach beyond us-and-them thinking.
School needs to be a place where all students can expect to feel safe, both physically and emotionally. Students should have the freedom to explore and discuss thoughts and ideas, as long as they do so respectfully and as long as their words and actions do not infringe on the rights of others to enjoy a safe and welcoming school environment. Ideally, school can be a place where our thoughts and ideas are challenged and tested through the rigors of reason backed up with reliable information.
The library supports the ideals of a safe, democratic, and welcoming learning environment for all students by providing space for students to work, read, listen, and discuss. We also offer access to reliable print and online resources from a variety of viewpoints and work with students on the skills of identifying potential bias and possible inaccurate or false information. We uphold the expectation that students interact in a positive and respectful manner; they almost always do.
Our students, all of these young people, are our future. They will help to shape solutions to any challenges we face from global warming, to health care, to clean drinking water, to terrorism. We are fortunate that we live in a country with so many freedoms and opportunities, that includes a good standard of living for most people with safety nets for the elderly and those in need. I wish we will leave these young people a legacy that is equally free, just, caring, and prosperous.
They are our best hope.
I need to spend time with my mother in her last months and am fortunate to live nearby. She is an amazing woman. I am trying to appreciate the time I left have with her. Sometimes sadness creeps in.
As a private citizen, I want to speak out against any misguided appointments and policy changes that I think will be harmful. I fear that my voice will not matter, but value our right as citizens to speak out. I also think it is my obligation to listen respectfully to other points of view. All of us want a good future for our young people.
There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.
— Elie Wiesel
Students need guidance on how to be critical thinkers, listeners, speakers, and group participants to prepare them for their future. A recent study from the Stanford History Education Group shows that students (they tested middle school, high school, and college students) are not adept at evaluating the origin or accuracy of information on social media. The results are alarming.
We have a great deal of work to do to prepare students to meet the challenges of the future. Their futures (and ours) depend on it!
We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future.
— Franklin D. Rooselvelt
