Having a Life

Overheard from two women who each have two children around the same ages.

Lady 1: I am older already, in my thirties, and I got married later.

Lady 2: I got married at 19. Right after high school.  I'm 24.

Lady 1: So you haven't had a life.

Lady 2: Basically ...

***
Lady 1 meant that Lady 2 went directly from her obligations at school to her obligations as a wife and mother, without having years to "do her own thing," which usually includes studying a profession, work, some travel.

I understand that, but it still sounded awful.  Maybe I should have piped up and asked, "Why do you think being a wife and mother isn't a life?" and seen where that went.  She may have said, I did not have any time for myself.  I might have responded, why then did you choose to meet someone and get married when you did? I don't know what she would have said.  I might have had the opportunity to say, if you want to study a field, you still can.  If you want to work, that is still possible (and I think she was working in the store I was in). So what do you think you missed out on that you cannot do now? She might say, a sense of freedom, being able to come and go and explore my interests. I might then say, there are hundreds, thousands of frum single girls who do just that.  Many get married along the way. Too many do not.  What do you think is more important than raising Yiddishe children?

Message from Zlata Press

Long ago, I read in the now defunct Horizons magazine, an article called "Our Core Belief," by Zlata Press, principal of a girls high school. I no longer have the issue but here are some points I jotted down from it about what Mrs. Press called, "the single most powerful lesson I've ever given."

 

She says high school performance has zero value in predicting accomplishment and success in adult life.

Not only can weak students can become wonderful wives and mothers and/or rich businesswomen.

That of course, but more -

Weak students have flowered into successful performers in the academic world!

She asks, what accounts for the dramatic turnaround? She says, sometimes sheer will and hard work.

Often, taking four college or sem classes instead of ten a term in high school.

Some need time to mature.

Others need to develop work habits.

College offers promise of a successful adult career which is motivating.

For some, the change occurs when they enter high school.

For others, the senior year.

For many, years later.

What to do about those who are miserable now?

She says, parents ask us to push less, expect less, but experience says this is not a good idea.

And interpersonal strengths, talent are not adequate replacements (despite those who extol school performances for that reason).

She says: It is our challenge as mechanchim to create the environment that is most conducive to children learning, of realistic but challenging expectations.

 

In a follow-up article, the author adds that those who are good students need to know that an entire area of adult life – family and community – have nothing to do with academic success!

The 99 on the chemistry quiz won’t help you to be an understanding, flexible, wise wife or a patient, creative, and dedicated mother.

Lots of food for thought both for the academically successful high school student and the unsuccessful.

Untapped Potential

Dr. Najjar is a celebrated neurologist from Syria.  He was not a good student and his parents and teachers considered him lazy.  When he was ten he failed his tests and the principal suggested that he learn a trade.  Education was very important to his father and so he sent his son to a different school. 

A teacher in the new school took an interest in him and praised him and he did extremely well in her class.  He eventually graduated top of his class in medical school and moved to the United States where he is presently an associate professor of neurology at the NYU Medical Center.  Here is an example of his winning diagnosis: medical-mystery solved

So much is left unsaid in this short account.  I wonder why a bright child would have done so abysmally in school when he was so smart and education was so important to his family.  How many other children have the capability of doing well in school but don't, while giving their teachers and principal the impression that they are not intelligent enough? Is this rare or common?

School - Then and Now

A woman from Hungary described what school was like there:

"Schools in those days (in the 50's) were very different from today.  Public schools had professional educators who were experts in their academic fields, and were fierce disciplinarians.  They were there to teach, and we were there to learn.  We truly feared them.  There was no talking back or fooling around.  They did not care about making us feel good, nor were they interested in our self-esteem.  They never praised us.  We were called by our last names.  We were like little soldiers in boot camp."

Is there any evidence that the school system today produces children who are any more well-adjusted, more knowledgeable, with greater character?

I am not in favor of school being a terrifying place but there is much to praise in a school system that fosters respect for authority, conformity to the rules, proper behavior, and an atmosphere in which one learns! From our perspective, these are vital lessons for life as Torah Jews.  Is it a coincidence that just as frum schools and homes are adopting the touchy-feely values of modern-day psychology that we are reading more and more about children who are acting out, dropping out, hurting themselves, and are miserable?

Pill in His Coffee

What a great story I heard.  A rebbi told a father that he could not handle his son, he was impossible.  The father said, but he sits nicely at home ... The rebbi wasn't interested, it was either get him Ritalin or he's out of the school.  The father said he couldn't afford it and the rebbi said raise the money.  The father, seeing he had no choice, said there's one more problem.  My wife and I leave early in the morning and we won't be able to ensure he gets the medication at the same time every morning.  The rebbi said that's no problem, I'll take care of it.  I'll send him to the teachers' room to make me a coffee and to take his medicine.

Two months go by and the child is doing beautifully.  One day, the father asks his son how things are going at school.  The child said, terrific! Better than ever.

The father asks, is there anything you can attribute this to? The son says, I don't know but the only thing that is different is that every day, after davening, rebbi asks me to make him a coffee and to take this pill, so every day I make him coffee and put the pill in. 

The question asked of R' Yitzchok Zilberstein was - does the teacher have to reimburse the father for the medication!

Should we laugh or cry?

How many parents are coerced into drugging their children in order to placate school staff? What a crime!