Reading for Treasure: The Arts are Critical

Unless you are completely unplugged, you know that the Writers Guild of America, the Screen Actors Guild, and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists are on strike. The people who write, perform, and create our on-screen entertainment are asking for a reasonable, sustainable, and appropriate share of the profits from their creations. Their artistry is critical to the well-being of our nation. I fully support their efforts and strike. 

Similarly, there is plenty of evidence to show that students engaged in art activities in school receive unique benefits. However, not enough students get these experiences. Arts Education is essential to our schools! 

Here are a few articles that prove this point: 

KQED: “How arts education builds better brains and better lives”

“Students with access to arts education are five times less likely to drop out of school and four times more likely to be recognized for high achievement. They score higher on the SAT, and on proficiency tests of literacy, writing, and English skills. They are also less likely to have disciplinary infractions. And when arts education is equitable so that all kids have equal access, the learning gap between low- and high-income students begins to shrink.” 

The New York Amsterdam News: “The Case for Arts Education” 

“Research also shows that children who participate in arts education are more curious, seek out different viewpoints and experiences, and are more socially engaged, says Jamie Kasper, director of the Arts Education Partnership. This means they are more likely to vote, run for office, and volunteer, and they have better life skills, like time management and prioritization.” 

The Washington Post: “How Theatre can teach our kids to be empathetic” 

“Several studies show communication skills are the most essential skills for navigating American adult life — better communicators are hired more often, enjoy happier relationships and marriages, ascend to leadership positions, and possess higher self-esteem. The ability to manage personal emotions and to recognize them in others — also known as emotional intelligence — is a predictor of academic and professional success. These skills are often taught through Social Emotional Learning programs, offered in K-12 schools in 27 states. But they are also a by-product of theater class, according to a recent study from George Mason University and the Commonwealth Theatre Center.” 

Buzz Feed: “14 Ways Being A Drama Kid Can Help You As An Adult”

Public speaking, teamwork, empathy, confidence, humility, reading,  and memorization are some of the skills that kids involved in theatre performance develop! 

Science Daily: “Major benefits for students who attend live theater, study finds”

“Field trips to live theater enhance literary knowledge, tolerance, and empathy among students, according to a study. The research team found that reading and watching movies of Hamlet and A Christmas Carol could not account for the increase in knowledge experienced by students who attended live performances of the plays. Students who attended live performances of the play also scored higher on the study's tolerance measure than the control group by a moderately large margin and were better able to recognize and appreciate what other people think and feel.” 

I am currently reading The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin 

1000 Days of Retirement: What Keeps You Busy?

Whatever I want. 

I thought about leaving it at that. Seriously, asking people what they are going to do when they retire or what they are doing in retirement is akin to asking what comes next to high school and college seniors. 

Before I retired, I would tell people that I was going to take a gap year and just figure things out. I would also joke that I was going to become a pirate. It is difficult to plan for retirement when one doesn’t know what it will look like. 

And now, 1000 days later, I am still figuring it out. Of the 1000 days since I retired, 720 of them have been during the COVID pandemic. At least once a week, someone says some variation on, “you retired at the right time.” Yes, I did. I deserve no credit for it. 

What have I been doing in retirement? A great deal! However, the big difference is that I am busy without being frenetic. I call it easy busy. One of the best things about retirement is that I get more control of the pace, and I have been trying to slow things down. When I list what I do on a particular day or week, it is much less than in my life when I was working.  That is one of the best things about retirement: it is reasonable.  

I love my slow mornings. As a high school teacher, I awoke at 5:15, did a half-hour workout, put my lunch together, took care of whatever home tasks had to be done in the morning, and got to school in the 7:15 range. Now, I can sleep a little later, although my body is still trained for early rising. My workout is now about an hour long. I take time making a far more interesting breakfast and read my morning feeds. 

After that, my activities fall into a few categories: 

I am getting to things I did not have time to do while I was working. We cleaned the basement during COVID, redecorated my daughter’s room into a new study and media room (which I call my ready room), and began a project of scanning and organizing old photos and documents. I have some plans to do some learning activities once we are less concerned about COVID. 

One of my worries about retirement was that I would become disconnected from my friends, especially those for whom my main connection was school. So I am very purposeful about sending emails, making lunch dates, and keeping in touch. When we were locked down, this turned into more phone and video calls as well as texts and emails. But with or without the pandemic, socializing has become a far greater part of my day-to-day life than it was while I was teaching. 

I am very active in my congregation. I planned our twentieth-anniversary celebration, run the fundraising, and teach in our Sunday school. I used to coordinate the oneg Shabbat food after Friday night services, but we haven’t done that since the pandemic began. However, I am still in charge of announcements. I am delighted to be singing in our choir again! 

I coordinate two science fiction book clubs. I volunteer with the planning of the World Science Fiction Convention in Chicago, which will be on Labor Day weekend downtown.  The pandemic made conventions more challenging. I attended a few virtual cons and have attended two in-person conventions in the last few months. 

I am spending more time and energy with my family. My children came home during the summer of 2020 and I helped with whatever they needed. I was walking my daughter’s dog, fixing meals, helping with technology, and helping my son move to Detroit and drive my daughter back to DC. Speaking of technology, I am the IT help desk for my folks and a few others. 

My family involvement includes more formal family structures. My wife, cousins and I are forming a family council. I have become the bookkeeper for our family's philanthropic activities. My involvement in our family business has increased far beyond what I anticipated. In fact, being more connected to the family business was a bit of a retirement surprise. 

I really really like to read. I have been reading RSS feeds, books, short stories, articles, non-fiction, and lots of other things. I have to be careful or I might read a day (or more) away! 

Before the pandemic, my wife and I would go to live theatre regularly as well. We love to travel and planning our trips took lots of time and energy. These are slowly returning. We have seen some plays at the high school. We went on a trip to California and I am planning trips to be with our kids. The more time I spend on travel planning, the more traveling we can do! 

Oh, yeah, and I grew a beard. 

Yet, when someone asks, “what keeps you busy,” I am at a loss to provide what I think would be a satisfying answer. Now I can just tell them to read this! 

Reunion Gratitude and Growing Up: A Reflection

Thomas Wolfe wrote that you can’t go home again. That is a good thing. Recently, I gathered with many of my college theatre classmates. I didn’t go to the university events. I didn’t go to a football game or tailgate or anything like that. I went to a small party at a classmate’s home as I have done every five or so years. There were about thirty or forty theatre alumni there. It was better than going back to our college home, thirty-five years ago. 

I chaired two of my high school reunions. I like reunions. Yet, there is something very special and different about this particular reunion and these people. We competed with each other in college. We may have continued that at our early reunions, but I don’t remember that. 

What I do know is, for me, that need to compete is gone. I look at my classmates and marvel and celebrate their outstanding work, spaning theatre and many other fields. I delight in their company in a way I did not in college. I appreciate them like I never could have imagined when we were in school years ago. Some of the folks who came were people with whom I spent a great deal of time. Some I knew in passing, and now I wish I had spent more time with them. 

Like my other reunions, some of my closest friends were unable to attend. None of the people present were at my wedding or my children’s mitzvahs. In other reunions, that might have been awkward or disappointing. That was not the case at all; it was an ideal chance to catch up, renew relationships, and celebrate.

I feel so grateful and fortunate to have second and third and fourth chances to meet these people. I am so grateful to the committee that worked hard to preserve our bond. Their work has allowed me to see so much more than a “reunion” version of our college selves. Each time we gather, I get a better glimpse of the more complex and real people we have become. 

At nineteen and twenty, I couldn’t get past myself. I was stuck and confused and struggling. I still am, but in my fifties the challenges are different. I am enjoying the confusion, choosing the struggle, and working hard to get out of myself and out of my own (and others) way. That was not true thirty-five years ago. Now, I have an opportunity to go beyond my college inadequacies, to present myself as I am now. To laugh at and, yes, even apologize for the sins of my college past. 

We hear about coming to terms with the past. We talk about forgiveness and putting the past in its place. At my reunion, I got to complement the past. I got to reconnect with my classmates, some of whom I have gotten to know far better in the years since college. And I appreciate them more each time I see them. 

This reunion made me long to see these folks again. I see many on Facebook and that whets my appetite. It enables me to see my classmates more fully and feel at least a little connected.

Everyone was not present. There were many people who were missed, talked about, or joined us via video call. While many of us have attended many of these reunions, it is wonderful when faraway faces are able to join us. When they are not, they are sincerely missed. These evenings are punctuated with the question, “What is happening with…?” 

I was not in love with everyone from my theatre program in college. However, that is meaningless now. Our relationship is now about a past we are rewriting, revising, revisiting, and renewing. 

College was never this good. Now it is. 

Reading For Treasure: Schools in the Pandemic

Reading for Treasure is my list of articles (and other readings) that are worth your attention. Click here for an introduction!

As I took my walk, I saw many parents walking their children to our local elementary school. I see signs about opening school and posts addressing concerns if we do. So this month, let’s talk about school. 

Usually, the articles I recommend from McSweeney’s are satire. This one is not. The writer is a high school English teacher who sarcastically says, “I Started School In Person This Week, And It Went Fine.”  Reopening schools does not mean schools as they used to be at all. 

A second piece from McSweeney’s is a masterful parody of the short piece “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid. This one is called “Teacher” and it is a great complement to the piece above. 

I am not sure how I landed at the Des Moines Register’s article, “9 ways America is having the wrong conversation about 'reopening' schools.” But it outlines the issues we are talking about – and those we are ignoring when we discuss going back to in-person classes. 

Education is built on relationships. Starting a relationship through a Zoom class is difficult for adults and extremely challenging for children and teenagers. Mindshift from KQED examines a wonderful solution in this article about looping, the practice where students have the same teacher for multiple years: “How Teacher Looping Can Ease the Learning Disruptions Caused by Coronavirus”

As a retired teacher and former dungeon master, I loved the idea that, especially as we use computers to reach our students, we can use some of the best lessons from Dungeons and Dragons to engage our students! This second article from Mindshift from KEQD provides, “Five Best Practices Teachers Can Learn from Dungeon Masters.”

It’s not only classroom experiences that have transformed as schools moved to remote learning. Students in the performing arts have adapted their work to the screen, too. This short radio story from NPR focuses on one high school’s play, but I have heard concerts and watched performances that have been artfully adapted so students can still create beautiful work, even in this frightening time “Performing In A Pandemic: Taking The High School Play Online”

Three articles from The Atlantic; The first two deal with issues regarding the college admission process. First, a professor from Tufts recommends, “The Easiest Reform for College Admissions.” Then, the president of Johns Hopkins University explains, “Why We Ended Legacy Admissions at Johns Hopkins.”

Lastly, echoing arguments I have been making since last spring, this Atlantic article states the obvious, “School Wasn’t So Great Before COVID, Either” and makes recommendations for improvements. COVID is an opportunity to reimagine and improve education. We should do far more than create an online analog! 

I am currently reading A Promised Land by Barak Obama.

Our Town and Our Old Videos: Glimpses into the Past

My first theatre production at Deerfield High School was Our Town. I did it because we had no money and it would include a large number of students. Recently, I have been looking at old videos and photos from my first decade of teaching. They remind me of Our Town.

A few years ago, Deerfield produced Our Town again. I cried my way through it. Similarly, I watched myself about thirty years ago on these videos. I felt like Emily looking at my very distant life.

I found the play and the videos frighteningly familiar. It happens each time I watch shows I have done, and I am surprised each time. The production is still inside me. The moments, lines, and nuances of the script don’t go away. They lie dormant, even for decades. So do the feelings I had for the people with whom I was working. 

I found, as I watched the videos and show, that I saw more than what was in front of me. I remembered the students from thirty-some years ago and saw them then and now. Thanks to the blessing of Facebook, I am still in touch with many of them.

As Emily returns to her birthday, I was returning to my own Deerfield Grover’s Corners. I didn’t need to die to relive my past. But, like Emily, I was painfully aware of how little I saw then.

During the last years of my career as a teacher, I tried to savor the moments.  Since my own children are growing up and no longer at home, the passage of time feels very real. I savor each phone call, text, and video chat.

When Emily sees her parents young and beautiful, I am filled with gratitude and fear. My parents are aging. They are doing it well, but again I am keenly aware of time. My wife’s parents are gone and, through her, I have a second-hand taste of that loss. And my students are aging, too. Their children were in my classroom.

Some of my former students have died. I can’t get over those losses. When one of those students appeared on one of the videos, it was a jarring and delightful moment. I wish I could go back and share with him what I know now. To paraphrase Mrs. Gibbs from Our Town, I was a blind person.

I watch the videos with wet eyes and wonder: Can we be the people the Stage Manager says don’t exist? Can we cherish and see each other every – every minute? Can we put the minutia and administrivia in its place and hold each other the way Emily tries to as she relives her birthday morning? I fully understand why she can’t go on with it. I had to stop the video a few times because the view became too blurry. It must have been decay from the old VHS tapes.

We do walk through the world in the dark. We don’t see each other. We take each other for granted and forget the miracles we make and live daily. The least important day is important enough.

As I reflect on my time as a teacher, as I review the old videos and memories, I keep coming back to Our Town. I am reminded of those years long ago, and the wonderful people whom I miss. That is the hard part of retirement: missing the wonderful people.

But I am so grateful to have spent time with them – and to have these memories.

Winning Plays

I am not a sports person. As a child, my athletic experiences were painful, humiliating, and drenched in sweat. However, I married a coach and an athlete and, unsurprisingly, our children have been involved in performing arts and athletics. When my younger child was waffling about soccer, I even became a coach for a few seasons.

There is a stark difference in the quality of my children’s experiences in theatre and sports. With few exceptions, my children’s experience on high school teams has been uneven and often frustrating and painful. They have loved their time working on plays and musicals. The key difference is the adults in charge. Whether it is a play, music ensemble, or athletic team, there are a few critical strategies that “coaches” can take so it is a healthy and positive experience for all kids.  

Be inclusive: The kids in the theatre are molded into a company. Every student has a job and is actively involved - even if a stagehand only places a prop or a “spear carrier” says only, “dinner is served.” If a student is chosen to be on the team, that student must do more than practice. While I have some qualms with the value, I understand that, at the varsity level, high school sports are about winning. For other levels, inclusion, the development of skills, and time on the field must be valued at least as much as victory. 

Build community: The track team at our school is remarkably close. Kids in theatre productions make new friends that extend beyond the boundaries of the show. There is a reason for this. The adults in charge help kids develop deep and meaningful relationships with each other. To them, kids are far more than chess pieces in a game. They create experiences in rehearsal and practice that allow kids to go beyond the superficial and break down “clique” barriers. That has never happened for my children on their teams and has been a consistent high spot in their experiences on stage.

Treat kids with respect and caring: Both of my kids believed that their coaches didn’t really care about them. With only one exception, my children neither liked their coaches nor thought that their coaches liked them. Their relationship was strictly business. In one case, my child feared her coach. My children cherish their relationships with the adults in theatre. Community is built on relationships. In theatre, kids get the message that their participation matters. The technical director and stage director get to know kids. They learn who they are beyond the show. This takes time, but more importantly, it takes adults who really want to connect deeply with kids. I know there are coaches, sponsors, and directors who fit this mold. 

Strike a balance between the needs of the individual and needs of the group: “There is no I in team.” There is no “I” in theatre either. The fact is that kids are individuals. They are not robots who subsume themselves in the collective. They are part of a team (or company), but they are also multidimensional people. They have families, other interests, and unique qualities. It pains me that my children had to sign up for special lessons and participate in club sports to be able to make the cut for teams. Many of my children’s teammates do nothing other than one or two sports. Specialization is what is required to compete. This is sad. I want my children to play sports. I also want them to play musical instruments, participate in clubs, go to youth group, and explore many activities.

Foster kids’ success: As a teacher, I work hard to help every student succeed. Every child in a production has a role to play. My children have been frustrated in sports because they did not have the opportunity to succeed. Furthermore, they didn’t feel like the coach was their ally. The coach was a critic, who more often than not gave them a thumbs down.

Our theatre program has a motto: The most important thing is how we treat each other. Can we treat kids in a more humane and caring way? Can inclusion and the development of skills sit side by side with competition? Winning means more than scoring: it is about the quality of kids’ experiences.