In the last six months I’ve had the privilege of being a guest
speaker at R.O. Hardin and Ladd Lane schools for Career Day.
In the last six months I’ve had the privilege of being a guest speaker at R.O. Hardin and Ladd Lane schools for Career Day. Now why on Earth would I talk anyone into doing this job unless I felt they needed to experience the vow of poverty?
At first I was nervous and afraid the mom in me would come out and the compulsion to wipe smudges off pint-sized faces would overpower me, but I held on and bluffed my way through it.
I explained to the students that to be a reporter is to be fair to both sides in a news story, no matter how you feel about the subject or the person you have to write about.
“A good reporter will write both sides,” I told them.
Telling the students about the newspaper profession was a welcome experience and it filled one of my personal top-100 goals – public speaking.
However, it was truly exciting to have an opportunity to inspire young minds and encourage them to think for themselves, and if writing is not a career for them, so be it. But I was not going to be their judge and jury.
Children do need to know it’s OK to change their mind, and changing careers is OK too. “It’s not how you start out in life, but how you end up,” I told them.
Sharing with these children a childhood dream of mine to be a doctor helped me make a point.
“I thought I wanted to be a doctor until I discovered that I had to learn about blood and guts and say names that were bigger than me,” I said. “If I didn’t like studying about the blood and guts, then I wouldn’t make a very good doctor, now would I?”
Many of the kids shook their heads “no” while others groaned at the thought of blood and guts.
What I did not see as a child was my devotion to the written word. My career was in front of me all along. I would write almost every day – little stories, poetry and plenty of useless thoughts. But what I failed to see was my natural ability to write, and apparently so did my school counselor.
Looking at those children also made me realize how impressionable they are, which is why I expressed to them not to worry about what others may want them to do with their life. More importantly, they need to be happy in their career choice or they won’t do a good job.
One thing I would like to do is speak to school counselors about what not to say when discussing a child’s future.
Counselors do not have all the answers and the harm they can cause takes years to get over it. I know; it took many years to get over what my school counselor said to me: “You don’t need an education – you’re a girl.”
“Then what am I doing here?” I said, walking out the door three months shy of graduation.
It took a lifetime to make a comeback, all because one person made a bad judgment call.
One person does make a difference.
