Resurrecting the Mentor

This reminded me of  my last five years as a high school teacher and coach. I don’t have a lot of memories of high school but the good ones bear a strong connection to the lives of not only the students but those of the teachers and coaches. For instance, I can remember my Honors English teacher Dr. Louis Sergio auditioning for Jeopardy or my Government/Economics teacher creating a classroom mural of pictures from countries he’d visited. I can’t remember being “weirded” out in high school when I saw a teacher off campus but I’m sure I was just like many other students who envision the cyborg teacher who simply powers down at night and boots up when the kids arrive. Teachers aren’t perceived as possessing vitality until a lifelike interaction takes place.

Joel Branstrom is that guy who just loves the environment of the campus. He’s the coach that kids probably know will be a good sport about a prank but means business in the afternoon when practice is taking place. He appears how I always felt among the students – ALIVE. Students ask questions about life and it’s easy as a teacher to disregard or sidestep but people of all ages, especially teens, like stimulation. They seek it so many other places but when a teacher/coach moves from positional authority to mentoring authority, school becomes a place kids want to be, even if only for the one hour they’re in your class. I always figured, well, let my class be the one hour they enjoy at school. Coach Branstrom  symbolizes the spirit we need to embody in order to genuinely relate to young people. Teens are like superheroes with the primary super power of detecting “fake”.  Perhaps that’s what makes impacting young people so difficult. The currency that spends in their world is transparency and if we’re too embarrassed about how we live to appear ALIVE, we can’t expect them to take us seriously.