#and also allows him to connect without more rigorous social practices

[maybe-boys-do-love]

And what if I saw so many reasons to headcanon Boston as audhd??? What then??????

[streetbottle18]

Workplace Mediation Advice & Training.

Mediation Services Uk

Content

Promediate Panel Mediator Paul Kirkwood Shares His Experience Of Remote Zoom Mediation.

Household Mediation In London & Kent.

The celebrations' previous attempts to discuss the issue had been unsuccessful. The mediation developed out of David's claims of disability discrimination and also his cases for civil service injury benefit and illness retired life. The employer rejected the accusations as well as withstood the claims on the basis that they had actually made reasonable adjustments to take into account David's disability which they had not discriminated against him. In this instance two participants of a team were experiencing recurring troubles as well as in spite of the best initiatives of the department manager and Human Resources might not find a resolution to the difficulties.

From my point of view the whole procedure has actually gone really efficiently, from my initial telephone call with Alison with to Sarah your office supervisor completing our brand-new vendor documents and also naturally John for being aggressive in contacting me. Both and have actually likewise asked me to pass on their thanks to you, also discussed he was really impressed with the service that has been offered.

Promediate Panel Arbitrator Paul Kirkwood Shares His Experience Of Remote Zoom Mediation.

Our director Emma Barugh is MA Chartered MCIPD. For additional information connect with us today. For additional information or if you would love to go over any of the solutions we offer, after that please don't think twice to get in touch with us. Croner-i is the relied on source of professional support as well as time-saving devices. Training course participants are required to take on around 6 hrs of pre-reading before coming on the training course.

When official procedures are necessary, we provide experienced independent detectives; making certain an objective and durable process to reduce the threat of cases. Neutral Analysis supplies an extremely effective alternative option for favorably handling tough staff member connections concerns by engaging with team as well as recognizing functional services.

Family Members Mediation In London & Kent.

Workplace Mediation is quicker as well as even more budget-friendly than tribunal or court preceedings. It can likewise bring back workplace connections and also enhance communication between colleagues. Mediation is provided on a fixed cost basis as well as includes a preliminary evaluation on the viability of mediation, specific meetings and a joint conference. To attend this course, you must have been formerly educated as a mediator, or have practiced as one. If you would love to work in this field and also put your competence as a mediator to the solution of worker wellness, this course is made for you. The same applies in instances where lawyers or administrators differ or even where there is a disagreement over the terms of a will.

Volunteer lawyers and SMU students recognised for their exemplary pro bono contribution - Perspectives@SMU

Volunteer lawyers and SMU students recognised for their exemplary pro bono contribution.

Posted: Thu, 17 Dec 2020 08:00:00 GMT [source]

Mediation can not be utilized if an insurance claim has actually been made, or can be made, to an employment tribunal about a conflict. If you believe that our Workplace Mediation Service may aid you or your business and also want to find out more see our Mediator Appointment Service page or you can call us and also speak in confidence to one of our knowledgeable participants of personnel.

The participants may share some or every one of the arrangement with the to make sure that the contract can be formally validated. Our Workplace Mediation Service can help to deal with Workplace Disputes without resorting to official tribunals. Handling matters in an economical way by staying clear of the significant legal costs of lawsuits. Commonly, mediation is arranged for one complete day, with some first call as well as follow up.

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Mediation might not be an ideal approach for some problem situations, for example, where major protecting issues occur. Redway HR can encourage on the appropriate way ahead in such cases. Data accumulated might be utilized periodically for advertising and marketing functions by Aaron & Partners LLP and will not be passed to any third parties. Opentracker is an option for website and also app traffic coverage as well as analytics. It is experts in service knowledge and works as an analytics tool to track digital occasions as well as interaction important to our website-- including clicks, logins, downloads as well as types. Jazz Shapers exists by Mishcon de Reya's Supervisor of Service Development and former LBC speaker Elliot Moss.

How can I get free mediation?

You automatically qualify for free mediation, if your capital is under a certain threshold AND you receive any of the following benefits: 1. Income-based Job Seekers Allowance. 2. Income-based Employment Support Allowance. 3. https://workplacemediations.co.uk/conflict-resolution/portsmouth/ . 4. Pension Guarantee Credit. 5. Universal Credit.

This award winning approach is confirmed to offer genuine and also sustained renovations for clients. This kind is meant for usage by individuals or organisations requesting even more info regarding Workplace Options product or services. Ingenious Employee Support Solutions-- We provide emotional, useful and physical support to staff members and also their households around the globe. Nonetheless, companies are obliged to adhere to rigorous procedures when making workers repetitive to guarantee that you are treated fairly.

They must still adhere to the same procedure if you are on furlough leave. In 2011 legislation brand-new legislation was presented making it unlawful to deal with any person differently due to their age other than if it could be warranted or drops within among the exemptions to the law.

We're 100% private, and also 100% focused on getting your organization back to typical. If a party understands the Mediation process and hesitates to engage. If you disable this cookie, we will certainly not be able to save your choices.

It is very important to participate in the course with an understanding of the mediation course prior to the first day. It is additionally important that delegates have an excellent command of the English language as this will certainly be required for both the practical and written evaluations. Globis Mediation Team understands, because of responses obtained from previous delegates, that this training course is challenging as well as requiring. Training course participants who demonstrate the called for level of skills with the observed study and created assignments will be granted the National Certification. The Structure in Workplace Mediation Skills Certification is granted to identify participation and also participation for program delegates who do not achieve certification. It is feasible to be re-assessed at a later stage in situations where certification is not attained very first time round. Prices quoted listed below are not comprehensive of costs and also depend upon the mediation being concluded in eventually.

https://workplacemediations.co.uk/conflict-resolution/milton-keynes/ deal with neighbours and also neighbourhoods to deal with neighborhood disagreements and also assist make communities more secure.

Lots of neighbourhood disagreements, even seemingly minor ones, can escalate if not managed at a beginning, and also mediation has a superb record in aiding individuals to find positive remedies.

We can additionally aid with handling files electronically and also ebundles.

We have the tech support to supply mediation by video clip link to make sure that the parties and also their advisers can satisfy the conciliator individually from each various other, with centers for lawyers to speak with each other besides customers if needed.

During each program, Elliot will certainly be interviewing shapers of the business world, people that, like the musicians in the program, have defied convention and also taken place to achieve excellent success. The Academy is Mishcon de Reya's in-house area of understanding, our vehicle driver for development and a platform for believed management. Here we will certainly combine immediate social issues and sector experts to provide cutting-edge idea leadership on problems that matter to us and to our customers. MDR Mayfair was produced to offer personal consultatory services for a pick group of family members by uniting a broad series of extremely certified experts to flawlessly manage their events. At MBHR Consulting Ltd, we satisfaction ourselves on being among the leading human resources firms in the North East. We are passionate concerning what we do as well as always go above and beyond to ensure our clients demands are met. We offer a comprehensive series of human resources solutions to our clients throughout the North East.

[pbwsports]

Driveways, canyons, pools: NFL players create clever workouts

A farm. A field. A canyon. A pool. Even a driveway. As NFL players wait for a return to normalcy before the 2020 regular season begins, they have had to get creative with how and where they train.

The ripple effects of these unprecedented times -- nationwide social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic and an unknown timetable for a vaccine --have altered the professional sports landscape, and the NFL is no exception.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell authorized the reopening of all team facilities this week, in accordance with state and local regulations, although coaches and players who are not undergoing rehabilitation are prohibited from entering team buildings. While a handful of clubs took advantage of this allowance, states such as New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Virginia, Michigan, Illinois, Washington and California are still imposing heavier restrictions that affect a dozen team facilities.

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These inconsistent regulations have also changed the responsibilities of NFL strength trainers, who have spent time remotely assessing the workout needs of players, including their access to resources, as well as acting as liaisons for online equipment purchases. NFL teams were permitted to provide each player with up to $1,500 worth of workout equipment. Nevertheless, players have had to find inventive ways to stay in shape.

Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins uses his parents' driveway as his outdoor gym. New York Giants wide receiver Golden Tate mowed a track into a steep canyon near his home. Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver James Washington designed a training regimen on his Texas farm. New Orleans Saintslinebacker Demario Davis has his personal trainers living with him. Giants linebacker Blake Martinez became the beneficiary of a state-of-the-art gym. And Cleveland Browns punter Jamie Gillan grabbed some beers and built a "grubby" garage gym.

Even though players' locations, living situations and resources differ, there's a lesson shared by all: There are no excuses.

Big-money quarterback staying with parents

The playful jab is uttered without warning, hurled from the driver's side of a passing vehicle.

"Go Pack, go!"

And in that moment of lighthearted jest, Kirk Cousins can only ignore it. He knows the stop sign in front of the house makes him a sitting duck every morning.

Four times a week, starting promptly at 9 a.m., the Vikings quarterback gathers equipment from the garage and arranges it neatly on the long, curved pavement leading from his parents' house to the sidewalk. Resting on a wooden chair is his laptop, connected by videoconference to his longtime personal trainer, Chad Cook, who is 450 miles away in Atlanta. This is a glimpse into what constitutes the 2020 NFL offseason.

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"I like my privacy, so being out in the driveway, on display for the whole neighborhood to see is probably less than ideal. But desperate times call for desperate measures," Cousins said with a smile during a recent ESPN interview. "If it means a guy drives by in a truck and yells, 'Go Pack, go!' at me while we're working out, then so be it."

The manicured lawns of this Orlando, Florida, suburb serve as a backdrop to Cousins' regimen and his attempt at normalcy in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.

It's not a "home gym" by any means, Cousins concedes, but he insists he has everything he needs: a medicine ball, jump-rope, foam rollers, free weights and a football. And, the most essential tool of all: the laptop he uses to connect with Cook.

"[Every car will] see me doing my shuffles across the driveway, or my cariocas, or doing the jump-rope or different plank exercises, core work, medicine ball, lunges -- whatever it may be. And different people honk or wave, so it's kind of fun," said Cousins, who signed a two-year, $66 million extension with the Vikings in March.

Spotty Wi-Fi is a challenge when working out outdoors, but sheltering in place with his parents was by design: The nine-year veteran and his wife, Julie, now have plenty of reinforcements when it comes to taking care of their sons, Cooper, 2½, and Turner, 1.

"I kind of laugh when I talk about having two like I have 10," Cousins joked, "because compared to other guys in the league who have three, four, five, six kids, having two is not a big deal."

Dealing with this adversity has reaffirmed his commitment to his craft. It also taught him that the Public Broadcasting Service can be a football player's, as well as a father's, best friend: "'Daniel Tiger['s Neighborhood]' on PBS can be a lifesaver."

'Strict training mode' means living with trainers

The plan was to be in Nashville, Tennessee, for a month, but Demario Davis' offseason residence has become his permanent dwelling during the pandemic. His 7,500-square-foot house, purchased last offseason, is a saving grace of sorts, equipped with enough room for his wife, Tamela, and their four children under the age of 6.

And his two personal trainers.

Davis' trainers, Jose Tienda and Piankhi Gibson, typically work with him in two-to-three-week "strict training mode" spurts before heading back to their respective homes. They'll return to Nashville soon for another extended stay with Davis.

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As the 31-year-old enters his ninth NFL season -- and the final year of his contract -- he is determined not to lose ground to a youngster who might be aiming for his spot.

Mid-morning acupuncture and soft tissue work with Tienda give way to afternoon aqua training in a neighbor's pool with Gibson. Davis pauses for dinner and to help put the kids to bed. But before long, he's headed back for more body work. He crawls into bed around 12:30 or 1 a.m. on those rigorous training days.

With Louisiana still reeling from 35,316 confirmed COVID-19 cases (and 2,485 reported deaths) as of Thursday, Davis wasn't surprised Saints coach Sean Payton -- who was the first known NFL figure to test positive for the coronavirus -- announced there would not be virtual workouts, meetings or workout sessions at the team facility.

"The virtual offseason really wouldn't have fit the flow of how we operate down there," the veteran linebacker said of the Saints, who have one of the oldest rosters in the NFL. "We don't have a young team. ... He knew with our experience level, the strong leaders we have at each position, that we'd get it done as far as training."

While Davis is eager to play, he said he won't waste time guessing when the season will start.

"The pandemic don't know nothing about football season. The virus ain't just like, 'Oh, football season's coming, let me chill out,'" he said with a laugh. "So I'm going to train and stay in shape because that's just a philosophy of mine -- you stay ready at all times. But I think it's a discredit to people who are on the front lines working, and the people who are being affected by it, when we're just thinking about how fast we can get back to sports."

'Grubby little gym' becomes labor of love

The police officers approached without warning.

Jamie Gillan had been punting on a turf field almost an hour away from his Tremont, Ohio, residence, completely unaware of the state's shelter-in-place orders. With nonessential businesses closed, the Browns punter -- nicknamed "The Scottish Hammer" -- had used local fields to practice his kicking drills. That is, until he was no longer allowed.

"[The officers] were like, 'Yeah man, we want to let you punt. We love the Browns and everything, but it's just the rules,'" the Scotland-born special-teamer explained in his thick brogue.

Faced with the prospect of quarantining alone, Gillan chose to go be with family.

He made trips to the liquor store and the supermarket -- packing his truck with several bottles of bourbon for his father, "120 eggs and 16 racks of bacon" -- and then he and his German shepherd named Bear traveled seven hours to southern Maryland to stay with his parents and 19-year-old sister.

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The rural area around his parents' house affords him space to practice his booming kicks, and there's a "massive" field, owned by a friend, which Gillan uses, too. But the self-described "workout junkie" had to get creative with strength training. Soon his parents' garage became his gym.

Unable to buy equipment online because of limited inventory and "skyrocketing" prices, Gillan purchased old equipment from a local high school: barbells, bumper plates, 40-, 80- and 100-pound dumbbells and bands. He purchased rubber matting from a local tractor store.

He searched Facebook Marketplace for a squat rack, but he and his father, Colin, who is a former rugby player and member of the United Kingdom's Royal Air Force, came up with a better solution -- they would construct their own.

"We came back [from Lowe's], cracked open some beers and just started building it," Gillan said with a chuckle. Even with old, rusty weights, his "grubby little gym" was everything he needed.

Gillan said his resourcefulness was forged during four years playing at Arkansas-Pine Bluff, a historically black university. During offseasons when he and his teammates didn't have access to the gym, their surroundings became their workout room. They bench-pressed and squatted logs, they did dips and pullups on metal bars at local parks, and Gillan hopped fences to punt on neighboring fields when access to their football field was prohibited.

"One thing I notice about a lot of historically black colleges is they're very underfunded," Gillan said, stressing that he and other student-athletes had to be creative. "Maybe it got me prepared for this weird period."

State-of-the-art amenities ease the transition

Blake Martinez's father, Marc, had a master plan: purchase a plot of land 15 minutes from the family home in Tucson, Arizona, and build a facility for his son to train and live. It didn't take long for the idea to become Martinez's reality.

The linebacker thanks his father every day for his ingenuity, as well as his construction company.

The 18,000-square-foot facility -- conceptualized and built last year -- "has everything a football player would need," said Martinez, a 2016 fourth-round draft pick by the Green Bay Packers who signed a three-year, $30 million free-agent contract with the Giants in March.

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The warehouse-looking steel structure contains "a miniature version of a college weight room," a full-length basketball court, a 30-by-15-yard turf field and an outdoor sand volleyball court. It also doubles as a residence, with three bedrooms, a living room and a kitchen on the second level for him, his wife, Kristy, and their young daughter.

"It kept getting better and better as it kept getting built," Martinez said. He works out for two hours in person with his longtime trainer, Glenn Howell, four times a week.

But familiarity with his new franchise is a luxury Martinez, 26, doesn't have.

With New York and New Jersey being one of the epicenters of the coronavirus outbreak in the United States, Martinez doesn't know when he'll be able to travel to the facility or even meet members of the Giants organization for the first time.

"It's not like I've been on the team for a while and I know the guys already. So, it's been tough in that aspect, connecting with guys," he said.

Martinez said the pandemic has taught him "I literally have zero excuses not to show up the first day and make sure I'm 100 percent ready to go and help push all of the younger guys to that level if they haven't gotten there yet."

Making use of California canyons

Golden Tate's stunning San Diego views come at a price.

"I've just got to watch out for rattlesnakes," the Giants wide receiver said with a laugh.

When stay-at-home orders were issued in California in mid-March, Tate took advantage of his surroundings -- namely, the canyon his house is built on.

"It's not the best condition to be running in," admitted the 11-year NFL player, who mowed a 7-by-40-yard patch of grass on a steep incline. "But it'll suffice right now. It's better than doing nothing."

Team work makes the dream work! Uncle @tatethagreat & LoLo helping me get my daily catches in. Hope everyone has a great Friday! #FamilyFriday

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Tate, a married father of two small kids, purchased PowerBlock dumbbells and a Jugs machine from which he catches about 100 balls a day. He bikes at home on his Peloton and uses mountain bike trails for his aerobic conditioning. But finding a flat surface for route running has been a challenge. So, too, is self-discipline.

"Over my career, I'm so used to having someone -- an instructor or the guys around me -- push me. And right now, I'm forced to push myself," said Tate, who turns 32 on Aug. 2.

The veteran receiver played through the 2011 NFL lockout, but he said the coronavirus pandemic is unlike anything he has experienced.

"I feel bad for the first-, second-, third- and fourth-round guys who are expected to come in and help the team right away, but they're not having the same opportunity to grow as a player, not getting those reps on the field," he said.

"The offseason is when you have the time to really focus on the fundamentals of the game, the bigger picture and the details of the game. And it looks like right now we're going to show up for camp -- if we show up for camp -- in the middle of the fire of trying to figure out who's going to make the team and trying to get ready for a season. That can be overwhelming."

Strengths trainers turned investigators

With their players scattered across the country, NFL strength and conditioning coaches feel more like part-time sleuths and office managers than in-person trainers.

"We kind of went more into equipment sales and trying to be a liaison to help guys get set up and make sure they're doing the right thing," said Justus Galac, now in his seventh year as the New York Jets' head strength and conditioning coach. "What we found was, guys in the Southern states and more into the Midwest had more access than our guys in the Northeast and West Coast."

Amendola shows off his backyard workout

Danny Amendola impresses with some nifty, one-handed catches while working out with a helmet on in his backyard.

Strength trainers have been tasked with identifying what their players need from a performance standpoint to achieve their fitness goals, regardless of where they live and what resources they have access to. "Even though they might have access to a Steak 'n Shake parking lot or they might be in a third floor of an apartment," said Justin Lovett, the Los Angeles Rams' new head strength and conditioning coach.

Lovett was hired in the midst of California's coronavirus shutdown, but unlike during the 2011 lockout year, when he was on the Denver Broncos' staff, communication is permitted and has proved paramount. But there have been challenges.

"The biggest problem with the rookie class is they don't have the money that some of the older guys do," Galac said. "Not saying millions of dollars, but able to go buy equipment, pay for a trainer to take care of them, buying more food that you may normally not have to buy because the facility provides it. All those little things are adding up for these guys. And the rookies, they have no idea. And it's not their fault."

This time of year is crucial for strength staffs, not only for getting players in shape but also for getting new players up to speed with their programs. "And we've lost that," Galac said.

In fact, the Jets' weight room underwent a face-lift this offseason, complete with a new floor, turf accents and equipment. "And nobody's using it," Galac said. "It's sitting empty. The players haven't even seen it yet."

Finding space and serenity in the countryside

James Washington misses football. And, occasionally, his farm.

The 26-acre property the Steelers wide receiver purchased near his hometown of Abilene, Texas, made it easy for him to comply with social distancing rules. It also afforded him space to work out and keep in shape by way of chores. Washington, who was an agribusiness major with a concentration in farm and ranch management at Oklahoma State, finds the countryside calming. He enjoys the views of passing cars, wheat fields and cattle pastures during his eight- to 12-mile rides on his recently purchased bicycle.

His workout setup, which included an assortment of resistance bands sent by the Steelers and his high school dumbbells retrieved from his parents' house, was complete with the arrival of a Jugs machine, which he kept in the barn and carried to a flat area in one of the pastures.

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However, staving off boredom is a challenge whenever he's in Pittsburgh, a more crowded city with fewer options for keeping busy.

"When I was in Texas, I'd work out, do my virtual [team] meetings and then I'd have to find something to do cause I can't just sit in the house," Washington said last week, after he, JuJu Smith-Schuster and fellow receiver Ryan Switzer worked out in quarterback Ben Roethlisberger's home weight room. "Being on the farm really helped me a lot, because there was always something that could have been done."

Washington loves his farm so much his recent stay in Pittsburgh was short-lived. He returned to Texas on Wednesday to celebrate Memorial Day weekend with family and tend to his most recent purchase: cattle. The time away from the Steelers' facility has also given Washington time to think.

"It just doesn't feel right," he said. "Everybody feels like we should be at the facility, doing physical stuff, getting ready to go. ... Even if there's no fans, we still have to go out there and just go 110 percent, even if it would feel weird. Fans help make the game. It's really crazy to think about.

"Just being away from things, you really find out how much you miss the sport. It sucks. That's really what I figured out. That I love football." Source - ESPN

[pamphletstoinspire]

Same-Sex Parenting: The Child Maltreatment No One Mentions

Recently, Utah found it necessary to put a law into effect that allows “free-range parenting.” That is, parents are free to make the judgment that their children are, say, free to walk to the local park by themselves or to bike a couple of blocks away from home without child protective services showing up at their door or, worse, the police coming to arrest them for child neglect. That a law had to be passed to uphold parental authority about such things shows how outrageous the ruling perspectives on child abuse and neglect have become in recent decades, where the state is prepared to second-guess parents left and right and to routinely treat all kinds of innocent parental actions as child maltreatment.

It’s no surprise that in recent years, according to Department of HHS statistics, that upwards of 80 percent of reports of child abuse and neglect are unfounded. It’s interesting that while self-styled child advocates, their academic allies, and the sprawling child protective system (CPS) are so ready to find child maltreatment inside almost every family’s front door, they are silent about the harms to children from being brought up by same-sex (male homosexual or, more typically, lesbian) couples. Almost intuitively, the average person would think this to be a recipe for serious, perhaps life-altering, problems for such children. The research now coming out suggests that the average person’s instincts are indeed correct—even though the mainstream academic social science and related professional organizations, which long ago became apologists if not mouthpieces for the homosexualist movement, ignore or try to discredit or even suppress it.

Many are aware of University of Texas sociologist Dr. Mark Regnerus’s studies several years ago which indicated—he was careful to avoid sweeping conclusions — that, among other things, children reared in homes headed by same-sex parents were “more likely” to: have poor educational attainment, cohabit when they became adults, be sexually molested, have sexually transmitted diseases, smoke tobacco and marijuana, be on public assistance as adults, be in mental health counseling or therapy and suffer from depression, and get into trouble with the law. Regnerus’s careful research, not unexpectedly, was met by denunciation from mainstream social scientists, who claimed his research was flawed without even seriously examining his data. The peer-reviewed professional journal that published the results of his studies was attacked, and the charge made that its review procedure was flawed. He was even subjected to a “scientific misconduct” investigation by his university, which ultimately exonerated him.

The attack on Regnerus occurred simply because of the overwhelming pro-homosexualist bias of mainstream social science and the efforts of homosexualist organizations against him.

The research of Fr. D. Paul Sullins, Ph.D., an emeritus professor of sociology at The Catholic University of America who has been connected with the Marriage and Religion Research Institute at CUA and now the Ruth Institute, has confirmed and expanded on Regnerus’s earlier findings. I have known Fr. Sullins for many years, as he has been a fellow board member of the Society of Catholic Social Scientists and is also the organization’s chaplain. He was one of the Episcopal clergy who converted to Catholicism and under the special provision put in place by Pope John Paul II was ordained to the priesthood. Like Regnerus, he’s a careful and ethical researcher who aims for what social science scholarship is supposed to be about: discerning the truth.

Fr. Sullins has convincingly shown that it is the research of the mainstream social scientists who have sought to deny the harm of same-sex parenting that is flawed. Not only have the sample of people they studied been too small to truly examine the question, but they have studied only what he calls “conveniently available or selected groups of participants, usually parents recruited from homophile sources.” The result was a “strong bias toward positive findings.” At the same time, their writing has refused to address the contrary findings. These have been either “dismissed in footnotes on specious grounds or, more commonly, simply ignored.” Among the studies that they have ignored which showed “substantially higher rates of problems or functional deficiencies among children with same-sex parents,” Sullins tells us, have been those relying on “large statistically representative” samples from the Centers for Disease Control and the University of North Carolina’s National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health.

Sullins’s own research has shown the following. In comparison to children with opposite-sex parents, children in the care of same-sex couples, were: almost twice as likely to have a developmental disability; almost twice as likely to have had medical treatment for an emotional problem and three times as likely to have had medicine prescribed for a psychological condition in the past year before the study; ten times more likely to have been sexually touched by a parent or other adult and four times more likely to have been forced to have sex against their will; less likely, when reaching adolescence, to have romantic relationships or to see themselves in a future relationship involving pregnancy or marriage (which suggests that their situation influences them away from relationships with the opposite sex); twice as likely, when becoming adults, to suffer from depression and four times as likely to consider suicide; more likely to use tobacco and marijuana and to have been arrested and then pled guilty of a crime; and three times more likely to be unemployed, receiving public assistance, or if later married to have had adulterous relationships. By the time women who had grown up in same-sex headed households reached age thirty, they were only half as likely to be married or in a relationship lasting three or more years and only a third as likely to have ever been pregnant.

In his writing, Sullins also speaks about much earlier studies — before even Regnerus’s — which showed the harms of same-sex parenting and were also ignored by mainstream social science. He mentions Paul Cameron’s studies, which — confirmed by Sullins later — showed that children with same-sex parents were more likely to be sexually molested. Their households were also more likely to witness domestic violence and, unsurprisingly, the children were more likely to become homosexual themselves. If the harm-deniers could dismiss Cameron because he heads the Family Research Institute, which is concerned about issues that threaten the family as traditionally understood, they would be more hard-pressed to reject Sotirios Sarantakos. Sarantakos is a noted Australian sociologist and authority on research design and methods. Studying elementary school children, he found that those from same-sex led households suffered considerable educational and social deficiencies.

Like Regnerus, Sullins is careful to avoid sweeping or unsubstantiated conclusions. He says that as in other situations where there is not an intact family with two married opposite-sex parents — as when there is a divorce or cohabitation—“most children still turn out all right.” Nevertheless, the “primary harm” to children from same-sex parenting, as suggested by the research findings noted, is “developmental” — with consequences not apparent until at least early adulthood. He concludes that while we don’t yet know enough, it’s certain that “the idea of ‘no differences’ is clearly false.” Sullins’s cautious conclusions didn’t stop the mainstream social science organizations from making false claims that he had used faulty research methods and — as with Regnerus — the journals that he published his findings in had slipshod review procedures. In fact, Sullins published them in international medical journals, where he knew the standards for review are more rigorous than in mainline U.S. social science journals—but also where genuine objectivity, as opposed to ideology, still rules. An article in Mercator.Net about Sullins’s work explains the air-tightness of his research methods and also notes that the mainline social science journals have been strikingly silent about the review procedures used for the harm-denial articles they routinely run.

Even if further research makes the harm of same-sex parenting indisputable — which, to this social scientist, is virtually so already — don’t expect mainstream social science to accept it. Ideology has long-since replaced true scholarship there — they are blind followers masquerading as independent thinkers at the cutting edge. Also, don’t expect the CPS to start thinking that the damage caused to children by same-sex parenting — and certainly not the whole notion of same-sex parenting itself — qualifies as child maltreatment. The CPS’s leaders and operatives are formed by and most accept without much question the perspectives of mainstream social science — including its ideologically grounded biases. Most are trained in the social work field and where its mainstream was seen a few years ago when a cadre of homosexual alumni from my university pressured it to delete homosexuality from a list of behaviors to be studied in a course on deviant behavior by contacting the secular social work accrediting agency, which they knew would agree with them. Besides, the CPS is too busy persecuting parents for innocent, commonsensical, traditional parenting practices — routinely treating such things as simple spanking as child abuse and free-range parenting as neglect — to be concerned about the problems Regnerus, Sullins, and the others have identified.

BY: STEPHEN M. KRASON

From: www.pamphletstoinspire.com

[humansofhds]

Seokweon Jeon, MTS ’19

“As long as I remember, I was always curious about what religion means to people.”

Seokweon is a master of theological studies degree candidate focusing on Religion and Social Sciences.

From South Korea to the U.S. and Back

Both my parents are Korean. My dad studied in the U.S. for his doctoral degree in Texas and Atlanta. I was born while he was finishing his degree, but I was actually born in Seoul because they wanted to raise their children as Korean. For my childhood, naturally, I always had two different kinds of cultural backgrounds—American culture and Korean culture, too. South Korea is the place I spent more than 20 years of my life.

Now my family is living in South Korea in a very beautiful seaside village. When he was teaching at a college, my dad got a call from his friends from his hometown in South Korea and he told him that there is no pastor or people who can lead the church because he is from a really small seaside village, just 1,500 people. But because it's such a small town in the countryside no pastors or ministers wanted to come lead the church. Right after that phone call, he decided to go back to his hometown in South Korea and lead the church. He went back to South Korea because of that one phone call, and he’s spent his whole life working in that church. And I grew up there in that village: Samcheok, in the province of Gangwon-do.

Son of a (Different) Preacher Man

I was born and raised as the son of a preacher man and professor. But mostly I would say son of a preacher man. Church was my home, as well as my dad’s office. Although I was raised as the son of a preacher man, my upbringing was kind of different, because my dad was, in some ways, a different figure compared to other average “normal” pastors in South Korea. When it comes to South Korean Protestant churches, they are not really rigorous in terms of inter-religious dialogue or engagement. They have a kind of anti-non-Christianity sentiment. So they tend to demonize Buddhism or Catholicism and of course Shamanism, or any other kinds of religious traditions other than Protestantism.

But my dad was really different. Every year on the Buddha’s birthday I went to the local temples and had tea with the headmaster of the temple, and the whole day I would hang around and talk with many monks and nuns and kids around the temple. I visited all the time because my dad really liked having conversations with the headmasters of the temples around the town. I met a lot of shamanists, too, because he really loved to sit and talk with shamans. So he invited many of them, and many shamans would come to my dad’s office or house without appointments. Any time they would just knock on the door and say, “Is Pastor Jeon here?” And my mom would invite them to come inside to have tea, or she would serve them a meal and talk with them. So when it comes to my childhood upbringing, I would say I was surrounded by many religious people like Fathers, shamans, Buddhist monks, nuns, and of course pastors.

Sharing Your Life

My family has a summer house right next to the seashore—a beautiful place. And because my dad is like the pastor “boy-next-door,” he would invite everyone all the time­—for 20 years not a single day has that house been empty. Backpackers, nuns, professors, friends of friends, businessmen, salarymen—everyone could come to my house. And every night if new guests came to my house I would just go there with my dad, mom, and brother and have tea and dinner and listen to their stories and how they live, how they get here, and what their worlds look like.

It was an amazing experience for me because from that time, as long as I can remember, I loved listening to other people’s stories, and that house was my natural setting. So I would listen to many people’s stories about how they live and how they found hardships in their lives. You know, if you go to a really beautiful place you could feel the tension drip away and sometimes you can really talk about your life and you really want to share your life. So that is my good fortune that my hometown had.

Religious Curiosity

Growing up, my dad had an inter-religious mindset. So as long as I remember, I was always curious about what religion means to people and what different faith traditions mean and signify in today's society. When I went to the summer house to see the new guests, they would talk about all the different faith traditions in their lives. Some talk about yoga, some talk about Buddha, some Bodhisattvas, and some Jesus Christ and Holy Spirit, and some angels, and some prophets, too. So I was really really curious about what all those things mean to me and to my family and to them. I think that is the place that I started to have an interest in having an occupation as a scholar to study religion and all the different religious traditions and practices. So that's the one part; interreligious settings and listening to different stories at the summer house.

Interdisciplinary Study

I studied sociology and theology in undergrad at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. From my undergrad years I worked on the sociological study of religion. I was fascinated by the fact that religious traditions and practice can be studied with quantitative methodologies and numbers and data. I also found out that can also provide a really good reflection, overview, and perspective on current movements and the larger picture of modern religion, too. So I was fascinated by two different academic disciplines in college—sociology and religion.

After graduation, I kept on studying religion but through a different lens: history. The reason I chose to study history of religion at a graduate level was to understand religion with an expanded frame of reference, with sensitivity and with an in-depth knowledge. As a student working on the religious movements of the current state or present time, it was really important for me to grasp the historical ways in which religious values and practices, which have a strong bearing on the way we behave and conduct ourselves in the society, have been formed and changed. So in graduate school in the same college I studied Christianity of East Asia. I studied how Western Christianity was introduced into most of East Asian countries, how they rooted to and interacted with the indigenous culture, and how Western Christianity became a model of “modernity” in East Asia. I especially focused on the late eighteenth-and-nineteenth century interplay between indigenous religious traditions and Christianity.

I think studying religion through the eyes of the humanities can give a vibrant framework that can reflect the diverse changes happening now. For me, choosing to study religion with sociology and history has allowed me consider not only what to think about religion, which will one day be outdated and obsolete, but also how to think about religion. I’m really fascinated by that at HDS, too, that I can experience the whole diverse spectrum of religion and be a part of this dynamic community, and reflect it back to my study using various methodologies; sociology, philosophy, and anthropology.

Academic and Cultural Differences

In Korean academia, I could not really synthesize all my different interests. And it is the same in Japan and China. They have their own kinds of boundaries when it comes to academic disciplines. But at HDS, there are not strict boundaries between disciplines. I can fully synthesize all methodologies and disparate academic perspectives in one place. Plus, last semester I went to BC, BU, MIT, HDS, and FAS, and I went to many seminars and classroom. I was a regular member of American politics seminar at BC. I feel like HDS does not attempt to funnel those whole diverse perspectives and methodologies down to one little path across the water but strive to connect the (seemingly irrelevant and distant) dots. In Boston, I can use all these diverse institutions and tools to study modern religious movement in depth and and comprehensive. That’s another big difference I am experiencing.

In Korea academia, its lecture oriented. So the instructor lectures and the advisor guides all your themes, dissertation, thesis, classes. There is hardly a vibrant dialogue between students. But in HDS, its more discussion oriented. And the academic relation between students is really vibrant and active. The second cultural different is rent. It's so expensive! So living in Boston can be overwhelming. Haha!

America Building Walls

Before I came to Harvard, Korea was a mess. The president was impeached and every day there were disturbing new allegations of corruption, scandal, bribery, deception, and collusion, which shook the very foundations of society. But in May 2017, a new president had been elected who was a former human rights lawyer. When I left there to study at Harvard, in August, it was a moment where everything seemed cleaned up. But when I got to HDS it seemed like a new kind of mess had started.

Growing up in South Korea, my parents always told me about the true source of America's greatness and what American greatness really means. Whenever they talked about it, they spoke of tolerance and diversity, and recognizing all different settings, race, ethnicity, gender, and political identity. My dad said that America can be one great country because they embrace all the differences and make them as great a thing, as positive power, the greatest power the U.S. can have. But after coming back to the U.S. in the Trump era, I am sensing and feeling the opposite context and landscape right now: hate speech and building walls rather than bridges.

So at first it was difficult for me because it was different from what I had heard and dreamed. Harvard is a safe haven for us, but if we walk out the door what we are seeing is so different. No tolerance. Too little empathy and compassion. Rather than tolerance what I’m seeing right now is hatred. That was one of the strongest impressions that I had in August and September of 2017, when I first arrived.

Positive Shock

I served in the army about four years. The first two years I spent at the DMZ, around the Joint Security Area (JSA). That is the place that Kim Jong Un and the president of South Korea, Moon Jae-in, met at that historical meeting and shook hands. So watching that scene gave me a chill because that place used to be a place of hatred, tension, fears, and tears. But things are starting to change. This dialogue gives me a kind of hope that everything can change, maybe if the initial power and gathering can be weak, but if someone starts to work on dialogue, conversation, embracing diversity and overcoming difference, some really great change can happen. When I served the army, I thought this division between the North and South would last longer because, frankly, I sensed no hope there. But now, especially since February, I'm starting to think some really positive and powerful changes can happen and maybe my future generation can live in a united country.

My family cried when they watched the whole interviews and live streaming of the event. It was a fresh shock also to them because everything was so smooth and fast. My dad once told me that if we are trying to achieve peace between North and South Korea, gradual steps would be needed. So this is so different from what I thought because it happened without buildup. This big change happened all of a sudden with a small number of people’s efforts. It was a positive shock. My dad was born in North Korea before the Korean War and both my mom and dad’s parents came from North Korea, too. It inspires hope, and the need for gathering and mobilizing our force because huge positive changes are actually possible and at the darkest and most unexpected moments.

Interview and photos by Anaïs Garvanian

[awaragainstboredom]

Writer’s Block: The RPG Method Part 1

I role play a lot. Like I’m currently a player character in 4 games, and I run my own campaign, and working on the world for my own homebrew campaign. This is also done in regularity on a weekly basis, which is completely different from back in the day we were lucky to get a few weekly sessions, and reconvene months later in the same campaign, only to never get back to the game again. 

Things like family, work, depression, etc. would end up putting those games on the back-burner, which was really a death flag for a campaign. I’ve made so many characters for so many role playing systems, just to never play as them ever again.

I honestly never thought I would become one of those guys who plays tabletop rpgs as much as I do. I mean, in the past when someone would share with me that they were in two D&D campaigns, and was part of a LARP over the weekend I would think it was ridiculous and laugh at their fervor for wanting to be in that many games. Well, the joke’s on me now.

However to my defense, this isn’t mostly about escapism. Okay, not to say that it isn’t, but I took on this many games to help out with my writer’s block. I see role playing games as a different way to explore narrative. 

You not only act out your characters, but you have to overcome challenges with a game of chance. And even though the person who is running the game and helping direct you through the story, that dice roll, whether it passes or fails the challenge (or check, if your nasty), effects the tale that is being woven, and you played an active part in it. That’s really amazing!

I’ve also read that a good number of fantasy novels that have originated from role playing campaigns. George R. R. Martin’s Game of Thrones series, and Scott Lynch’s Gentleman Bastard books are couple of examples. Game of Thrones was born from a Roman rpg, and Gentleman Bastard’s main character Locke Lamora was based upon a character Lynch made for D&D (which to my delight, I learned was also based on the “treasure hunter”, Locke Cole from Final Fantasy VI).

This was enough to influence me to try and do the same. Universe building is hard for those who prefer to write in such a manner, because it’s hard to balance out how much detail do I want to write about said world and not get obsessed with it and never actually finish it, or at least that has been my experience. 

My goal here is to document as much as I can about things that I have made for my games in the way of world creation, and characters for other peoples games. I know some Dungeon Masters don’t want a novel for character backgrounds, so give them a short and concise one, and you can go and expand on it more on your own.

Or maybe you can just make it as you go along in the game that you are playing in currently. As an example for character background here is mine for my D&D character Rota.

                                                  ***

                                     Rota Grendelstadt

Rota, the magic academy drop-out turned sellsword, ventures forth to find knowledge in all things, and the true path of a warrior. Hailing from the cold north in the fishing town of Grendelstadt (located close to Neverwinter), she stands at 6 foot 5, with a lean muscular build, moonlight-pale skin, with silver hair in a fringe style cut and silver eyes to match. And if that doesn’t make her stand out, then perhaps the fact that she is a tiefling without a tail (Her mother and her father were the same, as well as most tieflings of Grendelstadt). Though tall, and muscular she is surprisingly bookish and introverted. She is brash, quick-tempered, prone to violence, fiery, socially challenged, but has a good heart, quick on her feet, tenacious, dependable, and has an weird natural charisma that draws people to her.

She is highly knowledgeable in magic theory and formulae, however she cannot connect to mana in order to cast spells. She has spent a lot her time honing her physical skills and researching why she in not able to use magic. She is working with a theory that she heard about when one exceeds their mental and physical limits, perhaps they can open a channel that can connect to the magical tapestry.

Growing up in a family of adventurers definitely was not the most normal of upbringings. Even with the simple life on a farm, Rota’s mother Herja wanted her to be as strong as she is and would put her through rigorous training that even the militia of Grendelstadt wouldn’t go through. And her father Beolf, a skald, would be off travelling to do research for his book of races and culture of the world. Because of this she hardly saw her father, but Beolf would make sure that when he was home he would bring her back books.

Beolf was rather awkward when he would see his daughter, and the only things that would break the silence between the two were to talk about books, and her mother’s crazy training routine. Though Beolf loved her, and tried his best (that he could muster) to be a parent to Rota, his trips back were too short and very infrequent, which caused their relationship to be a distant one.  

The dramatic change that shaped Rota into who she is now begins with the death of her father, Beolf. She spent the rest of her life being raised by her mother, uncle and various friends of the family. It wasn’t a normal childhood, being that she had to flee for her safety and train to become a warrior to be strong enough to defend herself and help others. It was a kind of splintered family unit with a bunch of troubled, dysfunctional adventurers. And though they all mean well in their way of bringing Rota up, they struggle with their own egos and misconceptions of what makes one a hero, and is there really such a thing?

Rota’s  father was killed in a fight with his cousin, over the spoils from an adventure that her father had owed to the cousin. And it was within the laws of their country for those who have been wronged by their neighbor or kinsmen, by settling things out in a physical challenge. Her father, Beolf and their cousin, Thorfinn chose to have a wrestling match as their way of settling their differences, while the Jarl, Falken was to oversee the fight and uphold the law.

Of course it was all an act to misdirect the Falken, to make him think that he and Thorfinn were on the outs. And by with Beolf creating a schism in the Grendelstadt family, the gamble was to perhaps draw the attention of the jarl to try pull Thorfinn on his side, allowing him to gain Falken’s trust and be the inside man. The jarl was pursuing Beolf and his comrades who had found the underground site for the earl’s humanoid smuggling ring that was being overseen by The Order of the Unspoken Rhyme (which Falken is a member of).

The Order of the Unspoken Rhyme is connected to the Cult of the Dragon, and handles underworld business for them making them an enemy of Beolf and his friends, who have vowed to take down the Order and their allies at any turn. Upon dismantling the slave trade, they also came upon treasure that Falken thought would be well hidden from anyone but himself. However the quick eyes of the bard Beolf found it. And within the cache of treasure was an ancient tome most dangerous, and Beolf knew he had to find a safe place for it.

He took all of the treasure and sent it to three different locations and had cut a map into 6 pieces to be found in order to find the treasure, and secretly sent the tome to his wizard friend and adventuring partner, Touchstone, who keeps it locked away hidden in the wizards’ academy, Hippocampus Scale, that the earl would focus on searching for the other treasures. Foolishly, death was the last thing that Beolf was prepared for in his plan. Thorfinn broke Beolf’s ribs which went directly into his lungs. He could have been healed, but Falken didn’t allow any outside potions, and only his healers at the fight. It was said he also might have had some responsibility in the “accident”.

At the age of 9, Rota saw her father die before her eyes, but did not shed a tear for him. Not because she was trying to make herself seem strong in front of the jarl and his men - she just didn’t know how.

Rota’s mother Herja, uncle Sigurd, and cousin Thorfinn were  devastated by these events and knew that things would become tough for them in Grendelstadt. Though being the tough battle-hardened adventurers they were, they knew that they would be alright.  However, as the years went by the concern was growing that Rota would be used as some sort of bargaining chip to find the treasure. the Grendelstadt family knew they had to send Rota off before things would get really dire.

At the age 12  it was decided that she were to be sent away from her town of Grendelstadt to attend a wizard’s academy, Hippocampus Scale and learn to become a wizard like she always wanted to be (Thorfinn pays for her tuition to account for the death of a kinsmen, as per the law of their country), while being under the watchful eye of her godfather, the human wizard Touchstone (who’s equally sassy as he is powerful).

She learns that she does have amazing aptitude for understanding magic formulas and theory. However when it comes to practice, she is terrible at actually manifesting the spell. Not because she doesn’t understand it, but because her connection to the source of mana is weak. All the spells would just fizzle right in front of her.

And although her grades were high in every other course of study except for spell casting, she became the object of ridicule among her peers (which would end in episodes of violence, mostly by her). Whenever there were spell casting exercises she would spend most of her time reading, and doing physical training that she learned from her warrior mother, who pushed her not only in farm work, but also learning how to fight with weapons.

Later on the headmaster of the Hippocampus Scale, upon Touchstone’s suggestion, wanted her help out with what they called “Battle Training”, or “Real Life Combat”, in which she would be the physical combat participant for her peers, so they would learn how to use spells effectively in combat. Normally they have hired swords stand in for this, but they thought it would be interesting to have someone who could understand spellcraft, formulas, and theory, and apply them to fighting against a mage, and see how they would react to it. Her popularity rose in both positive and negative ways after this, but she was known not to be a simple challenge to her rivals anymore.

She was going take the job of becoming a researcher in Hippocampus Scale, and then maybe some way she could find out how to connect with the source of mana. Touchstone, though proud of her accomplishments, saw that she was only making things harder on herself in her pursuit learning how to cast spells and felt that she need to find another path to become what she wanted.

And sent her off to become an apprentice to one of he and her father’s other adventuring comrades, the master swordsman, Dragnar Fafnirson. He thought perhaps that her connection to mana will come from a battle-borne soul. However before he sent her off from Hippocampus Scale, he gave her the ancient tome that her father had found to protect it (He was beginning to see the Order’s shadow reach out to his academy).

After her training with Dragnar, she was pitted against Herja, to test her strength. Her mother quickly dispatched Rota, and sent her back to continue her training, but not after scolding Dragnar first. And though she won’t tell Rota this, she did get some good hits on her mother, which excited her blood to see what potential her daughter has in the way of battle. With a few more years of learning under Dragnar, her master sent her out to get some experience, by sending her out in the world to test her mettle.

Other notes:

She would get in trouble with her mother, Herja when she was reading instead of doing farm work, or physical training. She learned how to workout and read at the same time because of this. And when she is not fighting, she is never without a book. She also likes to visit libraries of each city she comes across. Rota also cannot stand wizards who have semi-useful spells, and thinks it is a waste. She is also very arrogant when it comes to talking with spell casters.

She was estranged with her father Beolf, and spent most of her early years being raised by her mother and uncle. Beolf was thought to be a gallivanting bard, getting caught in women and wine, and was just a deadbeat father (or at least how those in Grendelstadt saw him), he really did care about his daughter and would bring her books whenever he came back to town.

She really didn’t know how to react after his death, because she felt she didn’t know him really well, except for the fact that he was the nice guy that gave her books and would share his love of them with her. It was after his death that she learned he was actually trying to save the world from evil. And it was only years later did her tears come after reading a poem that he dedicated to her in the signed copy of the book that he wrote.

[duaneodavila]

A Healthy Media Diet For A Litigator: How You Spend Your Free Time Can Make You A Smarter, Better Litigator

Don’t kid yourself that professional development is limited to what you learn in the office.

As you recover from yesterday’s traditional solstice feast, this is a good time to take stock of your media diet. As with food, if you try to subsist on the equivalent of Twizzlers and French fries, it will eventually catch up with you. You won’t realize it right away, and quite possibly not until it’s too late, but it will gradually make you slower, dumber, and generally useless.

You will become particularly useless as a litigator, where two of the main job qualifications are quickly processing large amounts of information and coming up with novel solutions to a problem you haven’t seen before. Modern commercial litigators need to bring more than just the obvious solutions to the table.

The good news is that, with a little willpower, you can make a big improvement over time and become not just a better litigator, but a smarter one as well. But before you can take those steps, you need to first understand where and how you need to improve.

WHY IT MATTERS

While we increasingly live in a society where we tell the kid picked last for the kickball team that he can be an astronaut — ultimately feeding into our $10 billion self-help industry — we know that’s not actually true. People can work, improve, and practice, but people also have their own ceilings and rates of improvement.

This is true in any field. Sure, LeBron James has a rigorous training regimen, but so does every other player in the NBA. One of the unfair aspects of ability is that the advantages tend to aggressively compound. LeBron was already outclassing his contemporaries in high school, and he never gave up that lead. Maybe he intuitively grasps the physics of basketball better than others. Maybe, like many elite athletes, his body recovers faster than most. Maybe he has preternatural hand-eye coordination. Most likely it’s a combination of all three and much more. But the vast, vast majority of people could practice 10 times as much as LeBron and never approach him.

In fact, practice often only compounds the inequality. Being good at something tends to create a positive feedback loop. You pick something up, you’re good at it, it feels great to make quick improvement, people tell you how special you are, and you want to keep practicing. When you’re bad at something, you often just make yourself feel worse the more you practice and fail to make the improvement you expected. Plus, people have different levels of stamina, sleep needs, and caffeine tolerance, and even work ethic itself is probably heritable.

So as great as optimism is, without a dose of realism you’ll waste your time chasing, if not unachievable goals, then at least your goals in a counterproductive manner. Different people not only have different strengths and weaknesses, they have different areas in which they can improve more or less quickly.

WHERE YOU CAN IMPROVE

Luckily, you’re in a much better position being a lawyer than trying to make it in the NBA. But that doesn’t mean you should ignore the reality of your situation. Some lawyers like to joke about how law isn’t exactly rocket science, but even if that were true, litigation’s still a zero-sum competition. Even the dumbest child can easily learn the rules of Go, Chess, Monopoly, Settlers of Catan, Diplomacy, or whatever game you prefer as a metaphor. But if that dumb child plays a smart adult who is experienced with the game, they’re usually going to lose badly.

And while lawyering may not be rocket science, it’s still one of the most g-loaded professions. Whatever predictive powers and correlations general intelligence may or may not have, it’s at least a good description of many of the key skills of a litigator.

But you’re in luck once again. General intelligence is generally considered to consist of two parts: fluid intelligence and crystallized intelligence.

Fluid intelligence is your ability to figure out an entirely novel situation. It’s how fast you pick up new things and how quickly you make connections. Fluid intelligence is your ability to decipher a new puzzle that someone puts in front of you when you’ve never seen anything like it before. It also peaks as early as the age of 20. And while there may be ways to improve your fluid intelligence, it’s hard. So whatever combination of genes, environment, or social conditioning lead to your current fluid intelligence, you’re probably for the most part stuck with what you have by the time you’re a practicing attorney.

Crystallized intelligence, on the other hand, is what you know, and your ability to apply what you already know to an otherwise novel situation. It’s your ability to look at a new puzzle that someone puts in front of you, but you remember that you once read a book about a similar puzzle, and then you use that memory to solve the new puzzle. Crystallized intelligence peaks as late as the age of 70.

Crystallized intelligence is, in other words, how you get smarter from learning things. It’s the legendary Boies memory. This still isn’t egalitarian — fluid intelligence is in a sense your ability to quickly add to your crystallized intelligence; memory itself is heritable, although highly teachable through certain secret Jesuit techniques — but it’s a start.

And most importantly, crystallized intelligence compounds as you add more and draw connections. Maybe someone puts a puzzle in front of you that you’ve never seen it before, but you remember reading a book about puzzle strategy once. Then you remember some magazine article you read once about puzzle tips. Then you remember a few puzzles you’ve done in the past that aren’t quite the new puzzle, but they have enough in common with it to give you a further boost. Separately, each of those memories may help a little bit, but combined they build on each other, and get you much closer to the puzzle’s solution.

 GET SMARTER

So you can get smarter. And better yet, you live in an age when you can access more knowledge, information, and analysis from your mobile telephone than you could absorb in a thousand lifetimes. The bad news is, so can everyone else you’re competing with. So spend your time wisely.

Luckily, as litigators, we already spend large portions of our day reading and writing, so that helps. It helps even more when dealing with the wide variety of commercial disputes my colleagues and I typically deal with; litigation being great because you learn all about a new business with each new case is a cliché, but it’s still often true. But if you just read legal briefs all day then go home and drink yourself to sleep while watching Survivor, you’re not getting a sufficiently well-balanced diet to help you build those mental connections.

I like to keep a healthy queue in Instapaper or Pocket, which I can then work through during downtime like commuting or walking. Then I fill it with whatever I come across that I find interesting, trying to cast a broad net. This does, and should, change periodically, but generally includes a variety of newspapers; a few blogs; some Twitter; and whatever else may be interesting. I also like to occasionally check the top few comments on popular news websites, especially ones that allow you to sort by most recommended. These days, they’re usually inane, but it’s interesting to see the consensus view a website’s reader’s may have on a particular topic.

It’s important to make time. Unless I’m truly swamped, I try to at least carve out time each day for Matt Levine’s newsletter, which usually gives a great analysis of the latest legal and financial news. RSS is still great and speeds everything up.

Everyone needs to find their own balance and what works for them. Someone who handles a lot of broker-dealer disputes probably wants to read more broker-dealer news than an antitrust specialist. But most important is simply gathering a large variety of thoughtful and well-informed opinions. You want to get a wide range to avoid a bubble, but reading the most popular comments on YouTube or Twitter isn’t going to do much good.

So now that the days are getting shorter and you’ve made your solstice resolutions, considering taking a moment to add one more. Perhaps the pickled herring won’t actually make you smarter, but better reading habits just might.

Matthew W. Schmidt has represented and counseled clients at all stages of litigation and in numerous matters including insider trading, fiduciary duty, antitrust law, and civil RICO. He is of counsel at the trial and investigations law firm Balestriere Fariello in New York, where he and his colleagues represent domestic and international clients in litigation, arbitration, appeals, and investigations. You can reach him by email at matthew.w.schmidt@balestrierefariello.com.

A Healthy Media Diet For A Litigator: How You Spend Your Free Time Can Make You A Smarter, Better Litigator republished via Above the Law

[rolandfontana]

At the Intersection: How Focusing on Criminal Justice Improves Health Outcomes

You’re stepping out of jail and into freedom for the first time in months or years. You have just a few days’ supply of medication to treat your diabetes, heart disease, and emphysema. You’re heading back into the same community where you ran afoul of the law, and you’re not really sure where you can go to get out of the cold and eat some dinner.

People who work in healthcare have a term for social issues like food insecurity or housing instability that are barriers to health and wellbeing. They’re called social determinants of health.

Lots of things can drive poor health outcomes, and they’re often the same hurdles that others have called social determinants of criminal behavior. In fact, criminal justice involvement can drive health problems, and vice versa.

Many who work in healthcare have realized this relationship is something they can’t afford to ignore.

At the Camden Coalition of Healthcare Providers in New Jersey, we connect healthcare with social services, primarily for Medicaid patients with multiple chronic illnesses and social barriers to health and wellbeing.

Vincent, known among his friends in Camden’s tent city as “Country,” was living with asthma, hypertension, depression, chronic pain, and addiction. We met him in Camden County Correctional Facility, where he was spending time for a probation violation.

Deeply troubled and in need of his medication, Country had struggled with homelessness and behavioral health issues for years, cycling in and out of area hospitals.

Our Camden ARISE research project showed that Country was not unique.

In a study of arrests and hospital records in Camden published by Harvard, we found that two-thirds of the people arrested over five years had also been to emergency rooms. And among that group, more than half had visited emergency rooms at least five times. We saw it as evidence of the relationship between criminal justice and healthcare.

We knew that if we could limit the effects of criminal justice involvement on healthcare outcomes for our patients, it would take careful, systematic collaboration with law enforcement. In Camden, a city across the river from Philadelphia with historically high rates of crime and poverty, we’ve piloted several programs that approach criminal justice as a health driver.

These programs are making a big difference for Country and many others like him whose complex set of health and social needs aren’t well served by the healthcare system.

 We interviewed Country in October for our blog, The Hotspot. It hasn’t been an easy journey, but he’s doing well – living on his own, following his care plan and using his story and his voice to help the community.

 Shared Data, Action Research

It all starts with rigorous research. Using police data, Camden ARISE not only uncovered the remarkable correlation between arrests and emergency room visits, it also led to the design of a new program that integrates healthcare and social services for Camden residents returning from jail.

Camden RESET tailors the Camden Core Model, our signature short-term care intervention, to the needs of the jail population. Our team approaches patients inside the county jail offering trauma-informed care that combines social work and healthcare coordination. It’s a collaboration with the Camden County Re-Entry Committee and the Laura and John Arnold Foundation.

At the end of the program, participants have a personalized care plan they helped create to overcome barriers to health and prevent avoidable hospital admissions and arrests.

But let’s back up. Neither the research nor the programs would be possible without robust data sharing.

We run a secure platform called the Camden Coalition Health Information Exchange (HIE) that allows hospitals, social service agencies, and others to view and upload data. The clinic at the jail, run by CFG Health Systems, began uploading information to the HIE in Spring 2018. Now primary care practices, health systems that run emergency rooms, and our staff can see diagnoses, medications, and other clinical information that originated at the jail, so we can better help residents returning to society.

Data sharing across sectors can be hard work, but it’s not insurmountable. We’ve shared some of the ways to overcome relational, technical, and legal barriers to cross-sector data sharing in a series of briefs and webinars supported by the Aetna Foundation.

Overcoming Barriers to Health – With Help

Patients like Country often face legal barriers to health and wellbeing like old debts or outstanding warrants. Others face evictions or family court issues.

These hurdles, often minor, can prevent them from sticking to their care plans and reverse months or sometimes years of progress. Our Medical-Legal Partnership with Rutgers Law School gives our participants access to a lawyer who can work with our care team to solve some of these problems.

For example, when housing instability is standing in the way of health, legal help may eliminate barriers to a Section 8 voucher. This can save the legal system the cost of incarceration, and with good care coordination, save the state Medicaid system the cost of repeated hospital use.

Keeping insulin refrigerated or preparing for a job interview are hard to do if you live in a tent.

Stable housing can often be the basis for getting healthy and becoming a productive member of society. Keeping insulin refrigerated or preparing for a job interview are hard to do if you live in a tent. Traditional housing programs require sobriety and a clear record, but the Housing First approach holds that stable housing is, for many, the starting point to improve other aspects of their lives.

In August, Country became the first Camden RESET patient to be housed under our Housing First program.

Consider how important the home is for all of us, and then think about how hard it would be to come out of jail with health problems and try to rebuild your life without a stable place to go

After Country completed the Camden RESET intervention, he decided to stay engaged with multiple community organizations, including our Community Advisory Committee. Along with the wraparound services he received to help him get on his feet, these networks have helped him overcome the adverse life moments that inevitably arise.

Country’s asthma and chronic pain have improved, his blood pressure is under control, and he hasn’t been hospitalized since he got into housing. Just as importantly, Country’s stayed out of jail.

He’s feeling better, and the state is saving the cost of hospitalization and incarceration.

David Scholnick

Successes like this require thinking hard about the relationships between sectors like healthcare and criminal justice, and how best to collaborate. In the United States, we spend far more on healthcare and we lock up far more of our citizens than any other industrialized country. To forge a more sustainable path, we have to be willing to put in the hard work to break silos, share, and cooperate.

It will begin with the recognition that healthcare, social services, and criminal justice are all connected.

David Scholnick is Director of Communications for the Camden Coalition of Healthcare Providers. He welcomes comments from readers.

At the Intersection: How Focusing on Criminal Justice Improves Health Outcomes syndicated from https://immigrationattorneyto.wordpress.com/

[edivupage]

4 Steps to Helping Adult Learners Pass the GED Math Section

A math educator shares how he prepares students for the one section of the high school-equivalency exams that holds many of them back from the job of their dreams.

By Steve Alvarado

Adults who take the General Educational Development (GED®) test and the High School Equivalency Test (HiSET®) often pass the reading, writing, science, and social studies sections, but fail the math portion. When I talk with my students, about 80% of them need a high school diploma or equivalency to get a job that pays a livable wage. Sometimes they’ve been laid off, but are given the option to reapply for their job if they fulfill the new requirement of having a high school diploma. Even if they’ve been working for that company for 10 years, they now need that piece of paper. Other times they aren’t having success moving up the ladder in their current position, or having a hard time finding a job at all without a diploma. They also can’t get a student loan from a college without a high school diploma or equivalency.

Their motivation is to improve their lives and move forward, and it’s common for the math section to be the only thing holding them back. Back in school, they were probably told that they just weren’t good at math. As a math teacher, I recognize that their negative experiences with math, and their keen awareness and fear of it, are their worst enemies. Here are four ways I help them overcome their anxiety, pass those tests, and move on to the next chapter of their lives.

1) Making the family connection

Around one-third of my students have children or grandchildren in the same school district, and I use this as leverage. It’s one thing to learn math. It’s another to pass a high school-equivalency exam, and yet another to help your children with their math homework. I like to joke that if they nail down math concepts and can help their kids with math homework, their children won’t be my future students. That makes them sit up and pay attention.

2) Replacing negative experiences with positive ones

Returning to math concepts as an adult learner is tough, especially after years of failure. To help students learn the basic math skills to pass the test, I primarily use a direct instruction approach. From what my students tell me, this is not a common way of teaching in adult schools. Apparently, it’s more common for instructors to assign work and wait at the desk for any questions their students might have. I have always been very old school in my approach to teaching math. I have found that explaining processes and answering questions with lots of examples and analogies is the best way for adult learners to understand math. I like to use humor, sarcasm, and real examples to help them better understand why the things I am teaching are important to their lives and future. I tell them that they need math, that it can make sense, and they can learn it.

I always use a prior student’s success story as a model, not only to recognize their success, but also in hopes that it will carry over to the rest of the class. This changes their attitude toward achievement to “maybe if they can do it, so can I.” Developing a support system through direct instruction reduces their anxiety and allows them to switch their experience of math from a negative to a positive one.

3) Requiring learning outside the classroom

It’s unrealistic to expect that four days a week in the classroom will be enough time to learn the algebra, geometry, and basic math concepts students need to master in order to pass their test. They’ve got to put in the time and apply their lessons while finishing their homework. For my students who have children, I ask them to observe their young student doing math homework. It’s disguised learning, and they get to bond with their child.

To guide their learning outside the classroom, I have them use a mobile app called Learning Upgrade, which offers math lessons designed for adult learners. I also encourage student to use free resources like Khan Academy to help deepen their understanding. I consider Learning Upgrade to be my “teacher’s assistant”. The program provides rigor, guided math practice, and immediate, meaningful feedback. There are things my students can’t do in my classroom—rewind, try again, pause, and take notes—that they can dive into using a program. The goal is not just to get the correct answer, but also to think mathematically and develop critical skills to employ in the future to solve multi-step problems. The Learning Upgrade app dissects skills individually and specifically, using graphics and music to boost memory retention.

Being able to track students’ progress on the app at home allows me to prescribe the specific lessons they need to pass the test. I had one student who had failed the GED math section three times, but he kept working on his skills at home and eventually passed the test. He’s at our local college now. I have students who saw him succeed after all of his frustration and struggle, and they wanted the same prescription. Watch the video here.

4) Preparing students for the test itself

Many of my students know the math concepts, but they can’t pass the test. I don’t want to add to their anxiety, so I don’t have them take tests in my classroom. I do have them practice going into the exam with a positive mindset, though. I also give them practical advice to prepare for the day of the exam, such as:

Get a good night’s sleep;

Eat breakfast;

Be aware that the questions with the most words are often the easiest ones;

Someone told me that, statistically speaking, C is the most common answer. This helps them to look at their options a bit faster.

When it comes to succeeding in the workplace, the high school equivalency certificates my students earn when they master the math section might be more beneficial to a company than a traditional diploma. So much work in high school is collaborative, and, although I guide them through these four steps, passing this exam is something my students do by themselves.

Steve Alvarado is a math instructor at Montgomery Adult School and Chula Vista Adult School in the Sweetwater Union High School District Adult Education Department.

The post 4 Steps to Helping Adult Learners Pass the GED Math Section appeared first on The Edvocate.

4 Steps to Helping Adult Learners Pass the GED Math Section published first on https://sapsnkra.tumblr.com

[talabib]

How To Become A Great Leader

If you go into just about any bookshop, you’ll find an abundance of books claiming to hold the secrets of how to become a great leader. Many of these books are speculative and/or consist of scattered anecdotes.

Based on detailed biographies of four of the most transformational presidents in US history, this post identify some key factors in the development of leadership. By comparing and contrasting Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson, we’ll see the similarities and differences between their paths to the White House. This, in turn, will allow us to discern what is and isn’t required for someone to become a great leader. Along the way, we’ll find answers to some of the crucial questions of leadership studies: Are great leaders made, or do they make themselves – and if so, how?

Great leaders can come from very different backgrounds.

If great leaders were just the products of their circumstances, then we might expect their backstories to share certain key features. But when we look at the lives of the transformational presidents, we see they come from dramatically different backgrounds.

Born to an illiterate father who eked out a living on one dirt farm after another, Lincoln grew up in the backwoods of Illinois in a cabin that was initially doorless, floorless and bedless. When he was about nine years old, his father dis-enrolled him from school so he could work on the farm.

Lincoln then had to educate himself. He walked long distances across the countryside to borrow books from people, then read them in his few spare moments. He did this without external support; indeed, if he was caught reading when he was supposed to be working, his father would sometimes beat him and destroy his books.

Upon entering adulthood, Lincoln was basically a nobody. Striking out from home to make a fresh start in life, he settled in the town of New Salem, Illinois. Because of his height and shabby appearance, the townsfolk regarded the newcomer as a bit of a freak. Through his friendliness and good deeds, like chopping wood for widows, he eventually won them over, but it took months of building relationships to earn enough of a reputation to run for a seat in the Illinois state assembly, which marked the beginning of his political career.

Lincoln’s lack of wealth, access to education, parental support and connections stand in stark contrast to the circumstances of Theodore Roosevelt. He was born with a trust fund bequeathed to him by his grandfather, a banker, merchant and real estate mogul who was one of the five richest individuals in New York.

His father was a well-respected philanthropist who provided him with a rigorous formal education and access to an extensive family library. If there was a book he didn’t already have, his father would help him procure it.

When Theodore Roosevelt reached early adulthood, he did not need to convince local citizens of his merit to enter politics. Thanks to the power already attached to his family’s name, the local Republican Party recruited him to run for the state assembly of New York.

If two people from such disparate circumstances could both become transformative presidents, the keys to becoming a great leader must lie somewhere else than in one’s background.

Great leaders can have very different personal characteristics.

Another place to look for the key to becoming a great leader might be shared personal characteristics. But the influential presidents under consideration suggest we look elsewhere. Their personal characteristics were as different as their backgrounds.

Franklin Roosevelt and Lincoln, for example, had drastically different temperaments. Growing up with loving parents who provided him with a warm, stable, peaceful and nurturing home environment, Roosevelt was blessed with a sunny, optimistic outlook on life. Lincoln, in contrast, was prone to melancholy, which began to appear at an early age, when his lofty ambitions and lowly circumstances seemed totally at odds with each other.

Between Lincoln and the other Roosevelt, Theodore, we can also see a diametric opposition between their physical characteristics. Lincoln was remarkably tall, strong, athletic and healthy – qualities that brought him respect from his male companions starting from a young age. He was never sick, according to his relatives, and as a young man, he was able to carry heavy loads that would be difficult for three ordinary men to lift, according to a friend. Theodore Roosevelt, in contrast, was plagued by frequent bouts of illness, fragility and asthma that necessitated days of bed rest.

With their mental characteristics, Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt provide another set of contrasting examples. As a child, Lincoln was praised for his exceptional feats of memory – but they did not come to him naturally. He had to put considerable effort into memorizing things – copying out whole passages from books multiple times, for instance. Roosevelt, by contrast, was blessed with a photographic memory; he could read a passage only once and remember it for the rest of his life.

Even the presidents’ attitudes toward work and free time were different. Given their achievements, you might expect them all to have been workaholics, but this was true only of Johnson. He rarely saw movies or plays, almost never read anything besides the news and couldn’t even attend a baseball game or a social event without turning it into an opportunity to talk about politics. In contrast, the other three presidents each had their diversions: poetry and drama for Lincoln, birds and novels for Theodore Roosevelt and sailing and poker for Franklin Roosevelt.

Great leaders have differing strengths and weaknesses, which are often linked.

In popular imagination, great leaders are sometimes portrayed as larger-than-life figures with almost superhuman strength. However, when we examine the transformational presidents, we see that this is an oversimplification. The presidents’ were undeniably gifted, but they were also undeniably human, with strengths that were remarkable but not miraculous, and with weaknesses as well.

Let’s start with their strengths. Like their circumstances and personal characteristics, these too were varied. Yet again, Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt provide contrasting examples.

One of Lincoln’s great strengths was his ability to learn through patient observation. When he first joined his state assembly, he quietly waited on the sidelines so he could watch and learn how it worked from a distance before involving himself in the fray.

Roosevelt, on the other hand, had a much more gung-ho approach: he dove right into action and aggressively interrogated his fellow legislators about how their assembly worked – often violating procedural rules and irritating his colleagues in the process.

His doing so was expressive of one of his great strengths and a potential weakness: his uncontainable energy and lack of inhibition. Like Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt also had a double-edged strength that could turn into a weakness. He had a willingness to bend, bypass or even break the rules when convinced that the ends justified the means.

For instance, as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Franklin Roosevelt figured out a clever way of getting around regulations against selling weapons to merchant ships. Namely, offer them as loans instead of sales. On another occasion, he felt so certain of the need for new guns, supplies and equipment worth millions of dollars that he put in an order for them before Congress had approved the funds.

A particularly vivid illustration of a strength turning into a weakness comes from Johnson, who was masterful at using cunning procedural tactics in Congress to accomplish his agenda. For example, to rescue his civil rights bill from legislative limbo in the House of Representatives, he craftily made use of an arcane procedure known as a discharge petition, in which a bill stuck in committee was brought to the floor for a vote. However, he also used such tactics to ramp up the Vietnam War without full public awareness – by manipulating the federal budget to conceal its escalating defense costs, for instance.

Ambition is one of the decisive factors in becoming a great leader.

Despite their differences, the transformative presidents all had one thing in common: ambition.

The crucial role that ambition plays in the path to leadership can be clarified by contrasting Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt’s very different upbringings.

If you described Lincoln’s impoverished, formally uneducated background on paper, he wouldn’t exactly sound like he had the makings of becoming a successful politician, let alone arguably the greatest president in US history.

Thanks to his ambition, however, he was able to overcome the challenges of his upbringing and develop his talents – particularly in regard to education. We can see this even at the beginning of his educational journey. Upon learning how to print the letters of the alphabet, he started practicing his writing on every surface he could find – even charcoal, dust, sand and snow.

Fast-forward to his young adulthood, and we see the same tenacity in his independent study of the law. He would stay up late into the night after his long working day to read legal cases. He would have to borrow the law book one at a time after hiking 40 miles back and forth to get each one.

Now, cut to Theodore Roosevelt. Given his privileged upbringing, it might seem like Roosevelt had the world served to him on a silver platter and therefore didn’t need ambition. But, by the same token, it would have been all too easy for him to have rested on his laurels and simply coasted into a life of comfort, especially given his frailty.

However, instead of dampening his ambition, his frailty actually helped to kindle it. Prevented from joining the physically demanding games of his siblings, Roosevelt became a voracious reader of books, which deepened his knowledge, sparked his imagination and left him with a thirst for adventure –  a thirst that would later lead him to explore the backwoods of Maine and lead a regiment in the Spanish-American War.

But as long as his body remained frail, that thirst for adventure would remain unquenched. Recognizing this, he devoted himself to a strenuous exercise regime from the age of ten through college, providing himself with first-hand experience in overcoming hardship and gaining the ability to pursue many exploits later in life.

Having a greater purpose is another decisive factor in becoming a great leader.

One of the crucial elements in the transformational presidents’ ascendance to leadership was their ability to combine their strengths and ambitions with a sense of greater national purpose. Lyndon Johnson clearly shows the importance of the latter, as his successes and failures largely hinged on the presence or absence of such a purpose.

One of Johnson’s strengths was his mastery of clever procedural tactics. This strength could lead him to very positive accomplishments, as in his promotion of Civil Rights. However, it could also lead him to very negative results, as in his escalation of the Vietnam War.

Let’s start with one of his main successes. His promotion of Civil Rights was part of his larger agenda, known as the Great Society. This referred to a set of programs aimed at eliminating not just racial injustice but also poverty. Guided by this lofty goal, he achieved an enormous amount, including the creation of a national health insurance program for the elderly, called Medicare, and the passage of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibited racially discriminatory voting laws.

Now let’s turn to one of his main failures. In his escalation of the Vietnam War, he had no higher purpose guiding him. His aim was simply to avoid losing face, both personally and nationally. He thought that if North Vietnam defeated US-backed South Vietnam, it would be a humiliating blow to both his presidential legacy and America’s stature in the world.

Without the guidance of a higher purpose, he went stumbling from one short-term decision to another – each one simply geared towards trying to contain the problem that the war represented. For example, in response to North Vietnamese raids on US barracks, he ordered airstrikes in February of 1965.

The airbases from which the strikes were launched needed protection, so he sent in troops to guard them. Those troops then needed protection themselves, so he sent in even more troops. By April, there were more than 50,000 US troops in South Vietnam. Eventually, that number would exceed 500,000.

Johnson’s mixed legacy is a reflection of his mixed sense of higher purpose. Guided by such a purpose, he accomplished the promotion of Civil Rights and the Great Society. Lacking such a purpose, he also laid the groundwork for one of the greatest tragedies of both the ‘60s and the ‘70s: the Vietnam War – one of the most disastrous conflicts in US history.

The path to leadership takes many twists and turns, with major setbacks along the way.

When he was 25 years old, Franklin Roosevelt envisaged a linear, step-by-step path that would take him straight to the White House – a path that combined his political ambitions with his lifelong interest in naval history. Step one, New York state legislator; step two, assistant secretary of the Navy; step three, governor of New York; step four, president of the United States.

Having achieved the first two steps by age 31, he seemed well on his way to the Oval Office. But then, the most devastating event of his life happened. At the age of 39, he developed polio, leaving him unable to walk or stand on his own.

As Franklin’s story illustrates, the only certainty on the path to leadership is uncertainty. Each of the other three transformative presidents provide ample illustrations of this truth as well.

Lincoln lost his first run for office in the Illinois state assembly. After he won his second run, he staked his reputation on spearheading a push for a massive overhaul of the state’s infrastructure. Facing the headwinds of a multi-year recession, the push collapsed, leaving incomplete bridges, canals and railroads in its wake.

Lincoln was so devastated by the push’s failure that his friends confiscated his razors, fearing he might commit suicide. He became increasingly depressed, to the point where he became bedridden for days on end, neither eating nor sleeping, which left him emaciated and delirious. His doctors feared he was on the verge of lunacy.

Theodore Roosevelt and Johnson suffered periods of severe depression as well. For Roosevelt, it was triggered by a devastating personal loss: both his wife and his mother unexpectedly died on the same day when he was 25 years old.

For Johnson, it was precipitated by a heart attack that occurred as he was gathering steam for a presidential run after becoming the youngest ever majority leader of the US senate. With the media all but running obituaries for his political ambitions just when they seemed to be reaching their peak, he retreated to bed, laying still as a corpse in a state of despondency.

Each of the four eventual presidents found himself flat on his back, both figuratively and literally. The most pivotal moments in their paths to the White House hinged on how they got back on their feet.

Great leaders use crises as opportunities to retreat, reflect and rebuild, eventually reemerging stronger than before.

For each of the presidents, one of the most crucial steps in the path to leadership hinged on how they responded to their setbacks. For all four men, this meant retreating from politics for a while – not just to recover but also to reflect and rebuild themselves. As a result, these setbacks allowed them to forge the stronger selves that would eventually propel them to greatness.

Lincoln returned to a career as a lawyer, during which time he assiduously studied the law and developed his public speaking skills in front of juries – skills that would enable him to become one of the greatest orators in American history.

Theodore Roosevelt built a ranch in the Badlands of South Dakota and lived the life of a rugged Westerner for a couple of years – transforming his frail, boyish body into that of a muscular man and replacing his timidity with unshakable courage in the process.

Johnson withdrew to his ranch in Texas Hill Country, where he devoted six months to improving his diet, exercising, spending more time with his family, learning to treat his staff in a less demanding manner, reconnecting to his political values and reevaluating his political goals. Johnson emerged from his convalescence with a renewed sense of purpose, which led him to champion a series of boldy progressive policy proposals immediately upon his return to the Senate. These proposals included expanding Social Security and eliminating poll taxes, which were a major impediment to black citizens’ abilities to vote.

Franklin Roosevelt devoted seven years to regaining his physical strength. However, his disease imposed limits on the extent to which he could recover on his own. To circumvent these limits, he gathered a small team of confidants who could act as surrogates for him – attending public events, giving speeches on his behalf and keeping his reputation alive in political circles. This small team was a harbinger of the larger teams he would assemble later when he became governor of New York and president of the United States. These teams would prove crucial to his success.

Great teams support great leaders.

Franklin Roosevelt’s restricted mobility serves as a stark reminder of the reason why every leader needs a team for support: even with Lincoln-esque mobility, no one can be everywhere or do everything at once. Everyone needs help to establish relationships and obtain information. Everyone needs strong team members to augment his or her limited powers.

This was certainly true of the transformative presidents, and it was especially true of Lincoln, who knew he needed a supportive team right from the start of his presidency. Even before his inauguration, the southern states were already seceding and forming the Confederacy, posing the gravest national crisis in the history of the United States.

To contend with this crisis, Lincoln assembled a diverse cabinet that wove together every disparate faction of his Republican Party, ranging from conservatives to radicals, and including all three of his main former rivals: Edward Bates, Salmon Chase and William Seward. With the nation in dire straits, he felt he needed to gather its most politically talented citizens to help him steer its course, regardless of their differences.

However, he derived strength from his team not just in spite of but because of its differences, which enabled him to view his decisions from multiple angles, consider alternative courses of actions and weigh his choices until the optimal ones emerged.

For example, his cabinet gave him a range of opinions on the Emancipation Proclamation, which declared the freedom of slaves living in the Confederacy. "Move forward with it right away," said some. "Hold back to avoid alienating the border states, England and France," said others. “Be careful about the optics of issuing it now,” warned his Secretary of State, William Seward, who was concerned it would seem like an act of desperation in the midst of the North’s recent losses to the South.

Ultimately, Lincoln piloted a cautious middle course. He waited for a significant victory against the South before issuing the Proclamation. That victory came with the Battle of Antietam, which led to the retreat of Robert E. Lee’s army from Maryland and Pennsylvania. Reflecting on the timing of the Proclamation later in life, Lincoln considered his decision to wait absolutely crucial to its success. He felt certain that if it had been issued even just six months earlier, it would have failed to find public support.

Great leaders respond to general crises by leveraging the strengths they have honed from their personal crises.

As we have seen, each of the transformative presidents faced a significant personal crisis from which they ultimately grew as leaders. Upon reaching the White House, each of them also faced a grave national crisis: for Lincoln, the Civil War; for Theodore Roosevelt, the Coal Strike of 1902; for Franklin Roosevelt, the Great Depression; and for Johnson, the assassination of President Kennedy.

Of the four presidents, Franklin Roosevelt provides the clearest illustration of the point at hand. That's in part because there were many parallels between the economic calamity behind the national crisis he faced and the physical affliction behind the personal crisis he weathered.

Like his body struck by polio, the economy was paralyzed by the Depression. Industry was grinding to a halt, and a quarter of workers were unemployed. Money stopped circulating; the banks started shutting down.

To overcome polio, Franklin had experimented with one recovery method after another – testing out dozens of newfangled contraptions, such as an electric belt and an oversized tricycle. Ultimately, he built his own rehabilitation center in Warm Springs, Georgia.

Faced with the Great Depression, he knew that a similar spirit of experimentation and willingness to pursue bold programs was needed. In both cases, he didn't know a secret solution to the problem, but he knew the only way to find one was to try things out and see what stuck.

From this spirit and willingness sprung a multitude of innovative governmental agencies designed to get people back to work, pump life back into the economy and raise the nation's spirits – programs such as the Civil Works Administration, the Works Progress Administration, the Public Works Administration and the Civilian Conservation Corps, among 16 others.

The latter was one of his first initiatives, and it set an early precedent for the boldness of his vision. Setting up 1,500 camps in America's neglected national forests, the Corps provided jobs to a quarter of a million young men at one point, who worked on clearing dead trees and shrubs, planting new trees, clearing paths and building firewalls.

His Secretary of Labor, Frances Perkins, thought the plan was a crazy pipe dream, but Roosevelt persisted, knowing all too well that desperate times called for dramatic measures.

Great leaders are not simply made by their circumstances or the personal characteristics with which they were born, nor are they lifted into their positions and accomplishments by some sort of superhuman ability to lead. They form themselves by taking their fallible strengths, fusing them with ambition and a sense of greater purpose, augmenting them with the strengths of their team members and refining them as they weather their own personal crises. By doing so, they are then able to rise to the occasion when confronted by larger crises on the world stage.

[kaae38ernstsen-blog]

Get in touch with Time For Congress Shows How Fundraising Controls Bleak Job Daily life.

I'm not sure if I need to feel thus unstable in the legs every time I activate Supermarket Management HD, however golly I do. Time management activities could be exciting, yet when they are actually made along with as best a rhythm as well as the prettiest of graphics as SMHDis, they are actually the sweetest from senior high school passions. Suggestion supplies practically unlimited customization options, it can alarm you at a certain instant or run regularly, and also tell you prior to a pointed out activity or go on advising you after it. The suggestion can easily show message, participate in songs, open up a link or even documentation, or stopped your PC. Opportunity Salvager is actually action-packed as well as rigorous, filled with fresh, cutting-edge tips as well as has terrific, impressive world-building. Launch that, as well as this will certainly seek any open copy of GarageBand (or Reasoning Pro X or MainStage 3) on your regional network. There are two main reason whies I gave this action such a high ranking as well as among them is actually Sir Toby Belch. The fantastic aspect of these questionnaire training courses is the natural inclination of my brain to hold away my recent analyses for random hookup time along with potential reads ends up being valuable for much more than only review creating. As in the past, TimeTag could be exited at any time while operating an active cooking timer, enabling you to remain effective. That said, the moment 2 is actually slightly bigger and bigger, coming in at 10.8 mm thick as well as 64.6 g, while the Marble Opportunity is actually 9.5 mm thick and also 42.5 g, though the staying sizes of 40.5 x 37.5 are identical. Connected music keyboards utilize one thing phoned MIDI (Music Equipment Digital Interface) to send the keys you're using the songs keyboard to your Mac computer. Like various other digital reality headsets on the market, PlayStation Virtual Reality has the demanding duty from fully submersing you in a computer game through generating pair of images at the same time and afterwards sending all of them to a headset a few feets away. The good news is, the stable of choices is actually huge-- I've assembled a checklist from greater than ONE HUNDRED Mac back-up plans Room doesn't allow a dialogue from all them listed here (so I ask forgiveness if I don't mention your favorite), but I desire to call your attention to a few depictive systems that take care of particular disadvantages of Time Equipment. And although it's occasionally feasible to utilize MobileMe's Back to My Macintosh attribute to access an Opportunity Pill on a distant system, Time Equipment's higher transmission capacity needs make such a setup bothersome for most customers. The formal Apple Watch reenergize opportunity is 1.5 hours to 80% and also and 2.5 hours to ONE HUNDRED%. 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Time Snatchers raises several intriguing ideas concerning Time-Traveling which are actually exceptionally enjoyable to imagine about and I 'd point out that this has actually performed it is actually project to create me intend to learn more TT stories. First of all, opportunity taking a trip tales are actually regularly complicated to pull off, and undoubtedly I can not think about excessive where some willingness to disregard to temporal mysteries and disputes goes to the very least demanded. Streaming media works in a different way relying on where the music or even video recording stems from, in addition to exactly what application you begin with. In the past, Terms Along with Buddies (free of charge) felt like the biggest mobile multiplayer video game worldwide, as the asynchronous turn-based technique was actually ideal for on-the-go play as well as followers commonly handled many games immediately. This are going to force him to play a more energetic job in fights, finding out the most ideal time to set his origins. Does not Produce Bootable Duplicates Even though Time Device supports every data on your disk to another hard disk drive, you can not launch your pc off your Opportunity Device back-up. It is actually going to be actually so hard to wait for book 3 in this particular artistic, special globe of time trip performed flawlessly! CBS CEO Les Moonves mentioned in December that Apple had struck the time out button on growth from its own streaming service as a result of challenge nailing down networks, as well as a Time Detector package would likely reboot that process. Instantaneous (free of charge, iPhone, IPad, as well as Apple Watch) still allows you track the moment you spend on your iPhone, getting in shape, resting as well as going locations. Within a few clicks, you could be backed-uping your documents, and whenever you hook up that drive Time Machine will, after a handful of few seconds, start backing up everything that's modified or even brand-new. In addition to the campaign method there is an ironman survival mode where you have to participate in via all the levels together until you cannot conserve the time clock. Opportunity trip is hard, and also is actually practically exactly what this book concerns - the details of being an opportunity visitor. At its own simplest, TimeLogger lets you begin the cooking timer when you begin a job, and cease this when you are actually performed. Ortofon put an end to the fabric interweave that helped make the eQ7 cable appearance very and ruined it for transportable use as a result of horrible microphonic touch sound. Unless the TELEVISION intensity is up as well loud or even others in the room are speaking, the PlayStation Electronic camera are going to often recognize your terms. click to read more (free of charge), as the label suggests, is actually the social offshoot from the collection: As opposed to participate in only to acquire all the stars, you'll contrast your credit ratings against those of your Facebook good friends, as well as compete in weekly leaderboard competitions. The option is to utilize Time Equipment's non-obvious feature for surfing second Opportunity Maker travels.

[perfectzablog]

A Deeper Look at the Whole School Approach to Behavior

To hear a podcast version of this story, check out the MindShift Podcast on Apple Podcasts, NPR One, Google Play or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Classroom management is an essential tool for an effective teacher, but it’s not always easy to do well. Without an orderly classroom it’s hard for teachers with upward of 25 kids in their classrooms to lead effective lessons, help students who are struggling, and perhaps most important, to trust students. That’s why getting behavior under control was Michael Essien’s number one goal when he started as the assistant principal at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Academic Middle School (MLK) in San Francisco.

Essien became an administrator after more than 20 years in Oakland classrooms, where he taught math and special education. He saw firsthand how students responded to project-based learning that was connected to the real world when he became an instructor with the University of California Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement (MESA) program. The program supports students from low-performing or poorly resourced schools in STEM fields through hands-on competitions, summer learning and academic mentoring at school sites throughout the year.

“I saw that kids who are in public school, if they were exposed to certain pedagogy and had certain content, that they can learn regardless of situation,” Essien said. The program doesn’t use lectures. Instead, instructors try to hook kids by posing inquiry-based questions and empowering students to find answers for themselves.

“Kids had a great time, especially since in the project-based learning they had to produce something in the end,” Essien said. “So we had kids doing things like building prosthetic arms — like literally building,” or figuring out how to measure the height of the Campanile on UC Berkeley’s campus. Essien was blown away by what kids could do. But even better, he saw those students return to school with more confidence, succeeding even when the pedagogy of their classrooms wasn’t as dynamic.

MLK and Vis Valley students at Oregon St. vs Cal Football game. Producing life long memories @SFUnified @SFUSD_Supe @pliucb @VVMSFalcons pic.twitter.com/uDFkbAez4Z

— MLK Middle (@mlk_ms) November 5, 2017

“The students actually developed skills around agency that it didn’t make a difference where they went and or who was teaching; kids began to excel in classes,” Essien said.

These experiences made him want to lead similar changes on a larger scale, which brought him to MLK Middle. But teachers there were drowning in behavior issues and burning out along the way. Essien knew he needed to help them manage that before he could convince them to take a plunge into new teaching techniques.

“We were surviving,” Essien said honestly of the tone at MLK when he started four years ago. “Students weren’t learning because students were having challenges in the classroom with their own academic abilities and or behaviors. Teachers who were trying to teach were having a difficult time getting into lessons because they were dealing with behaviors. It was challenging to hold collaborative conversations among the teachers because all teachers could deal with in any setting was the overwhelming behavior.”

MLK serves many students who live in poverty, for whom English is not their first language, and who have been poorly served by the education system for a long time. So it’s no surprise that some students are academically behind and struggle to access grade-level content. When Essien started at MLK, teachers dealt with behavior disruptions by sending students out of class to a room where they waited for the deans in charge of discipline to write them up. While that may have calmed down the classroom, kids soon learned that if the day’s lesson was challenging they could make a disturbance and get sent to a room where many of their friends had also been sent.

Michael Essien greets students warmly during a passing period. (Samantha Shanahan/KQED)

Eighth-grade English and history teacher Jennifer Founds’ classroom was right next door to this holding room. “You would just hear through the walls sort of like screams and loud music and cursing as the one person supervising this room of 10 kids who’ve been kicked out of class is trying to keep things under control,” Founds said. Worse, kids wanted to go there precisely because it was chaotic and out of control. “Especially if a kid has no idea how to do the work for the day, or has a bad relationship with the teacher, or doesn’t think the teacher believes in them, then they’re like, ‘I’m out of here,’ ” Founds said.

Everyone at the school knew something needed to change, but figuring out what would work better was an iterative process. First, Essien thought he could “cocoon” the chronically difficult kids during transition periods, but that didn’t help the classroom dynamic. Then he and the counseling staff tried talking with kids who were sent out of class about what was going on in their lives. They hoped they could leverage the strong relationships they had with kids to get at the underlying problems. They found out that often kids were hungry and traumatized, but that didn’t ultimately solve the classroom behavior issues either.

“At the end of the first year it struck me that we were saying we were holding restorative conversations, but they could not be restorative conversations because the kids didn’t do anything to us,” Essien said. “What needed to be restored was actually in the classroom between the teacher and the classroom where the disruptive behavior occurred.”

A full day of school-wide behavior expectations for students, with passport accountability and fun BINGO. And still we rise!!!! #MLKstrong pic.twitter.com/V6QWKaI1ME

— MLK Middle (@mlk_ms) August 24, 2017

So, Essien started trying to support teachers to have restorative conversations in the classroom, at the moment when a disruption occurred. This sounds like a good idea, but in an environment like MLK disruptive behavior was constant, and teachers didn’t always have strong relationships with their students, which are the foundation of effective restorative practices. Restorative practices are still central to the school’s approach, but the burden isn’t all on teachers now.

“We were asking teachers to do too many things,” Essien realized. “They need to be rigorous in their instruction; they need to be big brother/big sister; they need to be counselors; they need to be therapists. And how are teachers supposed to do all of that and still deliver a quality lesson? There was just too much.” He needed to figure out how to remove something from teachers’ plates, not add another big mandate that they felt unprepared to carry out.

That’s when Essien hit on the idea of sending support staff — adults who don’t have teaching roles, like the social worker, deans, academic adviser — into the classroom to help when a situation arose. He calls it “push-in” and his staff started implementing it at the start of Essien’s third year at MLK, but his first year as principal. They had no information about whether it would work or not because they hadn’t been able to run an accurate trial at the end of the previous year. All they knew was that something had to change.

Counselor Clifton Szeto returns from helping a teacher and student with a push-in call. (Samantha Shanahan/KQED)

Here’s how it works: First, Essien got all his teachers trained in de-escalation tactics. They learned about how nonverbal communication, tone, volume, cadence, word choice and proximity work to either escalate or de-escalate a situation. Now, when a teacher sees that a student has become escalated, rather than engaging with her and potentially worsening the situation, teachers pick up the phone, call the office for a push-in, and go back to teaching. The support staff all carry walkie-talkies where they receive the call and they respond on a rotation.

“The idea of going to the room and the push-in is to help the teacher repair the damage, the harm that has been done, the disturbance, whatever you want to call it, in the class,” said Antoinette Marracq, who was head counselor at MLK during this transition. When support staff show up in class they can either take over supervising the lesson so the teacher can step out into the hallway and resolve the issue with the student, or intervene themselves. The hope is to help de-escalate the situation and get the student back into class and learning.

“Students ended up learning that, when a teacher calls for a push-in that they were never getting out of class, that somebody was coming,” Essien said. Once students got used to the new system, he said, their behavior started to change. Even the threat of a push-in is enough sometimes to convince a student to get back on task. And in some cases the relationships between teachers and students started to improve as teachers were freed up to talk things out with students.

“I think it communicates this idea that we’re here to learn and our interest, all of our interests, are for students to be in the class and learning and engaged and to feel supported,” Founds said. She says she doesn’t often have to call for push-ins anymore. When the classroom is calmer overall most kids will stay on task and that has allowed her to feel more comfortable giving students more choice and freedom over their assignments.

HONORED for Team @sfusdCEC to catch a photo with @SFUSD_Supe, Principal @EssienPmessien, & the amazing @mlk_ms Team! #SFUSDEnrollmentFair17 pic.twitter.com/BzV9dqkhSO

— Victor Tam (@PrincipalTam) October 14, 2017

Eighth-grade students who have experienced these changes agreed that the school culture has improved at MLK. On the whole, they said they felt safer and more supported, although they acknowledged discipline felt stricter. Some students weren’t so sure that the push-in process had improved their relationships with teachers, though. They like teachers who demonstrate some understanding and give them chances to improve before getting upset. It was clear, however, that they like and respect the support staff, even saying they feel bad when a teacher calls for a push-in because it means a support person would have to come to the room.

There are still students who want to get out of class and run around the hallways, but they are the exception now. And, when a serious issue does come up, support staff are more available to streamline support systems, make a phone call home, or suspend a student if warranted.

The push-in system isn’t easy for the support staff, who all have other jobs like coordinating social services for students, conducting counseling sessions, communicating with parents and taking care of the paperwork that accompanies any kind of disciplinary action.

“Push-in is a priority because the student is escalated,” said Clifton Szeto, a dean who handles much of the discipline. “So sometimes we have to drop what we’re doing and go for a push-in, and it makes it hard to get your other things done.” All of the seven support staff have these feelings at times, but they also say the culture and climate of the school has improved dramatically because of the push-in system.

Overall, the disruptions feel worth it. Even better, by working more directly alongside teachers, support staff are sharing some of their knowledge about how to form deep relationships with students. Some teachers even ask for feedback on how they handled different situations, looking for guidance on how to improve.

SHIFTING TEACHING PRACTICES

As an instructional leader Essien has credibility because he spent so long in the classroom, but when he started at MLK teachers were wary of him. He knew he needed to show them he could teach, so they’d trust him as a thought partner on how teaching practices could change. He remembers leading a three-day inquiry with an algebra class that got students making predictions, talking to the adults in their lives about algebraic concepts, and debating mathematical ideas. When the lesson was over, the teacher had a new appreciation for what might be possible in his classroom.

Students exploring actual data around diversity of children’s books. I love my AMAZING staff @SFUSD_Supe @SFUnified @pliucb #MLKstrong pic.twitter.com/0XH7Ziw12r

— MLK Middle (@mlk_ms) October 18, 2017

Essien calls this “cognitive disequilibrium,” an experience that displaces teachers from some of their previously held beliefs. With behavior issues causing less stress, teachers are experimenting with project-based learning. MLK held a STEAM night where students displayed their work to the community. Essien said it was a wonderful event, but he noticed that teachers did all the talking. He waited a week so he wouldn’t seem too critical, but then convened teachers to think about how the following year they could get students speaking more. And when the second annual STEAM event rolled around, he said teachers agreed it was even better.

“So what made it better? Teachers still did the same work in terms of working with kids and projects, but the students presented.” Now he’s thinking about how he can make sure every kid presents, and how the school could do themed nights in every subject.

Principal Michael Essien in his office. (Samantha Shanahan/KQED)

“I’m the guy who is always thinking about how can we drill deeper. How can we make something better,” Essien said. “So although I feel good that we’re making these changes, I’m thinking still: How can I support teachers in increasing their capacity.” This quality might also be why Essien has been successful at MLK, something he attributes to his special education training. He’s used to making a plan, evaluating if it’s working, and changing course if goals aren’t being met.

MLK still deals with some behavior issues; it hasn’t completely transformed. But there’s a feeling that all the adults in the building are working toward the same goal and they’ve got a leader who has articulated a clear vision — make MLK Middle the best school in San Francisco. Essien knows his students deserve that.

  A Deeper Look at the Whole School Approach to Behavior published first on https://greatpricecourse.tumblr.com/

[bisoroblog]

A Deeper Look at the Whole School Approach to Behavior

To hear a podcast version of this story, check out the MindShift Podcast on Apple Podcasts, NPR One, Google Play or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Classroom management is an essential tool for an effective teacher, but it’s not always easy to do well. Without an orderly classroom it’s hard for teachers with upward of 25 kids in their classrooms to lead effective lessons, help students who are struggling, and perhaps most important, to trust students. That’s why getting behavior under control was Michael Essien’s number one goal when he started as the assistant principal at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Academic Middle School (MLK) in San Francisco.

Essien became an administrator after more than 20 years in Oakland classrooms, where he taught math and special education. He saw firsthand how students responded to project-based learning that was connected to the real world when he became an instructor with the University of California Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement (MESA) program. The program supports students from low-performing or poorly resourced schools in STEM fields through hands-on competitions, summer learning and academic mentoring at school sites throughout the year.

“I saw that kids who are in public school, if they were exposed to certain pedagogy and had certain content, that they can learn regardless of situation,” Essien said. The program doesn’t use lectures. Instead, instructors try to hook kids by posing inquiry-based questions and empowering students to find answers for themselves.

“Kids had a great time, especially since in the project-based learning they had to produce something in the end,” Essien said. “So we had kids doing things like building prosthetic arms — like literally building,” or figuring out how to measure the height of the Campanile on UC Berkeley’s campus. Essien was blown away by what kids could do. But even better, he saw those students return to school with more confidence, succeeding even when the pedagogy of their classrooms wasn’t as dynamic.

MLK and Vis Valley students at Oregon St. vs Cal Football game. Producing life long memories @SFUnified @SFUSD_Supe @pliucb @VVMSFalcons pic.twitter.com/uDFkbAez4Z

— MLK Middle (@mlk_ms) November 5, 2017

“The students actually developed skills around agency that it didn’t make a difference where they went and or who was teaching; kids began to excel in classes,” Essien said.

These experiences made him want to lead similar changes on a larger scale, which brought him to MLK Middle. But teachers there were drowning in behavior issues and burning out along the way. Essien knew he needed to help them manage that before he could convince them to take a plunge into new teaching techniques.

“We were surviving,” Essien said honestly of the tone at MLK when he started four years ago. “Students weren’t learning because students were having challenges in the classroom with their own academic abilities and or behaviors. Teachers who were trying to teach were having a difficult time getting into lessons because they were dealing with behaviors. It was challenging to hold collaborative conversations among the teachers because all teachers could deal with in any setting was the overwhelming behavior.”

MLK serves many students who live in poverty, for whom English is not their first language, and who have been poorly served by the education system for a long time. So it’s no surprise that some students are academically behind and struggle to access grade-level content. When Essien started at MLK, teachers dealt with behavior disruptions by sending students out of class to a room where they waited for the deans in charge of discipline to write them up. While that may have calmed down the classroom, kids soon learned that if the day’s lesson was challenging they could make a disturbance and get sent to a room where many of their friends had also been sent.

Michael Essien greets students warmly during a passing period. (Samantha Shanahan/KQED)

Eighth-grade English and history teacher Jennifer Founds’ classroom was right next door to this holding room. “You would just hear through the walls sort of like screams and loud music and cursing as the one person supervising this room of 10 kids who’ve been kicked out of class is trying to keep things under control,” Founds said. Worse, kids wanted to go there precisely because it was chaotic and out of control. “Especially if a kid has no idea how to do the work for the day, or has a bad relationship with the teacher, or doesn’t think the teacher believes in them, then they’re like, ‘I’m out of here,’ ” Founds said.

Everyone at the school knew something needed to change, but figuring out what would work better was an iterative process. First, Essien thought he could “cocoon” the chronically difficult kids during transition periods, but that didn’t help the classroom dynamic. Then he and the counseling staff tried talking with kids who were sent out of class about what was going on in their lives. They hoped they could leverage the strong relationships they had with kids to get at the underlying problems. They found out that often kids were hungry and traumatized, but that didn’t ultimately solve the classroom behavior issues either.

“At the end of the first year it struck me that we were saying we were holding restorative conversations, but they could not be restorative conversations because the kids didn’t do anything to us,” Essien said. “What needed to be restored was actually in the classroom between the teacher and the classroom where the disruptive behavior occurred.”

A full day of school-wide behavior expectations for students, with passport accountability and fun BINGO. And still we rise!!!! #MLKstrong pic.twitter.com/V6QWKaI1ME

— MLK Middle (@mlk_ms) August 24, 2017

So, Essien started trying to support teachers to have restorative conversations in the classroom, at the moment when a disruption occurred. This sounds like a good idea, but in an environment like MLK disruptive behavior was constant, and teachers didn’t always have strong relationships with their students, which are the foundation of effective restorative practices. Restorative practices are still central to the school’s approach, but the burden isn’t all on teachers now.

“We were asking teachers to do too many things,” Essien realized. “They need to be rigorous in their instruction; they need to be big brother/big sister; they need to be counselors; they need to be therapists. And how are teachers supposed to do all of that and still deliver a quality lesson? There was just too much.” He needed to figure out how to remove something from teachers’ plates, not add another big mandate that they felt unprepared to carry out.

That’s when Essien hit on the idea of sending support staff — adults who don’t have teaching roles, like the social worker, deans, academic adviser — into the classroom to help when a situation arose. He calls it “push-in” and his staff started implementing it at the start of Essien’s third year at MLK, but his first year as principal. They had no information about whether it would work or not because they hadn’t been able to run an accurate trial at the end of the previous year. All they knew was that something had to change.

Counselor Clifton Szeto returns from helping a teacher and student with a push-in call. (Samantha Shanahan/KQED)

Here’s how it works: First, Essien got all his teachers trained in de-escalation tactics. They learned about how nonverbal communication, tone, volume, cadence, word choice and proximity work to either escalate or de-escalate a situation. Now, when a teacher sees that a student has become escalated, rather than engaging with her and potentially worsening the situation, teachers pick up the phone, call the office for a push-in, and go back to teaching. The support staff all carry walkie-talkies where they receive the call and they respond on a rotation.

“The idea of going to the room and the push-in is to help the teacher repair the damage, the harm that has been done, the disturbance, whatever you want to call it, in the class,” said Antoinette Marracq, who was head counselor at MLK during this transition. When support staff show up in class they can either take over supervising the lesson so the teacher can step out into the hallway and resolve the issue with the student, or intervene themselves. The hope is to help de-escalate the situation and get the student back into class and learning.

“Students ended up learning that, when a teacher calls for a push-in that they were never getting out of class, that somebody was coming,” Essien said. Once students got used to the new system, he said, their behavior started to change. Even the threat of a push-in is enough sometimes to convince a student to get back on task. And in some cases the relationships between teachers and students started to improve as teachers were freed up to talk things out with students.

“I think it communicates this idea that we’re here to learn and our interest, all of our interests, are for students to be in the class and learning and engaged and to feel supported,” Founds said. She says she doesn’t often have to call for push-ins anymore. When the classroom is calmer overall most kids will stay on task and that has allowed her to feel more comfortable giving students more choice and freedom over their assignments.

HONORED for Team @sfusdCEC to catch a photo with @SFUSD_Supe, Principal @EssienPmessien, & the amazing @mlk_ms Team! #SFUSDEnrollmentFair17 pic.twitter.com/BzV9dqkhSO

— Victor Tam (@PrincipalTam) October 14, 2017

Eighth-grade students who have experienced these changes agreed that the school culture has improved at MLK. On the whole, they said they felt safer and more supported, although they acknowledged discipline felt stricter. Some students weren’t so sure that the push-in process had improved their relationships with teachers, though. They like teachers who demonstrate some understanding and give them chances to improve before getting upset. It was clear, however, that they like and respect the support staff, even saying they feel bad when a teacher calls for a push-in because it means a support person would have to come to the room.

There are still students who want to get out of class and run around the hallways, but they are the exception now. And, when a serious issue does come up, support staff are more available to streamline support systems, make a phone call home, or suspend a student if warranted.

The push-in system isn’t easy for the support staff, who all have other jobs like coordinating social services for students, conducting counseling sessions, communicating with parents and taking care of the paperwork that accompanies any kind of disciplinary action.

“Push-in is a priority because the student is escalated,” said Clifton Szeto, a dean who handles much of the discipline. “So sometimes we have to drop what we’re doing and go for a push-in, and it makes it hard to get your other things done.” All of the seven support staff have these feelings at times, but they also say the culture and climate of the school has improved dramatically because of the push-in system.

Overall, the disruptions feel worth it. Even better, by working more directly alongside teachers, support staff are sharing some of their knowledge about how to form deep relationships with students. Some teachers even ask for feedback on how they handled different situations, looking for guidance on how to improve.

SHIFTING TEACHING PRACTICES

As an instructional leader Essien has credibility because he spent so long in the classroom, but when he started at MLK teachers were wary of him. He knew he needed to show them he could teach, so they’d trust him as a thought partner on how teaching practices could change. He remembers leading a three-day inquiry with an algebra class that got students making predictions, talking to the adults in their lives about algebraic concepts, and debating mathematical ideas. When the lesson was over, the teacher had a new appreciation for what might be possible in his classroom.

Students exploring actual data around diversity of children’s books. I love my AMAZING staff @SFUSD_Supe @SFUnified @pliucb #MLKstrong pic.twitter.com/0XH7Ziw12r

— MLK Middle (@mlk_ms) October 18, 2017

Essien calls this “cognitive disequilibrium,” an experience that displaces teachers from some of their previously held beliefs. With behavior issues causing less stress, teachers are experimenting with project-based learning. MLK held a STEAM night where students displayed their work to the community. Essien said it was a wonderful event, but he noticed that teachers did all the talking. He waited a week so he wouldn’t seem too critical, but then convened teachers to think about how the following year they could get students speaking more. And when the second annual STEAM event rolled around, he said teachers agreed it was even better.

“So what made it better? Teachers still did the same work in terms of working with kids and projects, but the students presented.” Now he’s thinking about how he can make sure every kid presents, and how the school could do themed nights in every subject.

Principal Michael Essien in his office. (Samantha Shanahan/KQED)

“I’m the guy who is always thinking about how can we drill deeper. How can we make something better,” Essien said. “So although I feel good that we’re making these changes, I’m thinking still: How can I support teachers in increasing their capacity.” This quality might also be why Essien has been successful at MLK, something he attributes to his special education training. He’s used to making a plan, evaluating if it’s working, and changing course if goals aren’t being met.

MLK still deals with some behavior issues; it hasn’t completely transformed. But there’s a feeling that all the adults in the building are working toward the same goal and they’ve got a leader who has articulated a clear vision — make MLK Middle the best school in San Francisco. Essien knows his students deserve that.

  A Deeper Look at the Whole School Approach to Behavior published first on https://dlbusinessnow.tumblr.com/

[trendingnewsb]

The Hidden Power of Every Single Person Around You

Other people’s thoughts and behaviors influence you. The people with whom you surround yourself affect your potential. This isn’t just speculation.

A person’s economic mobility is largely determined by the county they live in.[1] Children from low income communities are less likely to have high earning potential than their affluent peers. It’s hard to break out of your surroundings.

Groups of friends may subconsciously pick up one another’s behaviors and living style. They use similar phrases when they speak, and they may influence each other’s clothing choices.

The effect of peer groups has not gone unnoticed in the corporate world as Jim Rohn quote,

“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.”

When we surround ourselves with strong, high-achievers with good character, we are more likely to become just like them. On the other hand, imagine how much of a negative influence low-achievers can have on you. If your five best friends have a poor outlook on life and are satisfied with sub-par performance, then there’s a good chance that some of that negativity will rub off on you.

Others’ Influence Is Easily Overlooked

In order to improve your life, associate with people with higher standards than you. If you have high expectations for yourself and you surround yourself with people who also have bold expectations, you’ll have a greater quality of life.

Everything that you allow into your life and every action you take reflects who you are. Tony Robbins once said,

“Let your grind be a reflection of the standards that you have set for yourself.”

This doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to have the fanciest things or work in the corner office right away, but it does mean that you do the best with whatever means you have. You don’t have to be top dog at the company to do excellent work. You don’t have to be wealthy to keep things organized. Going above and beyond will take you to the next level of success.

If you feel like you’re stagnating in your current situation, it might be time to make some changes. Change and growth can arise when you make conscious choices about your environment.

Beyond aspiring to improve your environment, keeping better company can go a long way toward helping you reach your goals. You can’t go through your life without people, and the types of people with whom you associate can impact your work.

For example, if your friends tend to waste lots of time on their phones and social media, you might be drawn into that cycle of distraction. If you’re health-conscious, but your peers spend all day munching on cookies and chips, you’ll have a hard time sticking to a nutritious diet.

On the other hand, when you’re surrounded by people who are focused when they’re working, you are more likely to be focused. In fact, it’s hard not to be focused because you want to be included and you don’t want to be responsible for breaking someone’s concentration. If you’ve never felt this type of motivation, step into a university library around finals. Everyone is united in their drive to succeed.

Your Network Is Your Net Worth

It’s a quote from Tim Sanders, the former director of Yahoo!

When you surround yourself with people who hold high standard to you, you are surrounded by people who strive to do better. Their energy is contagious and will positively influence you.

Motivation and dedication are contagious.

Imagine working on a team in which 80% of team members are highly motivated and 20% of them slack off. The slackers are in the minority, and they are surrounded by the high achievers.

For the 20%, there are only two options for them. They can’t continue to put out mediocre work because the 80% will not accept it. They will either be influenced to do better work, or they will quit because they are unwilling to keep up. In the end, 100% of the remaining workers will be highly motivated.

If we switched the percentages of high achievers and unmotivated workers, there would be a different outcome. If 80% of workers have a low level of motivation and 20% are highly motivated, the team’s outputs will be low quality. The high achievers will either lower their own standards, or they will become fed up with their team members’ lackadaisical approach. In the end, all remaining team members will exhibit uninspired work performance.

You’ll do more than you thought you could do.

When you are surrounded by people with low standards, you may feel like you don’t have to put in extra work. You may perceive yourself as good enough because you aren’t comparing your work with people aiming for continuous improvement.

This means that even though you may be doing better than the average person in your peer group, you haven’t even scratched the surface of your full potential. Highly motivated people are constantly striving for improvement, and when you spend time with them, you recognize that you have plenty of growing to do too. You’ll make more breakthroughs than you thought possible because you are pushing yourself.

For example, I studied Spanish when I was in college. Most people who were taking the Spanish didn’t care too much about it. When we had to review our translations in class, I was always stuck with a low-achiever. There seemed to be no upside to me putting in extra work since I wasn’t able to learn from my partner. I did well enough to get good grades, but I wasn’t progressing as much as I could have.

My professor was a great teacher, and he noticed that I didn’t seem to be getting much out of group work with my current partner. He paired me with the top student in the class. Suddenly, both of us started doing better work because we were 100% invested in our studies. Her high standards pushed me to work harder and think more deeply. My willingness to learn helped her sharpen her skills by discussing the work with me.

When you control your environment, you control your life.

A fulfilling life doesn’t just come about through a stroke of good luck. If that were true, then people who win the lottery would be guaranteed happiness. In fact, most people who hit the jackpot end up miserable because even though they acquired a windfall of cash, they could not control the people and circumstances around them.[2]

The habits that you commit to every day can have a greater positive impact on your life than getting a large sum of money. When you surround yourself with people who help you grow, you’ll make greater gains. Peers who enrich your life with their presence and actions can help you reach your goals.

One of my friends is a talented artist. He can take what other people would consider to be junk and turn it into fantastic sculptures. He came from a family that did not support his talent. He wanted for nothing in terms of food, clothing, and shelter, but he was completely miserable.

My friend almost gave up on his dream until he met other artists in college. He was surrounded by professors and students who believed in the transformative power of art. He began practicing his craft every day, and today he makes his living off his work.

For my friend, his family life was toxic. Even though he had all of his needs met, he didn’t flourish until he was surrounded by people who had high expectations of him.

Find Friends Who Strive for Excellence

If you feel that you’re stuck, seek out people who have high expectations. Take notice of the coworker that is only satisfied with turning in the best work, and the friend who seems to have a clear direction in his or her life.

Connect with people that have rigorous standards for themselves and others. Talk to them to figure out how they reached their level of success. Perhaps they have a philosophy or mindset that you could adopt to improve yourself.

When you talk to these people, try to learn their perspectives about work, relationships, and life. Analyze why they think the way that they think. As your relationship develops, you can share your perspectives and seek feedback from them.

As you discuss life and work with them, think about what aspects of their approach you would like to incorporate into your life. If some mindset or action has propelled them to be successful, try to emulate that. Mimicking positive behaviors can change your attitude. This is just like forcing yourself to smile to induce happiness or striking a power pose to improve your confidence.

This is not the same as blindly copying whatever someone else does to be successful. This is about thoughtfully analyzing the successes of others and finding what works for you.

Every Relationship Should Push You to Be the Best Version of Yourself

It’s important to keep high standards in all aspects of your life. Look for coworkers, friends and even a romantic partner that bring out the best in you.

By removing the toxicity from your life and seeking people that will accept nothing less than excellence from you, you set yourself up to achieve your dreams.

Featured photo credit: Stocksnap via stocksnap.io

Reference

[1]^The Equality of Opportunity Project: The Geography of Upward Mobility in America[2]^Time: Powerball: Here’s How Winning the Lottery Makes You Miserable

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[maybe-boys-do-love]

Nah, the notes from @emotionallychargedtowel are far too good to leave in the tags. This is what I’m talking about.

My original tags were:

#and like a non-puerile representation of audhd at that!!!#visual sensitivity (photographer)#caught daydreaming and distracted throughout the series#confused by complex social dynamics and protocols#spends hours alone his dark room#keeps all the photos of his hook-ups in an organized filing system#promiscuity one of many examples of acting impulsively#and also allows him to connect without more rigorous social practices#(and to get some d obviously)#famously blunt#doesn’t intuitively understand others’ boundaries#could go through the diagnostic criteria and find more than enough evidence for a dual diagnosis for him#not an excuse for the behavior nor a defense against the consequences he experiences

And @emotionallychargedtowel added:

#first off a big yes to this#good point about his meticulous collection of hookup photos#side point (or maybe not): he’s part of a long tradition in the lgbtq+ community in this respect#take for example sam steward/phil andros and his ‘stud file’ which was immeasurably useful to Alfred Kinsey#maybe edmund white also kept journals about the men he slept with?#kind of puts the photo collection in a different light when you think about it#i'm sure there are other examples from known queer history not to mention who knows how many examples lost to time#raises the question of whether sex is a ‘special interest’ for boston#i think yes#as you alluded to re: photography the flip side of having sensory aversions is particularly enjoying other sensory experiences#boston definitely engages in sensation-seeking on a number of levels#you could also classify a lot of things he does as dopamine-seeking#i think it’s telling that he's surprised by the hypocrisy displayed by his so-called friends despite having known them a long time#maybe he took them at their word about their attitudes and couldn’t pick up on their insincerity#folks with autism can also tend to question social conventions and refuse to abide by them if they think they’re wrongheaded#boston's tendency in this direction is actually one of my favorite things about him#at times he definitely uses this way of thinking to justify things he wants to do in a self-serving manner#but he also makes legitimate points about unjustified norms and judgments#he definitely doesn’t have the best executive functioning ever#his sudden shifts from ‘whatever’ to open antagonism seem to point toward difficulties with emotion regulation#even his undoubtedly harmful manipulative tendencies can make more sense in this context#manipulation might be one of the few tools he has to exercise a modicum of control over his otherwise unpredictable & confusing social worl#anyway i think this framing not only resonates with the text but also points toward a number of potentially useful angles

And like yes, YES! In fact, I don't think the organized collection of photography and the traditions threaded through LGBT+ history are a side point at all (as you hint). Autistic individuals and folks with ADHD have a majorly higher percentage of identifying as not-heterosexual, at least according to the surveys done in this study and this study, and I've often thought about how many Euro-American gay cultural stereotypes and traditions have the flavor of neurodivergence. Compare the gay 'limp wrist' with the autistic T-Rex arms or the 'camp' attachments to outmoded cultural objects (media, decor, etc.) with autistic special interests. How about the particularities around beauty, style, and aesthetic rules and its relationship to visual sensitivity or the thrill of bitchy reading practices that allow someone to be direct in expressing their thoughts? I've always been especially interested in the emerging research about autistic women and how that might relate to our understanding of gay men and transwomen on the spectrum, too. And then there's the promiscuity (affectionate) and impulsive intensity-seeking associated on the adhd-side of the equation, which certainly aligns with aspects of gay culture, too.

And all these things aren't an excuse for his behavior, which can ignore others boundaries or cause social harm for him and others, but a depiction of some adaptive (and maladaptive) strategies someone with audhd, especially unaddressed audhd, might use to navigate a confusing world, but also aspects of gay men’s culture that have been to some degree accepted. And so, like his collecting habits, Boston’s behaviors seem particularly connected to queer history and its relationship to neurodivergence, which is perhaps why it feels so tragic and painful for many to watch him get chewed out, condemned without forgiveness, and excluded from his homonormative friend circle and their economic endeavors. It’s a bit too familiar to many of us about the real turns social circles, businesses, and politics seem to take on the people and behaviors of these marginalized groups when they move into the mainstream.

And what if I saw so many reasons to headcanon Boston as audhd??? What then??????

[trendingnewsb]

The Hidden Power of Every Single Person Around You

Other people’s thoughts and behaviors influence you. The people with whom you surround yourself affect your potential. This isn’t just speculation.

A person’s economic mobility is largely determined by the county they live in.[1] Children from low income communities are less likely to have high earning potential than their affluent peers. It’s hard to break out of your surroundings.

Groups of friends may subconsciously pick up one another’s behaviors and living style. They use similar phrases when they speak, and they may influence each other’s clothing choices.

The effect of peer groups has not gone unnoticed in the corporate world as Jim Rohn quote,

“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.”

When we surround ourselves with strong, high-achievers with good character, we are more likely to become just like them. On the other hand, imagine how much of a negative influence low-achievers can have on you. If your five best friends have a poor outlook on life and are satisfied with sub-par performance, then there’s a good chance that some of that negativity will rub off on you.

Others’ Influence Is Easily Overlooked

In order to improve your life, associate with people with higher standards than you. If you have high expectations for yourself and you surround yourself with people who also have bold expectations, you’ll have a greater quality of life.

Everything that you allow into your life and every action you take reflects who you are. Tony Robbins once said,

“Let your grind be a reflection of the standards that you have set for yourself.”

This doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to have the fanciest things or work in the corner office right away, but it does mean that you do the best with whatever means you have. You don’t have to be top dog at the company to do excellent work. You don’t have to be wealthy to keep things organized. Going above and beyond will take you to the next level of success.

If you feel like you’re stagnating in your current situation, it might be time to make some changes. Change and growth can arise when you make conscious choices about your environment.

Beyond aspiring to improve your environment, keeping better company can go a long way toward helping you reach your goals. You can’t go through your life without people, and the types of people with whom you associate can impact your work.

For example, if your friends tend to waste lots of time on their phones and social media, you might be drawn into that cycle of distraction. If you’re health-conscious, but your peers spend all day munching on cookies and chips, you’ll have a hard time sticking to a nutritious diet.

On the other hand, when you’re surrounded by people who are focused when they’re working, you are more likely to be focused. In fact, it’s hard not to be focused because you want to be included and you don’t want to be responsible for breaking someone’s concentration. If you’ve never felt this type of motivation, step into a university library around finals. Everyone is united in their drive to succeed.

Your Network Is Your Net Worth

It’s a quote from Tim Sanders, the former director of Yahoo!

When you surround yourself with people who hold high standard to you, you are surrounded by people who strive to do better. Their energy is contagious and will positively influence you.

Motivation and dedication are contagious.

Imagine working on a team in which 80% of team members are highly motivated and 20% of them slack off. The slackers are in the minority, and they are surrounded by the high achievers.

For the 20%, there are only two options for them. They can’t continue to put out mediocre work because the 80% will not accept it. They will either be influenced to do better work, or they will quit because they are unwilling to keep up. In the end, 100% of the remaining workers will be highly motivated.

If we switched the percentages of high achievers and unmotivated workers, there would be a different outcome. If 80% of workers have a low level of motivation and 20% are highly motivated, the team’s outputs will be low quality. The high achievers will either lower their own standards, or they will become fed up with their team members’ lackadaisical approach. In the end, all remaining team members will exhibit uninspired work performance.

You’ll do more than you thought you could do.

When you are surrounded by people with low standards, you may feel like you don’t have to put in extra work. You may perceive yourself as good enough because you aren’t comparing your work with people aiming for continuous improvement.

This means that even though you may be doing better than the average person in your peer group, you haven’t even scratched the surface of your full potential. Highly motivated people are constantly striving for improvement, and when you spend time with them, you recognize that you have plenty of growing to do too. You’ll make more breakthroughs than you thought possible because you are pushing yourself.

For example, I studied Spanish when I was in college. Most people who were taking the Spanish didn’t care too much about it. When we had to review our translations in class, I was always stuck with a low-achiever. There seemed to be no upside to me putting in extra work since I wasn’t able to learn from my partner. I did well enough to get good grades, but I wasn’t progressing as much as I could have.

My professor was a great teacher, and he noticed that I didn’t seem to be getting much out of group work with my current partner. He paired me with the top student in the class. Suddenly, both of us started doing better work because we were 100% invested in our studies. Her high standards pushed me to work harder and think more deeply. My willingness to learn helped her sharpen her skills by discussing the work with me.

When you control your environment, you control your life.

A fulfilling life doesn’t just come about through a stroke of good luck. If that were true, then people who win the lottery would be guaranteed happiness. In fact, most people who hit the jackpot end up miserable because even though they acquired a windfall of cash, they could not control the people and circumstances around them.[2]

The habits that you commit to every day can have a greater positive impact on your life than getting a large sum of money. When you surround yourself with people who help you grow, you’ll make greater gains. Peers who enrich your life with their presence and actions can help you reach your goals.

One of my friends is a talented artist. He can take what other people would consider to be junk and turn it into fantastic sculptures. He came from a family that did not support his talent. He wanted for nothing in terms of food, clothing, and shelter, but he was completely miserable.

My friend almost gave up on his dream until he met other artists in college. He was surrounded by professors and students who believed in the transformative power of art. He began practicing his craft every day, and today he makes his living off his work.

For my friend, his family life was toxic. Even though he had all of his needs met, he didn’t flourish until he was surrounded by people who had high expectations of him.

Find Friends Who Strive for Excellence

If you feel that you’re stuck, seek out people who have high expectations. Take notice of the coworker that is only satisfied with turning in the best work, and the friend who seems to have a clear direction in his or her life.

Connect with people that have rigorous standards for themselves and others. Talk to them to figure out how they reached their level of success. Perhaps they have a philosophy or mindset that you could adopt to improve yourself.

When you talk to these people, try to learn their perspectives about work, relationships, and life. Analyze why they think the way that they think. As your relationship develops, you can share your perspectives and seek feedback from them.

As you discuss life and work with them, think about what aspects of their approach you would like to incorporate into your life. If some mindset or action has propelled them to be successful, try to emulate that. Mimicking positive behaviors can change your attitude. This is just like forcing yourself to smile to induce happiness or striking a power pose to improve your confidence.

This is not the same as blindly copying whatever someone else does to be successful. This is about thoughtfully analyzing the successes of others and finding what works for you.

Every Relationship Should Push You to Be the Best Version of Yourself

It’s important to keep high standards in all aspects of your life. Look for coworkers, friends and even a romantic partner that bring out the best in you.

By removing the toxicity from your life and seeking people that will accept nothing less than excellence from you, you set yourself up to achieve your dreams.

Featured photo credit: Stocksnap via stocksnap.io

Reference

[1]^The Equality of Opportunity Project: The Geography of Upward Mobility in America[2]^Time: Powerball: Here’s How Winning the Lottery Makes You Miserable

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