Work Update

Recently, I have been rather hesitant to write new "Highlight of the Day" segments of my blog. This is something that is supposed to force me to update my blog on a near-daily basis by talking about an interesting or funny story from work.  Currently, my work is being a one-on-one with a young man who has autism.  These days, my job consists mostly of the same schedule everyday.

In the morning, my student comes to school, and we spend the first few hours of school dealing with bad behavior.  These includes inappropriate language and topics of conversation, violent and threatening language, hitting and kicking objects, and throwing objects.  When he get's angry and aggressive (and there isn't always a reason why he gets angry), I become the primary target of his aggression because I spend the most time with him.  So far, I have been kicked, spit on, and had various objects thrown at me.  Some of this behavior is work avoidance, and some of it is his Torette's.  Depending on the day, there is little or any school work that gets done by lunch.  He goes to lunch, and usually takes a nap (a product of the different types of medicine he is on).  By the time he wakes up, he has time to do maybe one or two assignments.  There are usually less than 2 hours left by the time we reach this point in the school day.  With maybe an occasional exception here and there, my student's schedule goes like this everyday.

I guess I have been hesitant to write about my job because, frankly, I haven't felt like writing about it.  At times, my job is fascinating and silly (he can be a really funny and sweet kid).  At other times, it is frustrating and downright depressing.  I feel so bad for the emotional roller coaster that his mind takes him on from hour-to-hour.  A lot of nights, the last thing I want to do is sit down and write about these difficult days in an internet post.  I hope readers will understand where I am coming from.

That doesn't mean I won't ever share any stories.  For instance, my student was talking about Monty Python yesterday, and he did his impression of the monks who hit themselves from The Holy Grail.  I don't think I have laughed that hard in a long time, and I know the other adults in the room thought it was funny too (by the way, he didn't actually hit himself).  For those of you who have never seen The Hold Grail and don't know what I'm talking about: first of all, SHAME ON YOU FOR NOT SEEING IT.  Go rent it right now.  Secondly, here are the monks who hit themselves.

Figting for the 100% (Not Against the 1%)

Activist Van Jones gives perhaps the best speech on the Occupy Wall Street movement at Occupy Boston since it began several weeks ago. Jones does an excelling job of highlighting the movement's short history, and explains the significance of demonstration and occupation as a tactic (as opposed to tactics like lobbying and writing politicians). The speech is quite inspiring despite the fact that a fire alarm continuously sounds off during the second half of the speech.



I say this is the best speech on the movement, but I am open to other suggestions if you find a better speech. Bill Maher's most recent New Rules is a good one also.

A video for Sunday II

Here is a gorgeous time-lapse nature video filmed in Iceland. Absolutely breathtaking!


Midnight Sun | Iceland from SCIENTIFANTASTIC on Vimeo.

A Video for Sunday: More Occupy Wall Street

One can never go wrong with the great Bill Maher. Here, Maher defends the Occupy Wall Street, and discusses the reality of the movement that so many of it's detractors don't want to admit: Occupy Wall Street is not a bunch of hippies.

There may be a few hippies there, but the reality is that the overwhelming majority of the movement are filled with everyday people who are either hard-working, or who can't work because of our shitty economy. Maher is as witty and poignant as ever in this video.



Remember, we are the 99% (hippies and non-hippies alike)

Early Childhood Education, Poverty, and Occupy Wall Street

Nicholas Kristoff recently wrote a fascinating piece regarding education and the Occupy Wall Street movement.  He seems generally in favor of what the movement stands for: the desire to change economic inequality in this country.  While Kristoff doesn't belittle ideas such as raising taxes on the rich, or throwing bankers in jail, he says those ideas will not be nearly as effective to fixing the crisis of income inequality as expanding early childhood education:

But although part of the problem is billionaires being taxed at lower rates than those with more modest incomes, a bigger source of structural inequality is that many young people never get the skills to compete.  They're just left behind.

I agree with the importance of funding early childhood education (and public education in general) as a means of changing society.  After all, one of the biggest reasons why many teachers choose the career they do is to make a greater difference in society (I would include myself in this category).  I don't know if it is more important that other policy measures such as raising taxes, and passing more baking and business regulations.  But nonetheless, education is highly important.  Here is another excerpt from Kristof's column:

“This is where inequality starts,” said Kathleen McCartney, the dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, as she showed me a chart demonstrating that even before kindergarten there are significant performance gaps between rich and poor students. Those gaps then widen further in school.

 “The reason early education is important is that you build a foundation for school success,” she added. “And success breeds success.”

Kristof goes onto quote Nobel Prize winning economist James Heckman, who says something I'm not sure I quite agree with.

“Schooling after the second grade plays only a minor role in creating or reducing gaps,” Heckman argues in an important article this year in American Educator. “It is imperative to change the way we look at education. We should invest in the foundation of school readiness from birth to age 5.”

One's early childhood education can determine a lot about how a student will fair in school.  I would even go so far to say that early childhood education does have a bigger impact on a child's education than upper elementary and secondary education does.   But I am skeptical that schooling from grades 3 and up only play a "minor role". 

Admittedly, I have not read Heckman's article, and I am sure he has good data and points to support his assertion.  But how can 10 additional years in school be considered a minor?  How are we defining what important vs less important?  I am not saying Heckman is wrong, I am just skeptical of his assertion.

Kristof also discusses the importance of the Head Start program.  I know multiple educators who like to criticize Head Start (and rightly so to a point) because of the long term ineffectiveness the program seems to have on a child's education.  While Kristoff admits the program has faults, he also shows that it is far better to have Head Start than nothing at all, showing the need for early childhood education:

Take Head Start, which serves more than 900,000 low-income children a year. There are flaws in Head Start, and researchers have found that while it improved test results, those gains were fleeting. As a result, Head Start seemed to confer no lasting benefits, and it has been widely criticized as a failure.

Not so fast.

One of the Harvard scholars I interviewed, David Deming, compared the outcomes of children who were in Head Start with their siblings who did not participate. Professor Deming found that critics were right that the Head Start advantage in test scores faded quickly. But, in other areas, perhaps more important ones, he found that Head Start had a significant long-term impact: the former Head Start participants are significantly less likely than siblings to repeat grades, to be diagnosed with a learning disability, or to suffer the kind of poor health associated with poverty. Head Start alumni were more likely than their siblings to graduate from high school and attend college.

Finally, Kristoff finished his column by discussing President Obama's need to fulfill his 2008 campaign promise of greater funding for early childhood education. 

President Obama often talked in his campaign about early childhood education, and he probably agrees with everything I’ve said. But the issue has slipped away and off the agenda.

That’s sad because the question isn’t whether we can afford early childhood education, but whether we can afford not to provide it. We can pay for prisons or we can pay, less, for early childhood education to help build a fairer and more equitable nation.

It is surprising that no one other columnists or pundits have brought this up.  Not that the Republicans will let him pass new spending on this, but Obama should at least try.  He also needs to quit supporting asinine measures such as Race To The Top and merit pay which only hurts education.  Like a lot of those on the "education reformer" side of the debate, I believe the President has good intentions when it comes to what education in America should look like.  But the reality of his education policies so far only hurt schools because they do so much to hurt teachers and push standardized testing.  This is not the way to fix American education, and it is damn sure not the way to help combat poverty in the long run.

Highlight of the Day: 10/20/2011

Two new things to report on:

1) Great day for my student. No behavior problems at all.  First time that has happened since the first day I worked with him last week.  I hope we can have days like this on a regular basis, but for right now, I will take once a week.

2) I finished up a mandatory, crisis intervention program that I have been attending for a few weeks now.  It wouldn't be so bad, except they have been taking place after school and going into the evening.  I missed the first half of the World Series tonight.  But, I took my test tonight, I'm got the proper certification my building requires me to have, and I am done with it.

 This day calls for a song.  Ice Cube, will you do the honors?

Being Left Behind Never Looked So Good

Cartoon courtesy of Join the Future

Highlight of the Day: 10/18/2011

Since I wrote my last Highlight of the Day, the student I am working with has (for a lack of a better phrase) shown me the other side of his personality.  At multiple points during a given day, he will swear, insult me, and utter some of the most outlandish and shocking vulgarities I have ever heard (and I don't shock easy).  Although less frequent, he has also shown my violent behavior ranging from kicking and pound walls, to kicking tables, to once even kicking me.  While he has never outright refused to do any school work for me, there is only so much work that is completed during the day.  He does have moments where he is calm, polite, fairly rational, and even remorseful for when he does behave badly.  But, having said that, the behavior I saw the first day I worked with him was not same I have seen since.  While everyday brings at least one great challenge, I can say with complete sincerity that I am still happy to be working with this young man, and will do everything I can to be a good teacher to him.  Especially given the fact that, so far, I am the one that is doing any teaching with him throughout the day.

And in less pressing news . . .

MY ST. LOUIS CARDINALS ARE GOING TO THE WORLD SERIES!!!!!

 

Photo by Robert Cohen of St. Louis Post Dispatch

Bring it on, Texas!

MLK, Poverty, and Occupy Wall Street

Picture of Martin Luther King at a march for sanitation workers in Memphis.  Photo comes from San Francisco Bay View website.

Today, nearly everyone from every political background admires King.  But if King were alive today, he probably would have been called a "a left-wing nut", a "socialist", and even "anti-American".  And just like the Occupy Wall Street movement today, King was considered both radical and controversial during his time.

Today, the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial had it's long-awaited dedication.  It is only by coincidence that the Occupy Wall Street movement is gradually increasing support across the country, and around the world.  There is no doubt that today, MLK would not only support the movement with his words, but would be right there with the protesters risking arrest.

Indeed, right before he was assassinated, King had helped organize the "Poor People's Campaign", which was focused on economic justice in the United States.  43 years later, the Occupy Wall Street movement is protesting economic justice in a similar manner as the protests King was involved in, but under different circumstances.  Just as Americans all love Martin Luther King now, and realize how right he was, will America look back to the supporters of the Occupy Wall Street movement in 40 years, and realize how right they are?  I can only hope so.

Here is a link to a YouTube video from a few months back by the amazing Tavis Smiley. He discusses the vital need for American politicians to tackle the issue of poverty (he quote King at the beginning of the video).  This was made before the Occupy Wall Street movement, but it does allude to the disgusting fact that so much wealth in America (the richest, most powerful nation in the history of the world), is occupied by the richest 1%.  This is one of the main things the Occupy Wall Street protesters are standing up against.

Video for Sunday

Recently, I have been watching episodes of The Cosby Show.  In addition to being a comedic and artistic genius, Bill Cosby is also freaking smart (he has a education doctorate).  Here is perhaps the most famous scene from his show, when he is talking to his son Theo about the importance of going to college.



In addition to learning lessons from my own parents, I know I will be borrowing parenting strategies from Dr. Cosby whenever I become a Dad.

Highlight of the Day: 10/12/11

Today at work, I received a new assignment for my job.  For the foreseeable future, I will be an all day, one-on-one para with for a young man who is new at our school.  In addition to a behavior disorder, this particular also has a PDD NOS (part of the autism spectrum), a speech disorder, and is intellectually disabled.  Because I am the only staff member (including certified teachers) who has experience working with ID students in the building, I was a natural fit for the position.

He is a very sweet, young man who unfortunately had a major meltdown on his first day at the school.  They put him right into the main classrooms at our school, which was obviously going to work for this young man.  For the time being, we are keeping him away from students and classes, and letting him get adjusted into the new environment.  Gradually, as he adapts to the new school, we will start letting him attend class, and work on more and more assignments.  In the meantime, I am trying to work with him on a little academics here and there (primarily to see where he is at academically), with frequent breaks in between.  I am also taking time to bond with him, so I can get to know him, and vice versa so he can have someone to feel comfortable with at school.

I am very excited to have been given this opportunity, and it is a major responsibility on my part.  Unfortunately, there is a first impression of what this young man is already like among many of the staff members and students due to his behavior on his first day.  One of the things I am trying to do now is to convey to others that this is actually a very nice young man who will act out if we don't work with him in the appropriate manner. 

Highlight of the Day: 10/11/11

At my evening, tutoring job, I was told that one of the students I was working (who I have been working on with reading skills), is now reading at home, which she never used to do, and the parents wanted to thank me.  I don't how much of that is actually me, but it still feels good.  It was a great way to end the day.

Highlight of the Day: 10/10/11

I was helping a student with Asperger's on a project.  He starts talking about his iPod, which leads into some interesting views on politics.  Here is what he said as closely and accurately as I can remember it:

"I wish I could afford to update music on my iPod more than once a month.  Being poor sucks.  Take it from me.  If I were President of the United States, I would tax the rich and give everyone in the country $2 billion.  That way, no one would be poor anymore.  I don't wonder what that would do to the deficit.  But I don't care.  I would resign after one term in office.  You know who this country should elect President?  That guy from New Jersey.  He is a fat guy.  American's are all fat.  It makes perfect sense."

Well, it makes more sense than just about anything the Tea Party has ever come up with.

A Video for Sunday: Socialism/Occupy Wall Street Edition

 

Picture from Crain's New York Business

This week, I am providing a double dose of videos.

I recently had the immense pleasure of listening to Upton Sinclair's The Jungle on audio book.  It's a novel about a Lithuanian family that moves to Chicago trying to find the American dream at the beginning of the 20th century.  What they actually find is personal and economic hardships not to be wished upon anyone.  Numerous events of a devastating nature crush the family into the lowest depths of despondency and poverty.  By the end of the novel, the main character, Jurgis Rudkus, realizes that evils of American capitalism and finds grace in supporting the socialist movement.  The novel was Sinclair's attempt for the American people to look at the evils of American economic system, and realize that socialism is the direction the country needed to head in.  Here is a video, originally posted on TeacherTube, that talks about the book a little more in depth, and what the real legacy of the book actually came to be after it was published. 



This book, as well as the the ever-growing Occupy Wall Street protests, provides a good opportunity to re-look at socialism.  For the longest time, the word "socialism" has had a dirty connotation to it in the United States, and even more so from the American right ever since Obama took office.  When people hear the term, they equate it with communism.  Images of the Soviet Union, Maoist China, and Che Guevera come to many American's minds.  But the reality is that most developed countries around the world, including the United States, have socialism in their economic system to a certain point.  Except unlike other countries in the world, socialism is generally not the evil, dirty word that it is in the United States.  And truth be told, many of us who do call ourselves socialists wouldn't advocate government takeover of all industries and private property (like some claim).  Most socialists (including myself) would probably prefer a type of mixed economic system: a capitalist/socialist hybrid where great emphasis is placed on economic equality, worker's right, and protections in case something bad happens to one of it's citizens (e.g. health care, unemployment benefits, etc.)  Here is a clip from a while ago by MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell on the the use of the word "socialist" to describe himself.



It should be noted that not all those who support the Occupy Wall Street movement are socialists.  What those of us who do support these demonstrations agree upon is that damage that the banks and corporations have done to our economy, and that something needs to be done about the way they do business.  It is a grave injustice that in this economy, corporations are receiving record profits, CEOs and other corporate executives are receiving bonuses, and more corporate cash than ever is being filtered into our political system (among so many other things).  All the while, no new jobs are being added to our economy, and millions of American's are suffering economic hardship, and are worried that they will never be financially secure again.  I won't say we have it as rough as Jurgis and his family did in the early 20th Century, but it is still quite bad, and we deserve better.

Photo from rrstar.com

There are those (myself included) who support the movement, but have expressed criticism to protesters on a couple of different points.  First, the protest needs to broaden it's marchers so that it will be more than just "hippie-types".  While it is perhaps unfair to classify all of those involved with such a stereotype (and we should be grateful to those "hippie-types" for getting the protest off the ground), this is a movement that has grown into something big.  If we really are the "99ers", and we really want to make a significant change in our system, our movement must go mainstream, and try to bring in more than those from the activist left.  We need to bring in average citizens who may normally not be involved with political issues  These can be liberals, socialists, fed up capitalists, moderates, maybe even some conservatives.  We need to grow and unify.

A second criticism is that, while those who are protesting are clearly angry at the actions of Wall Street, they must also be able to come up with some specific, concrete ideas for policy change.  Hopefully, this movement is young, and when it comes to the potential to create change, the sky is the limit.  However, Eric Stetson at Daily Kos has some good ideas for short term changes:

1. A bailout for homeowners who are facing foreclosure and unemployed people with student loan debt -- of equal or greater value as the bank bailouts. Give these people a fresh start by forgiving their debts and keeping them in their homes, and thus improving the economy for all.
2. The "Buffett Tax" (i.e. taxing capital gains at the same rate as income earned from a job, so that working people won't pay higher taxes than the idle rich). It's only fair! And this will help to fund #1.
3. A short-term trading transaction tax for people and financial institutions who use Wall Street as a casino. Such a tax could raise huge amounts of money to fund #1, and would likely reduce the volatility in the markets by making computerized "high frequency auto-trading" by large investment companies less profitable. Such a tax would also make it harder for already-wealthy institutions to "vacuum up" more and more money from the productive sectors of the economy into the black hole of their own coffers.

Highlight of the Day: 10/5/2011

At my full-time job, it seemed even crazier than usual, but there aren't really any interesting stories to share.  At my part-time job tutoring job however,I had a moment with a student that I would like to share.

I was working with a young girl in middle school, and she was telling me that in a book she is reading, a physically disabled boy was labeled by a doctor as an "idiot", and then hospitalized.  She said, "That is what they called them back in the old days.  Isn't that sad?" 

I agreed with her that is sad, but fortunately, we as a society have gotten a lot better with the way disabled individuals are treated.  She talked about her disabled cousin who is "slow" (I took that to mean he had an intellectual disability), and wondered if he would have been labeled an "idiot" back then (he probably would have).  She then said she wondered if he was autistic. 

With that statement, the conversation took a sudden turn into a new direction.  I was not upset with her as it is quite common for individuals who do not work with the disabled to make that mistake. I explained that an individual with autism doesn't mean that they have an intellectual disability, and that often times, their intelligence is as good as or better than everyone else. 

I didn't spend too long explaining the difference between autism and intellectual disabilities (regretfully, I used the term "mentally challenged with her, which I will try and not do again).  Also, I didn't go into other areas of conversation, such as the fact that many people with autism who do test "mentally retarded" on a normal IQ test may not be so because such tests are not generally suited for the communication issues that go along with autism.  For one, she is in middle school.  And also, we had to get back to the math work we were doing.

Since I am on the topic, here is a great little article by a woman named Sue Robin.  Sue is severely autistic, and back in 2003 (when she was in college), she wrote a short essay about autism myths, including the one that most individual with autism are intellectually disabled.  Here is an exert:

As a really autistic person I am definitely qualified to address the topic of myths about autism and mental retardation.  The first myth I would like to attack is that 75% to 80% of all people with autism are mentally retarded.  Some professionals have reduced that number to 50% because so many of the young children now being diagnosed have Asperger’s Syndrome or High Functioning Autism.  Seventy-five, eighty, or fifty – they are all wrong.  Those of us who don’t speak, or speak echolalically, are counted as retarded.  We also score in the retarded range of I.Q. tests, so it is reasonable that we are assumed to be retarded.  What we have found through use of Facilitated Communication is that these low functioning people have at least normal intelligence with lots of movement problems masking their intellect. 

I am a great example.  Without facilitation I still test as a retarded person because I can’t manipulate objects to pass a non-verbal intelligence test.  When allowed to type, which I can do independently, I can answer the same questions.  For example, when asked to put similar cards together, I couldn’t do it.  But when the cards were labeled A, B, C, D, etc., I was able to type which cards belonged together.  Clearly I understood the task and could answer correctly, but not in the standard way. 

Highlight of the Day: 10/4/2011

Nothing too exciting going on today.  I had to give referrals to a couple of students, and one student was testing my patience when I watched him during ISS today.

For my lack of anything interesting happening today, here is an awesome, hilarious Beastie Boys video with an all-star cast.

Highlight of the Day: 10/3/2011

Today, we did not work with students.  Instead, the teachers attended numerous in service meetings, and the paras watched training videos.  One video we watched really hit home with my old teaching job: teaching life skills to Intellectually Disabled students.

Specifically, the video was about teaching what is known as "The Hidden Curriculum" to students with Autism.  What this refers to is the instruction of skills to students revolving around social etiquette and what is generally considered common sense behavior in social situations that most of us learn as we grow up (without ever really being taught).  Examples includes when is the appropriate time to use profanity (not around adults or certain social situations), using tactful conversation with someone you may not see eye to eye with, or even when is it appropriate time and place to pick or scratch at oneself (that includes ALL of their body parts).

Some good examples of what an Autistic student might need to learn can be found on the video below.  You may want to mute the volume as you don't need it, and the music playing in the background repeats itself over and over (it gets quite annoying):




As the speaker in the video shared examples of the hidden curriculum, I kept thinking of the different autistic students I worked with.  At my current job, we have several students with Asperger's Syndrome, though I don't work with them as much as work with students who have conduct disorders and severe mental illness.  I hope that in the future, I get the opportunity to work with more students who have Autism, as they are an immense pleasure to work with.

It Gets Better

Photo of Mitchell Wilson from Huffington Post

Over the past year or so, the "It Get's Better" has garnered much attention to the issue of GLBT teens committing suicide after they were bullied in school.  It started out as a project to GLBT teens, but has seemed to morphed into a message for all teens who are bullied, regardless of their sexual orientation.  It is a wonderful message that more teens need to hear.

Above is a picture of Mitchell Wilson.  Mitchell was an 11-year-old boy with muscular dystrophy in Ontario, Canada who committed suicide after being beaten up and robbed by another student.  Mitchell was the previous recipient of bullying, and after the assault, he was so terrified of going back to school and running into that student that he took his own life.  More details on Mitchell's death can be found here, but there is so much to be disturbed about this story on so many levels.  It is more than just the fact that he was a young man who was bullied, and committed suicide.  It is the fact that Mitchell was so young (not even a teenager), the fact that he was physically disabled, and the fact he wasn't merely teased or pushed around, but violently assaulted.  There have been very few stories in my life that have made me as sick as this one. 

Certainly, bullying is an all too frequent part of school growing up.  Traditionally, adults have taken a nonchalance attitude towards it.  Some will say it's merely a case of "kids being kids".  Others see it almost as a right of passage, or it will make someone a stronger person in the long run.  I can't say there isn't a hint of truth in any of those assertions, but it doesn't mean that bullying is harmless, and it certainly shouldn't be tolerated by anyone (especially adults).  Fortunately, times have changed, and people are not starting to wise up to how damaging bullying can be.  Since I started my career as an educator a couple of years ago, I have always had a zero tolerance attitude towards bullying in my classroom.  Mitchell's story has only renewed my commitment to stand up to bullying.

Like so many others, I was bullied growing up.  I wasn't bullied or assaulted in the same fashion that Mitchell was (although I did take my share of physical abuse from peers).  And I am straight, so I was not picked on for my sexual orientation (although I was called words like a "queer" and a "faggot" on several occasions).  I was simply a social awkward young man who was trying to fit in where I could.  Middle school was the most miserable three years of my life because of bullying.  I remember it being a good day at school when I was only called a "faggot" once, and maybe flicked in the ear a couple of times.

Oddly enough, a number of the students who bullied me I considered friends for the longest time.  For a while, I thought that beating each other up and calling each other hurtful names were how friends treated each other.  By the time I left middle school, I figured out that wasn't how friends treat each other, and I had almost no self-esteem left.  Suicide never crossed my mind, although I was probably really close to that becoming an option in my mind.  I do remember thinking that no one would ever love me and my life would never amount to anything.  There was very little I felt I could do about my own bullying at the time, although if I had to do it again, I would have probably tried to seek out help from school counselors. 

When I entered high school, I decided I would keep my mind and energy focused on getting good grades so I could go to college, and get a fresh start.  The bullying situation, for the most part, got better for me as high school went on, although I know that for so many others, the torment of bullying gets only worse.  One major regret I do have is not standing up whenever I saw other students get bullied.  I didn't stand up because I didn't want to get singled out myself.  I was afraid I would somehow divert the attention of bullying to myself.  I now wish I would have stood up and said something.

I ended up graduating high school and going to college.  I have done so much with my life since then.  This includes graduating college, starting my career, having lots of great friends, and getting married to a wonderful wife.  While I won't say I don't ever think about all those years I was tormented with bullying, I now know that my teenage years, as hard as they were, are only a small part of my life.  For anyone reading this post who happens to be in school now and is being bullied (regardless why you are being bullied), I want to let you know that IT DOES GET BETTER.  Know that no matter how hard it feels right now, it will not always be like this. 

I would like to add something else, and I know this may be hard for you to do if you are being bullied.  Do not look at your bully with hate.  At my current position, I work with students who have sever behavior and conduct disorders.  The students I work with frequently bully other students.  One thing I can tell you about such students is that they aren't bad people, and they aren't naturally prone bullying others.  Often times, they come from broken homes, and lives of dysfunction.  They may even be the products of bullying themselves, except the bullies in their lives may not be peers, but members of their own family.  By no means am I trying to justify their actions, and I would not go as far to say that you shouldn't take it personally.  Just know that generally, bullying comes from a place of pain and torment on the part of the bullier.

If you are having trouble dealing with bullying, there are a number of great outlets that you can go to and get help.  For starters, there is your school counselor, but there is also the National Suicide Prevention Hot line (1-800-273-8255), as well as stopbullying.gov.  Please, don't hesitate to get help if you need it. 

A Video for Sunday

Recently, the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell has allowed gay and lesbian active members of the military to come out of the closet.  Here is a video that has become a YouTube sensation.  It is a soldier stationed in Germany calling his father and telling him he was gay.  You may have already seen this video.  But if you haven't it is worth a watch.  It is both moving and coragous.




By the way, if you are someone who still thinks repealling Don't Ask, Don't Tell is a bad idea (I'm looking at you Republican debate audiences), you might want to not only take a look at yourself as a human being, but also who also supports it's repeal.  Two Words: TOBY. KEITH.