I’m going to share a clip with you and if it doesn’t give you goosebumps I’ll be surprised – here we go:

Mark Rober and Son

At around the 3 minute 30 seconds mark this YouTuber describes in vivid detail how a person with autism likely experiences the world.  For those not familiar with Mark Rober, he was a NASA bonafide and Apple engineer; I should have just copied his Wikipedia profile!  The dude’s brain power is legit but the way he captures an audience is uncommon.  More remarkable though, is his next gen Bill Nye-style connection on promoting science and I’ve blogged about him before.  With over 18M subscribers, chances are you may have heard of him too.  And this evening he will be doing a livestream with Jimmy Kimmel and an A-list of celebrities to capstone Autism Awareness Month.

If you need a brain break (we’re in AP and SAT mode right now, with additional state testing on the way heading into these final weeks) I’m invoking all the tricks so check out this previous gem by Mark.  He’s a physics guy and everything he shares has been formed by his study.  But let’s be honest, how many people assemble an obstacle course for squirrels?!  He’s just wicked smart and hilarious in his sharing of knowledge.

And now he is disclosing his son has autism and admits how fiercely protective he is of him.  And later in the announcement there is a reference to a young man named J-Mac featured in the clip playing basketball (it’s worth the wait I promise).  I perked up quickly because I know J-Mac – and much of what I know I’m not going to blog other than he was a remarkable student in the school system I once served and he brought a community together.  He was like no other – he also was a Y guy and we ran into each other often at the gym while he was there with other students from the local high school.

I have never subscribed to the one up game (and I will continue to challenge that dogma) but I think this past year hopefully has taught us we don’t have time for the debate and we best get on board with the we up game.  We need less self-promoters and way more selfless servers.  I attended a meeting earlier this week that gathered basically our district’s brain trust and it was clear we still had some fuel left in the tank.  One principal shared out on a particular initiative and I sent her a follow up note – her leadership is the type we need to clone.  She’s always struck me as genuine and sincere and honest.  She’s not telling me what she thinks I want to hear.

As you head into the weekend on this final day in April, I hope all school folks can get some rest and begin to reflect on this lifetime year.  There is still much work left to be done but overall it’s definitely been a winning season.  And if you are up for some inspiration, check out that livestream I mentioned.

Friday, April 30th | 8PM EST / 5PM PST

I’ve spent the better part of this weekend thus far coming to terms with the title of this entry.  To clarify, I’ve been thinking about the implications of disconnecting and not what I would name this entry.

I’m learning as I go like most of you and as I do I’m leaning towards some new understandings.  Disconnecting in my household usually meant a heated exchange and implied the children consequently had restricted access to technology.  We as parents were disconnecting their access…

At the dinner table on Friday night our conversation made me revisit some of our set rules.  This has been an extremely disruptive year and I sense the adhesive on the duct tape is running weak as it tends to do in summer heat.  One of the concerns raised at my dinner table was how to maintain relationships when the opportunity to form them is COVID curtailed.  And at that moment I finally dialed into how hard it really must be for our kids right now.  In all honesty, it has to be overwhelming.

I went to the grocery store yesterday and I passed one school administrator from one campus and a counselor from another; I had to make a scene with both to establish recognitions (we’re all still wearing SAFETY masks). And then it donned on me how much I have failed to understand the impact of this pandemic. My boys have been in-person learners from the start of the year so they’ve had to wear masks for extended periods. I drop my younger son off at school around 5:50 am for swim practice and my older son generally has tennis practice after school until 4 pm. And yet they have to feel isolated in this whole pandemic response.

I read this article in USA Today which had a not so upbeat tagline and addressed the impact these past forever months have had on our kids.  Unfortunately, it’s a paywall site so if you do not subscribe you more likely will not be able to access.  The summary of the article acknowledged stress and depression are on the rise for America’s youth (the world’s youth for that matter) and feelings of isolation loom large.  In it several individuals were interviewed including children and adults.  One finding by a third party group (YouthTruth; it’s an open source and the survey can be accessed here) was that for high schoolers the biggest stressor has been the sense of disconnect from friends and loved ones compounded by the difficulties of focusing on school or work (we don’t talk nearly as much in the school biz about the impact this pandemic has had on our school-aged work force).  The survey data reflects responses from 20,000 students in grades 5-12 sampled across 9 states in the U.S. and to be honest if you study data like I do it hurts the heart.  The silver lining was the prevailing theme that relationships with teachers provided significant comfort amid all the chaos.  If you access the available slide deck on the website one note of mention is slide 34 – “Student-teacher relationships were reshaped in positive ways as teachers took a more personalized approach.”  As a parent of two, I have definitely observed this shift and it’s not to slight teachers but rather spotlight how collectively they’ve upped their A game.  What I may have overlooked or failed to appreciate was “while relationships with teachers improved for some while learning at home, students across the board reported a diminished sense of belonging in their school community” and “the ability to connect with friends received the lowest average rating of all items in the survey.”  We still have a lot of work left to do in reconnecting our youth – this is a challenge all adults must accept.