It was 2011, and I was an awkward high school junior beginning to navigate the realm of Advanced Placement and university preparation. My school ran on a quarter system, and every other quarter, I had a zeroth period. The zeroth period was an hour-long period before school would start, where the concert band would come to class and rehearse their pieces for performances or competitions. So, for two quarters, my weekday schedule (more or less) looked like this:
- 5:45 am: Wake up (6:00 am if I felt like living on the edge)
- 6:00 am: Actually leaving my bed (this includes showering and getting dressed)
- 6:20 am: Trying to finish the mess that was my AP English and Composition Homework
- 6:30 am: Leave the house (I needed to be at school by 6:50 am)
- 6:50 am: Get to class and warm up
- 7:00 am: Start of zeroth period
- 7:45 am: End of zeroth period
- 7:50 am: Eat breakfast
- 8:00 am: Actual start of school
School would end at 3:00 pm, but I usually wouldn't get home until much later due to my participation in other extracurricular activities (outside of the ongoing football and basketball seasons). I also had AP Chemistry and AP English assignments to worry about, thus I often found myself done with academic responsibilities around 3:00 am... with only a few hours left to sleep, and a sense of longing for time to practice activities that I actually LIKED doing. But that was my life, and if I wanted to go to a four-year university, I had to suck it up.
When (bull)shit hit the fan
About a month into this cycle, we began working on a song intended for our winter performance at the end of the quarter. One morning, the song did not sound as was intended – though no one (but the director) could pinpoint why, either. It was 7:00 am, and we kept starting, stopping, and restarting the song, while the director became more and more frustrated with our lack of improvement. After a few more instances of this, he stopped completely, dismissed class, and headed for his office... well, before the morning bell had rung. Our confusion would have ended there if he hadn't come back out, a few minutes later, cursing us out in his frustration. And in that moment, 15-year-old me had to have a (very silent) chuckle. Why? Because in assessing the situation, and how I currently felt about school (and life, actually), I was reminded that morning of how much I wasn't where I wanted to be.
At that point, I was up until 3 am every morning, finishing frustrating chemistry and English assignments, with a cold and cough that refused to pass because of how little sleep I would get, on top of the frustration of never having time to practice like I wanted to, due to the constant time limitations I faced throughout the semester. And outside of these things, I dealt with constantly explaining my tired appearance, brittle hair, and weathered skin to the unaware, as well as hiding the growing feelings of inadequacy, failure, and impending doom from myself (BAD IDEA!) and everyone I interacted with. And now, another sense of failure, from being unable to perform through exhaustion and frustration. It wasn't even 7:30 am.
The situation
It was difficult to find a way out of this. There was no way to reschedule any of the classes; after all, this was finalized months in advance. Failing at any of these activities meant becoming a failure in general, but so did blatantly quitting, as well as openly admitting that it was difficult and unbearable at times. Some students were struggling, but... others weren't. And since it was not affecting the collective quality of performances in public, it was never addressed.
Furthermore, struggling through it all was the "ultimate" show of dedication to the group – no matter how difficult or painful it became, a member who "marched on" and STILL played through it all had more drive than a member who gave up mid-way. So, I quietly made it through those quarters for the duration of the year – alive, but not unscathed.
When I heard about Ally Wakefield and the physical stress forced onto her, I felt nothing but empathy, as well as a dreaded sense of familiarity. Her position on the team –more than likely coveted by many– was now jeopardized by a minor setback, despite showing clear competence in an audition. Perhaps she felt she had no choice but to achieve through this specific method set by her coach -- or, this was the one way to show true dedication to the team and a drive towards success.
Analyzing the situation
The rise of prodigal talent among younger children often creates situations where teachers and coaches resort to intense extremes in pushing students to be great – or at least, as great as their gifted peers.
This can have a positive effect on students – giving them an idea of what it means to work hard, maintain a rigorous schedule, and achieve through constant practice and dedication. However, it often leads to situations where children and teenagers feel obligated to push past the brink of reasonable physical and mental limits. In the end, this form of intensity endows younger generations with an unhealthy and obsessive fear of failure and the idea that inexperience, or the inability to excel at any particular skill from the start, is indicative of severe, unbridled, and unforgivable stupidity.
Indeed, while we appreciate and celebrate the successes of a young person, we disregard the personal struggles that occurred in getting there, for fear of "rewarding mediocrity". We understand that students cannot be praised for mere participation, but have adopted another extreme: expecting students to be top-level from the beginning – and showing hostility and frustration towards students who are invested in their success but struggle to replicate the talent of their more experienced peers.
In shunning the so-called "participation medal." there is also an avoidance to provide any accommodation for a reasonable learning curve – one in which a teacher gives the necessary tools and resources a student needs to master a certain skill set, and holds the student accountable for learning these skills in a reasonable time-frame. Without the "gray area" between the strict, established binaries of success and failure, students adopt an "all-or-nothing" approach to learning new skills –resorting to short periods of high stress and intensity for immediate recognition– rather than a measured and controlled strategy for long-term success.
Wakefield's coaches, who were inevitably fired for their practice methods, had the option to take another approach, outside of selecting candidates with more flexibility or the desired skill sets.
For instance, rather than forcing her (and other members) to defy the current physical limitations of their muscles in an abrupt manner "for the team," a robust lesson plan – with thorough stretching techniques, constant progress checks, and warm up routines that use the same muscle groups– would have achieved the same (if not near the same) results, without injury and within a reasonable time frame. The coaches could have also challenged themselves to choreograph competitive routines that highlight already-existing peaks of talent within the group while utilizing new skill sets that challenge team members to identify and improve upon various techniques during the season.
