Way to Motivate!

The other day my principal came into my room during the day to give me the results from the state testing last May. As fourth graders, my current students tested in reading, math, and writing. The results from the testing as a whole were not really good. Anyway, the state sends the results to the school districts to distribute as they see fit, either by mail or to send out to schools to send home with kids. It gets quite costly to send them out by mail, so our district hands them out to students. So enter Mr. Principal. Mr. Principal hands me a huge stack and tells me to separate out the results for my students. As I am busily doing this, he proceeds to give the kids a "pep talk." He begins by asking them how many are thinking of college. Just about of fourth of my class raised their hand, I was surprised to see (I have my work cut out for me this year.). But, we are a 51% free and reduced school, so I know money is a poor subject for many families. But there are ways to make it work. Mr. Principal then dives into a speech about the state testing they did from last year, and how it was just a snapshot of where the were at that time, and how the important thing is to work hard to keep improving. This was good. Then came the uninspirational part. He tells the kids how expensive college is, giving as an example the fact that he is paying $12,000.00 a year for his older daughter to attend college. He then has to begin talking more about himself, something he loves to do. He tells the students that he is taking his Administrator's III (or something like that), and when he finishes he will have paid $70,000! So how did he ever think that this was something to motivate my class? Half of my class is on Free and Reduced lunch. Money is tough. It's hard to come by. And here he is, telling them how expensive college is? Doesn't he realize that many kids right then might think, "Well, that's out, then. Guess I'd better do something else..." The next day I decided I had better follow up on that discussion. I asked the class to remember what Mr. Principal had said the other day. I then told the kids that college was absolutely something any one of them could do if they wanted. I talked about studying hard. I talked about scholorships. I said they could work part time while they went to college. I talked about starting (and sometimes finishing) at a community college. I told them that with a college degree, there was nothing that they couldn't do! I hope I motivate quite a few of my kids this year, in spite of Mr. Principal.