Lauren E. Persons

I never feel like I do enough, so it's funny when people ask about my success. I would say that maybe it's because I was able to get down on kids' level and understand what they're going through - maybe I'm childish, or I'd like to think childlike. I had a wonderful principal who, when he hired me to take the drama club at my high school, said 'I want you to really push the envelope.' I don't think principals usually say that! So I did just that--I had high school kids doing Chorus Line, Fahrenheit 451 and To Kill a Mockingbird. We did some pretty gritty stuff. I was able to pick shows and really push the limits with my students, and I think that ability to connect with them and challenge them made a difference.

Another lesson I learned--Students can be the best teachers...In my creative writing class, I asked my students what they wanted to pursue after high school. One of my students said he wanted to be a professional rapper and write and record his own music. Trying to be the voice of reason, I said that dream was akin to being a national sports figure, that few realize that dream. Years later, my student is, indeed, a rapper, recording his own music. I was schooled that day. Fortunately, I had the chance to hear his music, apologize for doubting him and congratulate him.

You know, I think that more than advice, I had my mother as an example. She was one of only a handful of secondary principals in Ohio in the mid-90s. I saw how difficult it was for her to navigate sexism and distrust for women at that time. To watch her run a household, teach, finish school and become a secondary principal for one of the largest high schools in Ohio was quite a feat. She made me realize that women can do what they want to do. And it may not be very easy, but it's doable. That lesson from watching her navigate those challenges as a woman in educational leadership has stayed with me throughout my career.

I've heard so many colleagues struggling with such a hard go dealing with AI and phones and all the challenges in education today. I would say we need good educators - don't give it up. I do think that what would take years and years to change in education now takes only a few months to accomplish. I see really good teachers trying to find the right way to reach their students, and I know it has to be very difficult. I remember substituting during COVID when everything was online, and I was reading 'The Things They Carry,' an incredible, brilliantly written book. I finished a particularly moving passage and said, "this passage is so brutally beautiful. What did O'Brien do in this paragraph?' Crickets. No response. They probably were outside on skateboards for all I knew. I think there was one response, and I thought, wow, how difficult to be a teacher at this time. So yes, it's a challenge, but we need really good teachers, and we need the arts more than anything, I believe. Regardless of the challenges, I would encourage people to go into education.

One of the biggest challenges is the rapid pace of change in education, especially with technology and shifting classroom engagement. However, there is also a strong opportunity to reinvigorate the role of arts in education and to use storytelling and creativity as tools for reaching students more effectively.

I write every morning. As Alice Walker said, "Writing is a very sturdy ladder out of the pit." Writing helps ground me. In addition, I pick a word each day to live by--gratitude, joy, peace. Today's word was kindness. There's so much divisiveness these days that I think it's so necessary to just find the places to extend small acts of kindness. And that's fine - I can't change the world particularly, but I can do it on a small level. I feel very lucky that I had the combination of theater and education because there's nothing like the arts that provides you, particularly theater, where you meet every single kind of person imaginable. It made me feel that I'm pretty open-minded. I attribute that, not only to my parents, but making theatre an important part of my life.