Upfront EDUCATION
A headmaster’s parting lesson for parents Too much focus on college preparation ‘extinguishes childhood,’ says head of Menlo School by Chris Kenrick
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n overemphasis on college preparation is “extinguishing childhood” for too many of today’s kids, says Norm Colb, who is nearing completion of his second decade as head of Menlo School in Atherton. Constant anxiety over grades and performance is a losing strategy for nurturing the self-confident, resilient, morally centered young adults who will succeed in the world, he believes. More than anything, today’s teens need “less worry and more enjoyment” from their parents — and opportunities for autonomy, the avuncular headmaster told a major gathering of Menlo parents and alumni Saturday, Feb. 9. Colb — who leaves Menlo this summer after nearly 50 years in public and private education — gently but firmly implored parents to resist the impulse to micromanage their children’s lives. Parental anxiety — which is contagious to kids — and “the pernicious quest for grades won’t lead us to where we want to go with our children,” he said. Colb illustrated his hour-long talk with a series of New Yorker cartoons, including his favorite: a clearly distraught teenager sitting on her bed with her mother at the door saying, “Try and tell me what’s bothering you — and use your SAT words.” He outlined four well-meaning parental behaviors that he warned have the perverse effect of undermining competence and self-confidence in teens: micromanagement of kids’ lives; overemphasis on grades and college admission; the “subcontracting of parenting” to others, including schools and the media; and worrying. “When parents correct the grammar, the spelling, the punctuation, the paragraphs, the student never learns those things. They get better grades, but they don’t do the learning,” he said. Cash incentives or other bribes for good grades as well as the increasing
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Woman mugged, robbed in downtown Palo Alto
use of “study drugs” such as Adderall promote superficial, short-term learning and are “very worrisome,” Colb said. Grade obsession has led to a plethora of cheating scandals at top schools such as the hypercompetitive Stuyvesant High School in New York City and Harvard University, he noted. “When I say the pursuit of grades is a toxin, this is what I mean,” he said. “It extinguishes engagement, can promote a barter economy in the family and does not promote the genuine learning I think we all want for our kids.” Pushing a child just enough so that she “gets into that next tier” of colleges also can backfire, he warned. “So I’ve spent four years of high school pressing my kid to get higher and higher Norm Colb grades so they can go to a university where they feel below average. “I’d much prefer a slightly less competitive college where the student ends up feeling powerful. I think kids would be much better served thinking of themselves as powerful than as marginal.” Colb said the “subcontracting of parenting” to schools is an honor for the schools, but parenting really needs to happen at home. And substituting television and other media for in-person parental attention is especially dangerous, he said. “Kids learn their values, their sense of self, at your breakfast table,” he told parents. Colb said his personal specialty as a parent — his kids are now well into adulthood — was worrying, “morning and night.” “The pressure is communicated very readily to kids,” he said. “These behaviors don’t launch
our kids into lives of great purpose. They just don’t. “If you worry about them incessantly they’ll worry about themselves. If you’re calm and competent about them, you give them a gift that lasts a lifetime. “What kids need from us is authentic, patient, loving, unloaded, unworried time.” Colb, who announced more than a year ago he would leave Menlo this summer, originally planned to retire but has changed plans. He will become head of school at Sage Ridge School, a 15-year-old independent school in Reno, Nev. Before joining Menlo in 1993 he spent nearly 30 years in public education, first as an English teacher in Brookline, Mass., and later as superintendent of schools in Mamaroneck, N.Y., where he dealt with seven separate employee unions. He said he switched to private education “to get closer to kids.” The teaching profession doesn’t have the status that it should, he believes. “The way I read the news, it’s progressively more debased, and I think that’s a tragedy. “Every profession has its marginal employees, but the press and political establishment seems to delight in focusing on (failed teachers) as opposed to the gifted teacher who works so hard day in and day out to raise up the next generation. “It’s really remarkable that the profession doesn’t enjoy that status, and I think we will pay a price for that.” Teachers should be viewed as an asset, not as labor, and need certain conditions to thrive: to be respected; to be paid well enough to live in the local economy; to be involved in decision-making; to have a certain degree of job security and professional renewal. “If you put these ingredients together, you could start to move the needle,” he said. N Staff Writer Chris Kenrick can be emailed at ckenrick@paweekly. com.
A woman was thrown to the ground and robbed of her purse in downtown Palo Alto Wednesday evening, Feb. 13, and the robber is still at large, police have announced. (Posted Feb. 13 at 10:48 p.m.)
Better Place to drive out of Palo Alto Better Place, a Palo Alto company that in recent years has become synonymous with the city’s drive to promote electric vehicles, plans to shutter its local headquarters in the coming months and focus its energies on Israel and Denmark. (Posted Feb. 13 at 5:20 p.m.)
Stanford trustees approve tuition hikes Stanford University’s undergraduate charges will rise 3.5 percent next year to $56,441, the board of trustees decided this week. A similar 3.5 percent increase was approved for general graduate, graduate engineering, medical and law students, while business students will see their tuition rise by 3.9 percent. (Posted Feb. 12 at 1:33 p.m.)
Police chief invites public on ‘virtual ride-along’ Palo Alto Police Chief Dennis Burns will don his police uniform, get behind the wheel of a patrol car and bring the community with him on a “virtual ride-along” this Friday as part of his department’s recent effort to expand its social-media presence. (Posted Feb. 12 at 11:07 a.m.)
Silicon Valley is second in U.S. in wealth Silicon Valley had the second-highest concentration of wealthy households during the period of 2007-2011, according to a report the U.S. Census Bureau released Monday, Feb. 11. (Posted Feb. 12 at 9:37 a.m.)
Big transformation underway for San Antonio area Clearly, the recession is over in the local housing sector. New development could bring more than 1,300 new homes to the San Antonio Road and El Camino Real area of Mountain View, so many that a new school may be needed to accommodate the new population. (Posted Feb. 11 at 10:03 p.m.)
Menlo Park man shot in East Palo Alto Police in East Palo Alto are investigating a shooting that sent a Menlo Park man to a hospital Saturday night with non-life-threatening injuries. (Posted Feb. 10 at 2:23 p.m.)
Man robbed at gunpoint near Greer Park A man was robbed at gunpoint in the carport of an apartment complex on the 1000 block of Tanland Drive on Saturday morning, Feb. 9, according to police. (Posted Feb. 9 at 5:57 p.m.)
Man killed by train in Palo Alto identified A pedestrian who was struck and killed by a train in Palo Alto on Friday has been identified as Jonathan Lazarus, 28, of Sunnyvale, the Santa Clara County Coroner’s office said on Tuesday. (Posted Feb. 8 at 8:29 p.m.)
Palo Alto teacher salaries compared statewide The average public school teacher in Palo Alto earns somewhere in the middle — not the highest, not the lowest — compared to teachers in surrounding communities. (Posted Feb. 8 at 9:56 a.m.)
Palo Alto Bicycles would like to invite you to join us for an evening event of wine, hor d’ oeuvres and Trek Travel. Whether it is white water rafting in Costa Rica, amazing sunset wine tasting in Tuscany or climbing the legendary mountain passes of the Alps,Trek Travel has your vacation of a lifetime. Please join us for a relaxing evening with fellow cyclists and vacation enthusiasts! Raffle prizes throughout the evening, Grand Prize:Trek Travel Luxury Long Wine Country Weekend for 2 in 2013. No purchase necessary. WHEN Thursday February 28th 2013 | 6:30 pm - 8:00 pm WHERE Palo Alto Bicycles, 171 University Avenue, Palo Alto RSVP Space is limited please respond to trektravel@paloaltobicycles.com
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