I Spoke at Plainfield South High School Yesterday and Received This Feedback Last Night

Reposting with permission. See below:

Denise,

It was so GREAT having you come into today for career week.  Your presentation was awesome.  I loved how open and honest you were with the kids and how many different options of career paths you discussed with them.  Amy Brown, the first classroom you spoke in each period, said both her classes wanted to talk about your presentation for the rest of the period after you left.

We would love to have you come in again. 

Thanks for taking time out to speak to our young people.  The need to hear these important life messages from other people besides the ones inside of the school.

You were really great, THANK YOU!

Kristi A. Boe

Counselor:  ORL-SKOR

 

 

So WHAT did I share? Well, considering that out of the four junior and senior English classes I visited, less than ten students enjoyed writing, talking up the benefits of freelance writing as the lifelong means to happiness and prosperity (definitely not prosperity) wasn't gonna wow them.

 

Talking about why I write, however, did. My path from high school student to writer was not a smooth, prosaic one. I didn't follow the established education to career path, so I neither encouraged nor discouraged the students to do the same.

 

I did, however, talk to them about what excited THEM and then encouraged them to go out and pursue it, but I didn't drudge up the well-worn saccharine "follow your dream" speech either.

 

Instead, I peppered my story with examples of what my children and I wanted to do with our lives, along with the unusual paths we traveled to get there.

 

I didn't need a PowerPoint. Heck, I didn't even need a podium. I did, however, bring plenty of writing samples.

 

And I definitely had their attention when I held up a health column sporting the photo of a male doctor of Asian descent and said, "I am he."

 

And I was, when I ghost wrote his column for him. ;)