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SETTING THE BAR – 09/02/2020

By September 2, 2020Daily Devotionals

SETTING THE BAR
September 2, 2020

Prayer: Dear Lord, please help me lead my students in the realities of life. Most important, may I show them You in my behavior.

Scripture: For we are not bold to class or compare ourselves with some of those who commend themselves; but when they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are without understanding. 2 Corinthians 10:12 NAS

He lay across the long table, making it tip–his 6’3 frame dangling off both sides. He kept changing his balance, making the table dip like a teeter totter throwing items on the table onto the floor. Later, when I was able to speak to him calmly to tell him why he received a detention he was flabbergasted that lying on a table and causing things to fall was cause for discipline.

He was equally shocked to find that his assault of an administrator the following week was reason for him to be suspended. His eyes were as round as his lips as he tried to make sense of why anyone would discipline him for what he felt was exercising his own rights.

I was watching American Idol this week. One young lady was aghast that the judges said no to her. She put her hands on her hips and demanded an explanation. A student can’t believe he deserves a grade on the inferior paper? A high school athlete can’t accept the refusal on the part of the administration to change a detention because he has practice the day of the assigned detention.

Reality. Reality says that there is a standard and you have not met it. When we lower the bar for students, when reality hits (in the form of a real job with real standards and real expectations) our students stand there, hands on hips, shocked that just because they are late for the sixth time or cheated or didn’t do what they were told that they’re out.

I saw a headline in a Christian publication that put it simply, “Get to work on time, do what you are told, and you will go far.”

Standards. We need to consider that we are setting the bar in our classrooms every day. How high is the bar? Does it realistically represent the bar in the workplace?

This week, think about the bar we set daily: for ourselves and our students. Does it need adjustment?

Copyright Cheryl Skid. Email [email protected]