If James Talarico has a superpower, it is from his experience as a middle school teacher. It provides a perfect background for knowing how to interact with his political opponents in the race. I don’t know about your experience with middle schoolers, but I was a youth minister for 20 years before moving into young adult ministry, and they taught me a lot about being an adult in the room.
I love those 12- to 15-year-old kids. If you don’t, you probably can’t understand how anyone could. I loved my babies, but I wasn’t drawn to babies in general. When people questioned my motherhood credentials, I would remind them that their children would be middle and high schoolers for much longer than they were babies and that I would have their backs when that time came.
I wasn’t always able to keep them from getting to me. Their energy and persistence can sometimes feel relentless. But through it all, the lessons they taught me were invaluable. As I watch candidate Talarico, I see similar lessons he lives out in this campaign.
Things to be learned from appreciating time with middle schoolers:
- You understand that they are not yet adults and are testing every limit. They do not want the adults in their lives to let them get away with things they know are wrong, but they do want you to smile conspiratorially, saying you understand what they are doing and that you know they know as well.
- You understand that sarcasm is a waste of your time when trying to help them figure out who they are. Just say it straight, with a gentle but consistent message. “This is a better way. Why don’t you try it?”
- When they are funny, you should genuinely laugh. It will throw them off their game.
- Reframe their pettiness and anger as a strength. Embrace their attempt to diminish you by helping them see it through a new lens. Talafreako.
- Answer the real questions they need answered, rather than the deliberately confusing ones they hope will take you down a rabbit hole where there is no rabbit.
- And finally, let them know that you have not given up your power to them or to anyone else. You see them, you hear them, but you will not be brought down by their efforts.
Middle schoolers, and just about everyone else, may say or even act as if they hate you in the moment they have tried to manipulate you. But they don’t. Begrudging respect usually outlasts the moment someone tried to make you look small.
It is refreshing to see an adult in the room. It’s been a while.
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Retired campus minister, campus ministry coordinator for the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of North Carolina, and Collegiate Specialist for the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.