Adults often have the luxury to pick and choose what we focus on and how we spend our time. As a matter of fact, as time goes by we often develop highly specialized skill sets that allow us to perform well in our chosen careers. Even during leisure time, we select what activities we pursue. This is not the case for our children.

 

School intentionally places students “outside their comfort zone” on a daily basis. Few children are comfortable at every moment engaging in English, history, science, world language, math, art, drama, singing, musical instruments and sports. It is at these moments that students are given the opportunity to develop and practice an important life habit: the ability to act courageously in the face of discomfort and uncertainty.

 

When I consider all of the habits and skills we help students develop between Pre-Kindergarten and graduation, courage is at the top of my list. As Winston Churchill noted, “Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees all others.” In this sense by developing in our students the skills and predisposition to act courageously, we enable them to act kindly, passionately, creatively, empathetically, inclusively and in any other way a situation may demand.

 

Courage, in this sense, is the great enabler. It allows students to lean into discomfort, to take risks both small and large, and perhaps most to develop their talents and become their best selves over time.

 

It is unfortunate that many in our society labor under an important misconception about courage. They believe that there are two kinds of people: those that are brave and those that are not. The reality, I believe, is much more nuanced. We are ALL brave and we are ALL cowardly in measure at different times of our lives and in different circumstances.

 

What matters is how we can go about the task of intentionally helping kids develop the skill to act courageously more and more often across situations. It is this daily courage to strive, to try, to practice and to get feedback that will allow our students to grow into the problem solvers, empathetic partners and leaders of the future.

 

We believe at CA that this ability to “lean in” to discomfort and to act from your best intentions is teachable over time and that the benefits of this skill set will be profound both for the individual and our community. There are many ways that we help students develop this skill set. In the hallways, classrooms, fields and courts:

 

Collectively, we believe that these efforts, in conjunction with parents’ important work at home, will help each student take whatever the next step may be. For some it may be to act courageously in a friendship by standing up for a peer, for others it may be speaking up more often in class to share an idea, for a third it may be joining a club or trying a new sport. The wonderful part about courage is that, when we stop to look for it, it can be seen and practiced all around us.

 

I believe that the CA community chose wisely to emphasize the twin skill sets of courage and kindness. How we go about helping each student develop the ability to be the change each wants to be in the world will take many shapes. Ultimately, though, our hope is that our efforts at home and school enable our students to fully develop their talents, not just the talents that come most naturally, but also the talents that demand courage to discover and develop fully.