What Stories Are Your Students Telling Themselves?

“I thought TEEN TRUTH was amazing, but the first 15-minutes are a little depressing,” said a recent client of ours. “Do you need to show such dark content?”

I’ve heard the argument that we shouldn’t show intense content many times before, but always from adults – never from students!

Some adults gloss over the hard issues, because they’re hard to talk about. The success of our program is about not being afraid of these difficult feelings and situations we all face because your students are already thinking about them. 

As a young filmmaker, I learned the art of storytelling. A great story must have conflict. There has to be an enemy we are fighting against. And all great stories follow a character into a dark season, only to see them return the hero.

You can’t have RETURN OF THE JEDI without EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. Luke can’t return the hero if we don’t think all hope is lost for the rebellion. 

You can’t have HARRY POTTER or KATNISS EVERDEEN become heroes if they don’t have trials and tribulations along the way. And we can’t ignite your school culture if we don’t talk about the hard issues that students on your campus are facing.

They are the heroes of their story, and without modeling what it looks like to overcome adversity, they can be left floundering.

The same is true for their interactions with your teachers and staff. A wrong interaction or a missed connection can mean a lifetime of doubt for your students. Don’t believe me? Take 2-minutes to read Sarah Hayden’s recent TEEN TRUTH blog. In it, she discusses how ONE mistakenly negative comment from a teacher changed her personal story FOREVER. We don’t want your teachers to make the same mistake, so CLICK HERE to read her powerful testimony and CLICK HERE to download an activity that you can use with your staff to help enhance their interactions with your students.

The stories that your students are telling themselves are happening right now, let’s find a way to work together to help them become the hero of their own story, and let’s not shy away from hard truths.

We’re better together.