Claim: intelligence matters in K-12 education. As an adult, reliability, hard work, and creativity matter more (in that order). As you get older, ability to grow and change matters most.
I was once a really smart kid. At that age, they only measure you based on potential.
I remember the transition to adulthood was relatively hard because I realized that all potential can’t be made actual. In fact, it’s worse than that: the only thing that makes anything real is hard work. It’s easier to do the hard work when you do it little by little regularly, so diligence. Also, creativity matters a bit at the edges.1
Now, as I see my parents’ generation get older and find my generation treading the footprints of what they once tread before, I realize that there’s a key trait that I’d been missing: personal growth. The people I most respect and admire head into their 70s and 80s still open and willing to change their minds. They may not care about current trends, but they haven’t locked themselves down to old approaches, either.
What’s worse, I feel the siren’s call of complacency. It would be so easy to think I figured everything out, shake my fist at the youth or the dang elected officials that don’t do the right thing.2 It would be easy to stop growing and maintain.
But, and maybe this is the last bit that’s needed: it’s hard to do that when I think I have the self-awareness that that’s what’s going on.
Hi freaders, if any of you exist. I miss you.
