To the student body of Atlantic High School,

After reading the articles affirming and negating the benefit(s) of career day, several thoughts come to mind that were not explored completely or absent from the discussion; the acceptability of avoiding the distasteful, and the lack of integrity in our town.

During my ten years of teaching, my goal as a teacher has evolved.  I began with the goal, as stated by my resume, “To educate and inspire adolescents in the theatrical arts.”  My current goal is to help create productive citizens that engage with their society and uphold their civic duty – in other words, “people who don’t suck.” Part of our current problem with society is the lack of civility in social settings; we have idiots who will use hate-filled speech on social media outlets; who flat-out bully others for no real reason; who judge others in their mind and alter the way they deal with others.  All of these problems stem from the root issue: Society’s avoidance of that which they dislike. Hypothetically, we can see how this would affect us if we all avoided things we found distasteful: No one would build roads – that work is too hard… the janitors wouldn’t clean the locker rooms; those are dirtier than the other bathrooms; No teacher would grade anything… because that’s not as fun as binge watching last season of Glee, or Arrow.

A bigger issue is the complicity of parents who wrote notes excusing the absence of their children.  They are willing to allow their children out of a situation that the school has deemed worth the student’s time, based on the distaste of their child.  Iowa Code 299.8 reads that a child missing school, “without reasonable excuse for the absence, shall be deemed to be a truant” (emphasis mine). While it’s true that many parents wrote notes excusing students, all of the notes indicated illness or family obligations.  According to Mrs. Saeugling, not one of the notes indicated that the parent deemed the activity inappropriate for school, as had been done for the Scary Guy presentation.

What does it say when we are willing to lie? Integrity is a highly regarded personal trait.  You cannot compensate for the lack of integrity.  Integrity is defined by Webster as, “the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles,” but the test of your integrity is not what you do in the spotlight, it’s what you do when no one is looking.  Think of your parent’s car.  Your parents are relying on the INTEGRITY of each weld holding the chassis together.  A lack of integrity there may not be easily seen, until it fails altogether. When it does fail, the result can be catastrophic.  Your personal lack of integrity might not be seen, but when it’s exposed, it will result in loss; but loss of what; your job? your love? your life? Examine who you are, and who you would like to be.  Make choices now that reflect who you want to be. Heck, PRETEND to have integrity – act the part, because as Kurt Vonnegut said, “’We are what we pretend to be.”