Creativity

I recently read a book by Sir Kenneth Robinson about creativity and education reform.  Sir Ken posits that the education system currently in place in the U.S. was developed to handle the needs of an industrial age and it is ill suited to the demands of the information age.  He feels that the creativity needed to succeed in a changing world is not being nurtured in the current education system and is actually accomplishing just the opposite of what is needed.

Robinson points out that research shows that kids entering the school system score very high on tests that measure creativity.  In fact almost all kids entering school score high on the creativity scale.  However, studies show a constant decline in scores for the kids as they progress through the system.  By the time kids get to the end of their high school education about 1% score high on creativity tests.

As I read this stuff I thought back on my own high school experience and concluded that creativity was not a part of the picture.  The elements needed for an industrial society were there.  We learned to be on time, who the boss was and how to work with groups of people.  These were valuable lessons. However, inspiring a desire to learn, finding one’s passion or developing one’s creativity was not part of the equation.

Thinking back on those days, I have come to the conclusion that creativity is a very difficult thing to completely crush.  When it isn’t formally encouraged or nourished, it finds ways, like the weeds in the cracks of your driveway, to force it’s way to the surface.  When you leave it in the hands of a bunch of budding juvenile delinquents, the results won’t be predictable and not as desirable as the shepherds of our education might have hoped for if they thought about it at all.  I will leave it to you, the reader, to determine what you think of the following examples but I think you will have to admit that creativity was playing its part.

I spent my freshman year in an all boys’ Catholic high school.  Teaching boys at this age must be a challenge for any teacher.  We were a collection of smart-ass, know-it-alls.  This being a Catholic high school, religion class was mandatory.  Unfortunately, our teacher for the 9^th grade class was perhaps the least suited and most incompetent teacher I would encounter in any phase of my education.  Added to his laundry list of inadequacies was the fact that he was rather effeminate and that was like throwing chum to the sharks. The result was total chaos.

We called the priest “The Black Adam” because his first name was Adam and there was already a priest there named Adam who liked to, occasionally give lectures while standing on a prone student and had a sawed off pool cue he named “the Holy Spirit” in his class room to encourage discipline.  The “Black” part of the name came from the fact that he chose to wear a black cassock every day.

The “Black Adam” was totally incapable of controlling the class.  Just about every day a near riot would break out.  One day a fellow scholar stashed about a half dozen Playboy magazine foldouts between the pages of another student’s religion book.   When the “Black Adam” entered the classroom, a couple of students accused the victim of looking at dirty pictures before class began.  Of course, the allegation was denied and the priest tried to regain control.  Then a cry went up around the room of “ Father, Timothy has a boner”.  This of course horrified the priest and Timothy equally and they both began turning a deep shade of crimson.  Then, on queue, someone grabbed Timothy’s religion book, discovered the playmates and began distributing the pictures around the room.  Timothy being a red head with a million freckles turned a shade of red unseen before by the human eye and the “Black Adam,” now absolutely in a panic, went scurrying around the classroom trying to collect the artwork.  The huge uproar drew the attention of other classrooms and a dour old priest from down the hall chose to enter our classroom just as the “Black Adam” was collecting the foldouts.  These type of disruptions happened on a near daily basis.

My example of creativity coming out of this class happened when the class was scheduled to spend two weeks studying human sexuality.  The “Black Adam” began this section of our religious training, and it was very clear he was terrified of both the subject and how his students might react.  The priest, following his outline, would at some point ask the class if they had any questions and here is where extraordinary creativity went on display.

For example, a student might rise (and I use this merely as a cleaned up example of what would happen) and ask:  “Father, if a woman had sex with a horse and her brother and became pregnant would she be morally required to tell the horse about the pregnancy and would this be a mortal sin?”  The priest would start turning red about a third of the way through the question and try to give an answer, usually unsuccessfully, that would discourage follow up questions.  Then another student would stand up and ask a question that made the one before seem like a third grade catechism question.

I have to admit, I was only an observer to this process but I do remember marveling at how my classmates could out do each other as they spun their extremely complex, obscene and depraved questions.  I think the “Black Adam” let it go on because at least while this weird question and answer period was happening, there was quiet as the class learned about the type of debauchery even their own twisted little minds hadn’t dreamt of yet.  I do challenge anyone to dispute the creativity.

The next year I ended my Catholic education and entered a public high school as a sophomore.  My next example of creativity was in my history class, although, as you might imagine, it had nothing to do with history.  I can honestly say that I never had a decent history class during my four years of high school.  It was a steady diet of events, dates and names without any attempt to show what was really happening and why it might have some relevancy to our lives.   The funny thing is that I liked history and had read history since I was a little kid.  

I actually had a history teacher pull me into his class room and show me a piece of paper that he said had been left behind after a secret meeting of the top communists in the country.  I guess the janitor must have found it.  Anyway it was the usual claptrap about undermining American youth by encouraging them to wear tight pants, let their hair get long and listen to rock and roll.  I laughed and told the teacher that any movement, so inept as to leave behind their secret plan to corrupt the youth of America, were the type of buffoons we needn’t worry about.

My history teacher for my sophomore year gave the “Black Adam” a run for his money when it came to incompetence.  I don’t know if he even found history interesting let alone knew anything about it.  He was truly a strange little man.  He would stop talking, as if a thought had just hit him, and walk back to his desk and pull a bunch of onions out of the bottom drawer and ask if anyone would like to buy onions.  His class often devolved into madness and this time we had girls who could participate.  One day he got in a fight with a young woman who, knowing how crazy possessive he was of everything in his class room, grabbed his waste basket and ran into the woman’s bathroom where he was powerless to enter.  He ran back down the hall to our classroom and began begging all of the girls to go in the bathroom and retrieve his wastebasket.  After getting no takers he spent about 20 minutes pleading and begging the young woman cooling her heels in the bathroom to return his wastebasket.  The rest of the class took a break or chose to call it a day and left class for good.  He finally negotiated the return of his wastebasket and returned to class where he spent the last ten minutes telling everyone that there was something wrong with the girl who had taken his wastebasket hostage.

This class was a complete and total waste of everyone’s time.  Nothing of value was being communicated and the only way to stay awake was to participate in the madness.  Many a student raised his hand and asked to be excused to relieve himself.  After a few days when half the class was spending considerable time in the restroom, “Old Porcupine,” a nickname given to him by the hero of this story, cracked down and refused to let anyone leave his class for nature calls.  One student came up with a brilliant plan to get around this prohibition.

At lunchtime Mark bought a bag of M&Ms and separated out the red ones and placed them in a small container.  Prior to class he consulted with a group of his co-conspirators and when the class became unbearable he put his plan in action.  Just as “Old Porcupine” went off on one of his boring tangents having nothing remotely to do with history, Mark threw himself on the floor and began thrashing around like he was in the throws of a grand mal seizure.  Desks flew as people scrambled to get out of the way.  “Old Porcupine” completely lost it and was shouting nonsense at the top of his lungs.  Then the co-conspirators went into action and jumped on the thrashing victim. Shouting we had his medicine, we proceeded to force a red M&M down his throat.  Mark immediately became calm and asked “Old Porcupine” if he could go to the restroom to regain his composure.  “Old Porcupine” who was really anxious to get Mark out of his classroom where he might break something, granted the request in a heartbeat.  For the rest of the year all Mark had to do was raise his hand and ask to be excused and his request was granted.  We didn’t see a lot of Mark in the class the rest of the year.  He didn’t miss anything of value.  Another creative solution to a problem conceived and executed successfully.

Then there was the Reed Street Gang.  A group of about 10 sophomores and juniors would get together behind the school for lunch weather permitting.  Reed Street ran right behind the school and we started calling the gathering the Reed Street Gang.  I was a quasi member of this group as I walked home for lunch every day.  I would gobble my lunch and hurry back just about the time that everyone else was finishing their lunch.  That left us about 25 minutes to be creative.

I sometimes missed some of the planning sessions but usually was there for the execution of whatever action that might have been decided upon.  As you might imagine, the Reed Street Gang was not the faculty or administration’s favorite student organization.  In fact things got a little testy after a group activity left dozens of live fish flopping on the rather busy street in front of the school.

My favorite Reed Street project was the time we decided to provide free safety checks for motorists who happened to be driving down Reed Street during the lunch hour. 

It was explained to the driver that we were participating in a school sponsored automobile safety check program in order to promote safe driving.  Most drivers were willing to take a few minutes to help civic-minded students conduct their socially beneficial safety checks and would pull over.

In accordance with the planning that had occurred the day before we were equipped with a clipboard, tire gauge, a spray bottle and a red rag like you used to see gas station attendants carry.  One student would man the clipboard and call out the different elements of the safety check.  First we would have the person turn their left blinker on and if it worked we would shout “left blinker check” and the person with the clipboard would check it off.  We would go through the blinkers, headlights, brake lights and taillights shouting out the results of our various checks.  Then someone would spray the windshield with water and clean it off with the red rag.

After all the preliminary checks were completed we would inform the driver that there was one more check that needed to be conducted to determine if their shock absorbers were functioning properly.  At that point we would position ourselves at the four corners and the middle of the trunk and hood and proceed to test the shock absorbers.  The object of this test was to bounce the car wildly up and down.  This was an age when no one wore seatbelts and the occupants of the cars would bounce around like exploding popcorn.  We would stop the shock absorber test after about ten seconds, walk over to the discombobulated driver and announce they had passed the test, place a sticker on their windshield and wish them a good day and safe travels.  Only when they got home and took a look at the sticker did they see it said “three legged fryer” or “boneless skinless breast.”

We never received a single complaint about the safety checks.  I don’t know if people were embarrassed that they had been had or if they figured that we really hadn’t done anything malicious, so they were going to let it ride.

And so ends my ode to creativity.   Our contributions to sexual perversity and animal husbandry, epilepsy awareness and motor vehicle safety reflect what students can do when given the opportunity.  If you wish to hear Sir Kenneth Robison’s somewhat more thoughtful approach to the issues of creativity and education reform check out this video.  It is informative and darn funny.