The shifts that come from listening
I've talked about the difference between hearing and listening to community before.
And even though it's something I believe in deeply, I'm still surprised at the shifts that happen when we truly do that.
A couple weeks ago, for work I'm doing in DC around systems-level shifts to school mental health, we brought together youth to generate ideas around how to improve youth engagement in the school context.
Here are some of the ideas that came up repeatedly:
"Having an area where we can take a break/chill"
"I WANT A MENTAL HEALTH DAY"
"Having more relatable/trusted adults"; "Respect is a two way street"
If we asked adults how we can improve youth engagement in the school context, what answers would we have gotten? I'm willing to bet this list would have been completely different.
So far, we've just heard these young people. How can we listen to them? By figuring out how to make more of these things happen! One thing that struck me about these ideas that bubbled to the top are that in theory, they shouldn't be that hard to make happen - but it does require adults setting aside their own perspectives and egos and prioritizing what young people most want.
One student shared how one of their teachers opens their room to students during lunch time, and how deeply they appreciate that space to chill - and only when I heard that did I remember some of my favorite memories from high school were in Mrs. Fort's English lit classroom, where a handful of us would go at least a few times a week to have our lunch.
Several students talked about specific teachers or other adults in the building that made them feel respected. What did that boil down to? The adult cared what the students had to say. They didn't talk down to the students. They made things fun. They listened. The conversation made me think of my favorite teachers through the years - they checked all those boxes too.
We were all young people once, but we quickly forget the day-to-day of that experience and how we felt about things.
If we can truly listen to and act upon what we hear from young people - or whoever your community members are - we might shift not only our solutions but even how we define problems.
But listening isn't always easy.
I've been thinking a lot about how we practice listening. We recently had a friend visit who loves birdwatching and taught our six year old more about birds in a weekend than we could have taught her, well...ever. But my favorite part of the whole experience was the emphasis on being still and listening - it's amazing what you hear when you do that.
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