{"data":{"ID":1585,"Class":"Conversation","Created":1790887965,"CreatorID":79,"RevisionID":null,"Status":"Accepted","Title":"We Need to Talk About the Boys","Handle":"we_need_to_talk_about_the_boys","ShortDescription":"Boys as a group hold tremendous privilege. They are also far behind in reading, writing, graduation, mental health, social, and long-term outcomes. Our labeling of boys is often a good\/bad binary; most are complicated, sensitive, and missing something essential in their lives. Let's talk about what we can offer them.","Description":"Start with an average boy you know as a student. Most of us probably have one in mind already: bright enough (or at least clearly interested in one thing), not quite always doing the work, funny in the hallway, silent in class, and generally an emotional and academic puzzle box. Not a leader among their peers; not a destructive force. Just there, and doing\u2026. fine? \r\nWe work in a world where male privilege is real and structural, and we also work in buildings where boys are falling behind in reading and writing, graduating less prepared, lonelier than they feel comfortable admitting, and in a growing genuine mental health crisis. The privilege is real; the challenges and at-risk status of boys and young men as a group is real. In mixed-gender schools the data that paint this picture are often hidden behind collective averages girls are lifting academically, or ameliorating behaviorally. Saying the second thing out loud feels risky, so often we don't, and the silence helps nobody, least of all the boys, who have found plenty of other people online happy to explain versions of manhood to them in ways that further depress long-term prospects for healthy outcomes. \r\nThis is not a session about boys deserving more. We have been handed plenty. This conversation aims to offer a space to explore the vast space between the limiting, binary superlative positive (leader, hero, champion) and negative (toxic, incel, failure) labels we often apply to boys and young men. Teenage boys may be among the most complex, sensitive, and easily misunderstood animals on the planet, and we often lack the vocabulary, cultural permission, and strategies to normalize their challenges, and invite them to talk about them openly and with compassion. \r\nWe'll borrow provocations from Richard Reeves, Adam Price, and Scott Galloway, but the real material is us: educators from all sorts of schools in many different regions, all watching different versions of the same thing. Come with a dilemma from your own building. Leave with a few new moves and better questions to take back home.","Link":["https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/connollyjp\/"],"Audience":["High School","Middle School","Elementary School","All School Levels"],"Practice":"I'll talk for maybe twelve of the ninety minutes, and I'd like someone to hold me to that.\r\n\r\nWe each start with a boy (10 min). Everyone writes silently about one boy they are worried about and what exactly the worry is. Pairs, then a handful of shares for the whole group. Abstractions about \"boys\" can get negative fast, which is why we\u2019re staring with a specific student - keeps us honest.\r\n\r\nChalk talk (15 min). Four provocations on chart paper around the room: a data set or claim from one of our anchor texts (Reeves, Price, Galloway). Starting with a blank sheet that just says what are you seeing? People walk, write, and argue with each other in the margins. No talking!\r\n\r\nStand somewhere (20 min). A deliberately contestable statement: \"our school should run programming specifically for boys\" and everyone physically places themselves along a line. That statement is open to interpretation. We hear from several points on it. People are invited to move, and asked what moved them. Nobody has to defend where they started.\r\n\r\nDilemma groups (25 min). Groups of 4-5, each taking a lens: literacy and engagement, discipline and referral patterns, advisory and relationships, how school staffing supports our boys, and what we say to families. We\u2019ll use a consultancy protocol: one person brings a live problem, the group asks clarifying and then probing questions before anyone is allowed to offer advice. \r\n\r\nShare & Capture (15 min). Each group puts two things worth stealing and one unresolved question into a shared doc that's open all session. We read it together and name what we still disagree about, because we will.\r\n\r\nClose (5 min). One sentence each: what you'll actually try before March.\r\n\r\nNorms will go up at the start next to the EduCon Code of Conduct. I\u2019m aware this session can go sideways, and it's kinder to say so in minute one. The shared doc stays open afterward, and I'll keep adding to it.","Presenter":["JP Connolly"],"PresenterAffiliation":["Avenues New York"],"PresenterEmail":["jp.connolly@avenues-ny.org"],"ScheduleSlotID":null,"ScheduleLocationID":null,"SubmitterID":79,"AdditionalComments":"If you have feedback on any of this language please let me know. This is a tricky one to phrase well. I did my best!","LiveChannel":null,"Hashtag":null,"VokleID":null,"RecordingURL":null,"ConferenceID":14}}