Wednesday, February 03, 2010

The Youth of Today Are NOT Our Future

I spoke to the Florida Campus Compact yesterday. That is a group of college students from all over the state of Florida that came to Tallahassee to learn about civic involvement.

With all my work with kids from 3 to 18 (OK I still like the idea of 24 year olds still having a whole lot of kidishness in them, too). Here is the one reason that a lot of people give for working with kids that I do not believe; "The children are our future."

Nope. Don't buy it. Don't believe it. The youth of today are very much our present. They are a physical representation of our current heart, priorities, beliefs and values. How we treat are youth shows how we treat someone who is simply less capable than ourselves.

Yes, if you turn a kid on to education your house is less likely to be vandalized. If you give a kid a good recreation program you might not have thugs scaring you in your neighborhood. If you give a kid a mentor you probably do give yourself a better future. But after all that better future starts with today, doesn't it?

1 comment:

The Cuke said...

Indeed. Agreed.