Dear Mr./Mrs./Ms/Guardian/Life partner/Significant other :

Your son/daughter/stepson/stepdaughter/love child who is a freshman/sophomore/junior/senior is in danger of failing_______________(fill in the blank with title of subject) because s/he is experiencing the most profound peer pressure of his/her life, deciding if his/her membership should include Jews for Jesus, the Gay/Straight Alliance or the Bible Club. S/he sits in classes daily with members of the opposite sex whose hormonal rages are palpable. A few of his/her peers have palpated themselves into pregnancy and are trying to figure out how to squeeze their ever inflating tummies into a student desk not ergonomically designed for any nearly full grown human nonetheless a burgeoning eight month gestational one. Pre-bell discussions may or may not include homework, drugs, sex, drinking, tests, and dating. Not necessarily in that order. Trying to define one’s self as a druggie/drinker/geek/jock/nerd/brainiac/overachiever/chronic absentee/discipline problem is all consuming.

At high profile cocktail parties-of which I attend about three a decade-I tell people who dare ask what I “do” for a living that I am a Metacognitive Diagnostician with a specialty in adolescent academics. They inevitably nod with an austere contemplation that results in their murmuring, “How interesting,” as they pirouette in a nanosecond to find the silver tray with the full stems of bubbly.

To tell them that I am a public school teacher is to invite hell on earth. Well, maybe not hell, but at least a slow burn. Most of them are hysterically happy that No Child Left Behind means my behind if one of those little darlings fails to get on the wagon train with the rest of the group. Because, after all, I am sure that every employee at his or her firm travels on the same I.Q. /capability light beam.