Paper Tigers (2015): How Did One School Change Its Approach to Delinquent Student Behavior?

Paper Tigers is a documentary set in a school known for high rates of delinquent student behavior and academic failure. It explores the background of some of the students and shows the changes undertaken by the school to help students deal with various problems, graduate, and even go to college.

Many of the students come from homes that are broken in some way. One of the critical parts of Paper Tigers is a discussion of ACEs (Adverse Childhood Experiences) and research showing how a greater number of ACEs in childhood leads to an increased risk of all kinds of problems throughout life - such as abusive relationships, poor health, struggles with work and finances, and mental illness.

ACEs include emotional, physical, and/or sexual abuse, and households with domestic violence, substance abuse, mental illness, or family members in prison. However, when children and teens have a healthy relationship with an adult, it serves as a protective factor that can help mitigate the effects of ACEs.

In the past, the school's approach to misbehaving students was purely punitive. The documentary shows how teachers began to also offer mentoring and guidance, not only punishments. The school also set up an on-site clinic that provided some basic health services and counseling. By the time the documentary wrapped up, there was a significant drop in the kinds of behaviors that lead to detention, suspension, or expulsion, and there were higher rates of graduation.

I like how the documentary shows the communal effort it took to make this new approach successful. Of course it depended on each teacher working with dedication and spending time with students who aren't used to positive attention from an adult. But the teachers were also able to give each other support. The school administration was fully committed to them and to the students. And the community at large supported the school. As inspiring as it is to read stories about a lone teacher bucking the system to reach out to students, a school-wide change works so much better when everyone is working together. It's more effective, and there's less burnout.

The documentary is also important for opening up a discussion about traumatic childhood experiences. These aren't one-time events - they're ongoing toxic problems that chip away at mental and physical health and stunt development. I also wondered about the teens who don't act out, but who keep things bottled up. The documentary doesn't really focus on the kids who struggle but don't express it through crime, violent outbursts, and other misbehavior. It was impressive, however, just to watch teachers who genuinely care about their students' academic performance, well-being, and life prospects.

Break me off a piece of that sugar, chocolate, and palm kernel oil composite

One of my selections for Deal Me In was “The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food,” an article by Michael Moss on how food companies refine their products to increase consumption as much as possible.

The article looks at the issue from the point-of-view of the companies and their scientists and marketers. We come across as lab rats sucking on sugar water in a bare cage. Any weakness, preference, or craving is an opening for more food to pour in. (I love the names of some of these - a cheap substitute for cheese might be something called “cheese food.” It’s cheese-like in nature; cheese-ish.)

Week in Seven Words #318

branding
She married someone who picks at her like tissue on the bottom of his shoe. With a determined smile, she spins his sullenness as shy charm, his malice as social awkwardness.

chlorosis
Under the fluorescent lights, the fake plants look anemic. So do the people - washed out, moving as if their feet were planted in deep, sucking mud.

diminishing
All the information we've found suggests there's no way the problem will disappear on its own. (Yes it will, he says.) Let's try a treatment. Giving it a try costs almost nothing. (It's unnecessary.) Why? (Because.)

methamphetamine
She gets a hit of anger from the TV news, her round-the-clock drug.

riddles
They're tech-savvy, but that doesn't mean they don't like offline games. Case in point - her scavenger hunt with clues planted among stuffed animals and kitchen appliances.

sequestered
Once people go into the little soundproof room in their mind, it doesn't matter how hard you pound on the door. I forget this, even though I've seen it often and done it myself.

sleeky
PowerPoint, pizza, multi-colored plastic chairs - it's like I'm back in grad school.

The Melancholy in Harvey (1950)

Title: Harvey
Director: Henry Koster
Language: English
Rating: Not Rated

On the surface, Harvey is a light-hearted story. It features Elwood P. Dowd (James Stewart), a gentle middle-aged man whose best friend is a giant rabbit named Harvey. For the most part, only Elwood can see Harvey and talk to him (though others might get a glimpse now and then). A question that runs throughout the movie is whether or not Harvey is "real." Is he a figment of Elwood's imagination, or is he an animal spirit of some kind with a presence outside of Elwood's mind? At one point Elwood gets taken to a psychiatric hospital, and the joke is that the staff assumes that his overwrought sister, Veta Louise Simmons (Josephine Hull), is the patient and not him. He's so polite and laid-back, so gentle and courteous. Maybe it doesn't matter that he's hallucinating a giant bunny who's his closest friend.



In many ways, the movie is fun (like when Elwood's portrait with Harvey comes on-screen). And its general tone of kindliness and gentle mischief suits the main character. The movie questions people's need to pathologize eccentric behavior. If Elwood isn't harming anyone, why not leave him alone? Elwood gets along well with pretty much everyone. He sees beautiful things in people, their potential for good. He's able to regard them with patience and love.

In contrast, the movie's authority figures are often petty, small-minded, and driven by their egos. They insist only on their version of reality. One pompous young psychiatrist even gets annoyed with the sensitivity and caring discernment of Ruth Kelly (Peggy Dow), a nurse at the institution. As for Elwood's sister - she wants to accept and love her brother, but she's also afraid to believe in Harvey's existence. She has an inkling that the rabbit is real in some way. But if she allows for a reality where a giant mostly invisible rabbit is real, wouldn't that mean she's crazy? Her efforts to avoid the appearance of craziness often lead her to act in unbalanced, neurotic ways.

Throughout Harvey, Elwood's calm, beautiful thoughts and the charm of his eccentricity shine through. But there's no doubt the movie is melancholy too. Elwood is a ruin in some ways. He drinks steadily. He doesn't seem to have any adult responsibilities; he lives with his sister, who runs the household. His life is made pleasant by alcohol, Harvey, and an appreciation of people's company. There are a few moments when he reflects on himself, and his tone is wistful. "I'd almost be willing to live my life over again. Almost," he says. And, "I've wrestled with reality for 35 years, Doctor, and I'm happy to state I've won out over it." He says he was smart for years, but now recommends being pleasant.

Although he views the world in a kindly way, he needs protection from it. Maybe the only way to cope with other people's hardness, and their ruthless determination to get everyone to think as they do, is to soften the world and see it through a haze. To imagine, as a constant companion, a friend who isn't even human and in that way offers safe relief for loneliness.

Nurse Kelly at one point feels that Elwood truly sees her, and she wonders if she'll ever feel happier than at that moment. Because will anyone else ever take the time to sincerely understand her? She's used to getting talked over. Like Elwood, she lacks ruthlessness. How will she continue negotiating a world where sensitivity and patience have little value or means of expression? A thick cushion of imagination and drink helps Elwood live as a child-like old soul and go about his life largely untroubled. Other people might adopt a similar approach, though less extreme. Some remind themselves to be more kind, to take more time to really listen. Many become callous.

Elwood doesn't skip around bestowing uncomplicated happiness on everyone. He remains on the fringes of his town as a kindly alcoholic who can make people smile sometimes, and sometimes get them to think more deeply about their life. That's beautiful, in and of itself. He has a beautiful soul, and it's bruised deep.

(Image source: Wikipedia.)

As Seen Through These Eyes (2008): Confronting Annihilation with Art

Title: As Seen Through These Eyes
Director: Hilary Helstein
Language: English
Rating: Unrated

"As Seen Through These Eyes" is a documentary about the Holocaust, and specifically artists, musicians, and writers imprisoned in ghettos and concentration camps.

Sometimes, their artistic talent saved them from death. For instance, one man played the harmonica very well, and a camp commander requested regular performances. One woman was singled out by the infamous Dr. Mengele in Auschwitz to paint portraits of the camp's Romani population; while she saw their beauty, what Mengele was interested in was the exact shade of their skin and shape of their ears.

Other people were murdered because of their art. For instance, they may have been kept alive in a ghetto to draw up propaganda posters, and were caught also secretly sketching the scenes of misery and brutality around them.

Art also became a way for people to grapple with their trauma, during and after the Holocaust. They wrote, painted, and performed music that expressed their torment or that shared their longing for beauty and life. Sometimes art was their one form of freedom and their way of staying sane. One musician described the importance of playing the fiddle. Because his experiences in the camps felt like an uncontrolled bass rhythm inside of him, maybe the fiddle would balance out the bass and bring some harmony into his life.

The movie shows many examples of art and presents interviews with survivors. It's also narrated by Maya Angelou. Altogether a beautiful, moving documentary and worth watching at any time. I'm writing about it now because Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) begins this year at sundown, May 4.

Week in Seven Words #288

classic
They laugh at the old-fashioned special effects, but are clearly into the story, these kids raised on CGI.

giggly
She practices her song and dance routine with a self-conscious grin, her voice sometimes falling to a whisper as she tries not to laugh.

insensate
One of the useless comments people have made to her, on hearing about her mental illness, is "Just get over it. It's all in your head." Their ignorance is all in their head too.

moviegoer
Most of the time, she lies on the couch with her head on her arms. But as soon as Toto appears, she tenses and starts barking. She rushes to the TV and presses her nose against the other dog, as he runs away from the Cowardly Lion.

obsessive
As he picks his way across the cracked asphalt, he keeps his head submerged in a newspaper. Even when crossing the street.

sylvan
The art in the lobby features women draped in silk and crowned with poppies, leaves, and sunflower petals.

underminer
Instead of trying to refute her arguments, he questions her right to argue. Now she has to use up energy defending herself on a more basic level.

Week in Seven Words #274

blue
The town is most memorable in its shades of blue: on walls, on signs, on balconies painted midnight. Also in the way its art galleries are strung together along narrow stone paths. Sculptures flow like melting wax. Painted bodies have been broken into basic geometric shapes, each a different color, some in shades of blue.

froth
Every day she acts out painful, unexamined feelings from her childhood. Her behavior stirs up frustration and anger in other people, and in herself. Maybe these familiar emotions are comforting; they generate a lot of surface churn, deflecting attention from the deeper damage.

hushfully
A peaceful stroll around a lake. The grass is riddled with abstract sculptures. Strange birds peck at the soil and slip into the water.

littoral
The coast changes its character along the way: golden sand and columns, a harbor shimmering in the heat, porous rocks pounded by the surf.

nibbles
Bins brimming with nuts and candies, the air rich and sweet.

passageways
The apartment complex is like a small, intricate city. Perched on a hill overlooking empty fields, it's full of winding lanes, narrow doors, and rough stone walls that open onto hidden courtyards.

sup
You get acquainted with their distinct personalities. There's the server who's everyone's favorite long lost son; he doles out soup with a smile and a self-deprecating joke. Another server makes motherly noises at you and gives you meatless bones that she claims are pieces of chicken. The cook is begrudgingly kind and clearly wishes she were elsewhere, maybe getting a pedicure or at home reading magazines and eating pickles.

Week in Seven Words #271

cultivated
Three ladies leafing through books in a room hung with tapestries.

delivery
A rattling cart, laden with aluminum trays of warm fragrant meat.

getaway
The only splash of color in the office comes from a banner with a beach scene: sunset, gold sand, palms imprinted on curling waves.

muted
Without the usual roar from the TV, there's a startling quiet in the house.

overcompensating
His know-it-all attitude masks a fear of the world and an uncertainty about his place in it.

treacherous
Dinner isn't so much a minefield as a sea dotted with icebergs. What's above the surface is dangerous enough; below, there are contours and formations we can't bear to think about.

upgrade
"Our online system works well. People can find things easily and save their search results reliably. Clearly we're doing something wrong."

Week in Seven Words #268

cantankerous
The dark building scowls at the street, its face scarred by scaffolding. The names by each mailbox are peeling off like scabs.

lazing
I'm tired of the expression "politically correct." It's become a knee-jerk criticism, a shortcut in thought.

liberated
Half of the fence has collapsed towards the house, the other half towards the lawn. An evergreen shrub has thrust itself into the gap.

ribbing
A broken umbrella tumbles between the cars, tickling them as it goes.

smirking
Another expression I'm tired of - more than tired of, I'd like to pulverize it with my fists - is "good intentions." It's an excuse, a deflection, a pat on the back. A false innocence, a willful ignorance.

unattainable
Some people show you a love like the horizon. It'll be yours, they say, if you keep struggling towards it, on land, by sea, with everything in you. One day you'll have their love. Just make an effort. A real effort. Break yourself on the dream of it.

unshackled
Behind a restaurant, a waiter puts out his cigarette and break dances. Pigeons rocket away.

Cleo and the Black Boston Elite in The Living Is Easy by Dorothy West

… she would cut off her arm for these sisters of hers with the same knife she held at the tenderest spot in their hearts.

That's Cleo, the main character of a book that brings to life the world of Boston's black elite shortly before and during the First World War.

Cleo is originally from the South, but after making her way north learns the social refinements of northern cities and marries a down-to-earth businessman, Bart Judson, whose money helps her maintain her social airs. She doesn't see herself as black so much as Bostonian, and wants to raise her daughter, Judy, to also be a little Bostonian lady.

Dorothy West's The Living Is Easy, which I read for the Classics Club Challenge, is fascinating for two main reasons.

Week in Seven Words #251

bits
Floor-to-ceiling windows frame a cityscape that looks like the inside of a computer.

diminished
She used to strike me as formidable in social settings, able to charm anyone and steer a conversation to where she liked. This time she comes across as clumsy and out of her depth, as she cuts into other people's sentences or responds to them with expressionless politeness. I feel bad for her, and wish I had more social graces, to shield her.

permeability
Fiddling with a flute of champagne on the edges of a crowd.

pursuing
Her love of science, combined with her family's alarming medical history, have pushed her towards a career researching cancer.

shamed
On top of the mental illness is the stigma, keeping people from feeling human and connected with others.

sighing
His voice is weary when he greets us, as if he regrets remembering our names.

unsullied
On pristine plates, they present dollops of food - three elegant squares of ravioli, or three hillocks of rice with a spray of vegetables.

M (1931): How Beckert Throws Society Off-Balance

Title: M
Director: Fritz Lang
Language: German
Rating: Not rated

Towards the end of M, a child murderer asks an assemblage of criminals, "Who knows what it's like to be me?"

It's a line from one of the most well-acted monologues I've ever watched on-screen, delivered by Peter Lorre - an actor usually best known for playing disturbing individuals. In this case, his character forces people to consider the limitations of earthly justice.

Lorre plays Hans Beckert, a small man, boyishly plump, who for much of the movie strolls the streets of a German city anonymously. He's responsible for a series of child murders (it's also all but explicitly stated that he has a sexual interest in his victims). The crimes remain off-screen. What we see is Beckert passing through the city, whistling "In the Hall of the Mountain King" in the presence of children he wants to prey on. He lures them with toys, candies, and balloons. What we also see is a mother, waiting for a child who never returns from school. And there are scenes of the city in a panic, people pointing fingers at each other and sending letters to the police that accuse their neighbors.

Week in Seven Words #234

afloat
A chair floating legs-up in a lake, like a creature from Seuss.

busted
A building grinning through broken teeth.

civilized
A well-to-do woman from San Francisco sits beside me on the bench. She asks several questions about New York - recommendations for museums, etc. - and after each suggestion, she points out that in San Francisco there's something better. "You have fine museums," she says, as if she fears I'm deeply offended. "But…" And here she tells me another thing that's wrong with New York, in tones of gentle regret. I hope she doesn't guess how amused I am by our conversation.

deposits
The lake has a marble quality to it, light and glass as you look to the floor of the shallows and find pink rocks and twisted scrap metal.

guardedness
I'm becoming better aware of what resources I can spare for others and what I should better protect. Another line of defense against those who alight on other people's emotions in a vampiric way.

heartsease
To make train fare, he tries selling artwork, some of it not his own. Out of a book he's torn a detailed sketch of a pansy drawn in three colors. One dollar for it.

pressured
A morning of quiet sidewalks and still trees. The air doesn't move, and the sun pounds on my head.

Six Short Stories About Different States of Mind

Title: The Balloon of William Fuerst
Author: Lowell B. Komie
Where I Read It: Legal Fictions

A short, funny story but one with a familiar pang in it, the feeling of life getting wasted on triviality. The main character is an attorney who starts to hear air escaping from his ears - "a hiss of all the useless acts." He imagines his head is a balloon, with air leaking out. How does he think he can fix the problem, without leaving a job he feels trapped in? Maybe helium is the answer! If nothing else, at least he'll sound like a new person...

Title: Bitter Grounds
Author: Neil Gaiman
Where I Read It: Fragile Things

Before reading "Bitter Grounds," I hadn't come across any zombie fic that interested me. But this story is further proof that it's never the subject matter that's the problem, but the way it's handled. Any topic can be written about in an interesting way.

This isn't a typical zombie fic. There are no rotting corpses staggering around - no brain-eating, post-apocalyptic monsters. It's more a confusing and fascinating story of escape and loss of identity, of blurred boundaries between people and between the living and the dead. It begins with a man who can't deal with his life anymore:

"In every way that counted, I was dead. Inside somewhere maybe I was screaming and weeping and howling like an animal, but that was another person deep inside, another person who had no access to the face and lips and mouth and head, so on the surface I just shrugged and smiled and kept moving."

One day, he drives and just keeps on driving, with no particular destination or purpose. And then starts to move between different identities. Through circumstances described in the story, he steps into the shoes of an anthropology professor invited to give a talk in New Orleans about tales of undead Haitian coffee girls. Nothing in this story is as it seems, and by the end, you have to wonder who is this man, and who has he met along the way? Not sure if this is a nightmare, or if he's ripped through the fragile tissues that life's made of.

Week in Seven Words #212 & 213

212

confinement
A young tree strait-jacketed by ice.

contorted
In black and white film: the grace of a ballerina and the grip of polio.

engulfed
A snow drift has swallowed up another small business.

fluffy
Sinking a fork into a marble chocolate cheesecake.

outsourcing
It's scary when you realize how much other people have staked their happiness on you, convincing you along the way that you're responsible for their moods.

tribunal
This is the dynamic at the table: there are those who can do no wrong, those who can do nothing right, and those who are judged right or wrong without consistency, based on how their hair looks at a given moment or on what shirt they picked out to wear.

untouched
Sometimes at a restaurant the best moment is when the food just arrives. It looks delicious. At that moment, you think there can be nothing wrong with it.

Week in Seven Words #192

awkwardness
A guy, a gal, and a third wheel are sandwiched together on a crowded bus. The guy and gal feel each other up and occasionally remember to include the third wheel in their whispered conversation. The third wheel laughs a lot and shares anecdotes about weird cellphone conversations she's recently had.

exposure
They find the strength to meet beneath the harsh lights and talk. They understand each other's inertia, emptiness and fear.

flaxen
Gold hair on a dappled picnic blanket.

hemmed
On one side of the park there's a broad river, tolerating a few sailboats on its shuddering back. On the other side, there are rows of buildings that look like cardboard boxes.

otherworldly
Her voice is lovely and sorrowful. She remains still as she sings, even when the children chase each other around her waving their swords and shrieking.

pimpled
Restless crowds seek junk food and bad comedy on a beautiful day.

robotic
Sometimes they don't sound human. They talk about themselves as if they're machines that need the right kind of tuning, the optimal dosages of medication to keep their parts moving.

Three Du Maurier Stories from Don't Look Now

Collection: Don't Look Now: Selected Stories of Daphne du Maurier
Author: Daphne du Maurier

For some of the stories, I didn't accept the premise; sometimes there was an over-reliance on coincidence and clairvoyance. But even in those cases, I enjoyed the atmosphere of the story.

Du Maurier is great at upending reality and writing about people who, in one way or another, are trapped in their own minds. They perceive a reality that they can't communicate to others; other people don't want to (or can't) understand them or believe them. Everywhere they go, they're failed by family, friends, the police, doctors, everyone we usually think can help. She understands this kind of terror and isolation. Even when one of her characters experiences clairvoyance, which you'd think would give them a greater understanding of what's going on around them, they're still blind in all the ways that matter.

Her stories will definitely stick with you. These are the three I liked best:

Week in Seven Words #170

aflutter
The keeper of keys has bats in his belfry.

glowworm
He talks and talks, and the point of his talk is just outside our reach, like a firefly winking in and out of existence.

paper-thin
Her smile is brittle. She's only sure of herself among books.

porous
From spirituality to bagels. I'm walking the surprisingly thin line between profundity and absurdity.

saturated
The tulips are in Technicolor, saturated in red and yellow.

storyteller
Rumpled hair, a coffee cup loose between his fingers. The familiar crinkle in the corners of his eyes.

tether
During the group meditation, my mind floats and expands, then abruptly contracts. The process restarts. The mind rises like a balloon until it reaches the end of its string. Then it descends and hits the floor.

Nonfiction Book of the Month: We've Got Issues

We've Got Issues by Judith Warner discusses different factors that account for the sorry state of mental health services for children and early intervention for learning disabilities in the U.S. There's much to debate in this book, but even if you disagree with some of the premises or feel that she needs to dig deeper into some of the issues, I think you'll find that her approach is refreshing, as she doesn't blindly demonize people, whether they be parents, psychiatrists, or teachers. She also points out flaws in much of how the media reports on children's mental health, including their misinterpretations of data and their use of children as mere symbols representing larger societal problems.

Worth Watching: Lars and the Real Girl (2007)

Title: Lars and the Real Girl
Director: Craig Gillespie
Language: English
Rating: PG-13

In Lars and the Real Girl, Lars Lindstrom (Ryan Gosling) buys a sex doll but doesn't use it for sex. The doll, named Bianca, is fully clothed and gets treated with care. Lars courts her chastely, takes her around town, and introduces her to people as if she's real; he even gives her an interesting back story. Instead of functioning as a sex toy, the doll becomes his way of working through a deep-seated inability to connect with real people.

From Wikipedia, Fair use, Link

I can hear some of you going, "Okkkaaaay..." and backing away slowly. So let me give you some background on Lars. His mother died giving birth to him. He grew up with a distant father and with an older brother, Gus (Paul Schneider), who left home as soon as he could. Now Gus is married to the warm and lovely Karin (Emily Mortimer), and the two are expecting a child. Lars lives near them physically, but keeps his distance emotionally. Though he can't articulate his fears, he is deeply afraid of people's unpredictability and mortality. He also doesn't respond well to physical touch.

How do people react to Lars and Bianca? After some initial hesitation, the townspeople play along with Lars's delusion and let him heal through it. Although Gus's first impulse is to have his younger brother committed to a mental hospital, he's dissuaded from this course of action by my favorite character in the movie, Dr. Dagmar (Patricia Clarkson), who combines cool understanding and warm compassion in her role as the town's medical doctor and psychologist.

Delusions can have their own logic and reveal something real and meaningful about the people experiencing them. And people reveal a lot about themselves in the way they respond to another person's psychological difficulties. Gus's initial desire to have his brother committed stems less from concern than from embarrassment and, more deeply, guilt and personal shame.

Is it realistic, the way the other people in the community come to support Lars and treat Bianca as a town mascot? Such widespread acceptance is rare, but not impossible. Read this article, which discusses the influence of social environment on people's ability to cope with mental illness. Ostracizing and isolating people with psychological problems makes them much worse off, but unfortunately that's what we usually do in our culture. The approach taken in Lars and the Real Girl might be more conducive to healing.

The movie is funny too. It shows the absurdity of the situation, but treats the characters with kindness. I also like how Lars uses a doll to work through his issues, instead of using a real life woman as a personal crutch or savior. He has a love interest in the movie - Margo (Kelli Garner), a colleague at work who seems to like him too, in a shy way. But on some level he realizes, even in the midst of his emotional disconnection, that he's not yet ready for a real relationship with her or with anyone except Bianca. And even Bianca starts to show signs of independence as the movie progresses, proving herself to be less pliant than she appears.