Last night our school put on a spring formal for our senior students. The event was a huge success. I had a chuckle at the end of the night when I got feedback from three students. The first from a gushing student telling me what an amazing night it was. “It was so wonderful, I didn’t know what to expect, but this was such an amazing night, thank you!”
The second was a student who thanked us and said how impressed she was. One of my teachers said, “See, start with low expectations and things always turn out great.” The student replied, “Actually I had pretty high expectations, I knew it was going to be good, and it still exceeded my expectations.”
The third one I’d like to share was actually said to me between these two. This student, who always calls me by my last name with no ‘Mr’ (which I don’t mind) said, “You know, Truss, any time you do something the first time, you can expect things to go wrong, but I have to say that tonight was pretty good. You got so much right, and I can’t think of anything I’d change. Good job.” Now that’s from a kid who understands radical candour and isn’t afraid to give hard feedback, especially to me, because he knows I want to hear it.
But the reality is that the event was the success that it was because of the wonderful team I work with. Every teacher and one of my secretaries was there helping to make the night a huge success. This event was the vision of one of our counsellors, who wanted the kids at our school to have an event like students at bigger schools. And the entire team stepped up to make the event something our students wanted… and enjoyed.
A student prepared a welcoming toast. Another one did a full ten minute speech that had everyone laughing and repeating quotes he said. Not platitudes, but humour that resonated with our entire community of students and staff. And a parent raised so much in gifts and prizes that most kids left with a gift card that was at a minimum 2/3rds the cost of the ticket, and many students left with a lot more.
I feel blessed to work in such an amazing environment with a fantastic team, and wonderful students, who all understand and appreciate that an event like this is a lot of work… and appreciate the effort it takes to do it right.
