The Importance of Trusting Teenagers

On Friday we participated in a webinar with Jonathan Worth and a few other scholars where we discussed several topics including building trust within the school, community and internet. Personally I enjoyed the experience, but found it rather "intimidating" to speak up only because I felt so disconnected from their status I guess you could say. After class I explained to Preston the importance of trusting teenagers and including them in discussions such as the one we were a part of on Friday. The statement that K-12 grades are isolated from the rest of the adult world was brought up and I couldn't agree more. The fact that "adolescence" are looked down upon as childish or immature, restricts the wisdom that could flow between the young and old thinkers. If the boundaries between the youth and adults were broken, the collaboration between our wisdom and theirs could create a whole new era of innovation and research. Diverse thinking is key to the up-rising of new leaders. Youth minds provide a perspective lost by adults, our input could create knowledge that would've never been discovered if it weren't for our adolescent thinking.
School is supposed to prepare us for that "real world" battle, but in reality how many people actually believe high school truly helped them and prepared them? A vast majority would agree that there path in life was paved through experience and not learning how to raise your hand to go to the restroom. Therefore, including teenagers in scholarly discussions and research is significant in preparing us to follow a beneficial path in life. So by the time we are adults conducting research or experiments or changing the world in whatever it is we do, we'll be far more prepared and experienced than the former generation. With each new generation will come a quicker acquirement of maturity and leadership in all fields of careers.