Theres No Such Thing As A Bad Kid

[Music]

hi

i’m shane maynor and i was one of those

bad teens you know the kind that makes

the teacher

tense up when they walk in i was always

getting into trouble

i got into fights a lot most of them i

started

destroyed public property came to class

with my knuckles bleeding

and almost got expelled for what i

thought was a hilarious prank

involving fake blood and four grossed

out and upset faculty members

often when adults come into contact with

a teen who is out of control

their first thought is a judgmental one

they see them as a nuisance

and think that teen needs some heavy

discipline

a good talking to to be put in their

place

as a teen i got that talk from adults

many times

and i’m here to tell you it definitely

wasn’t what i needed

and it didn’t work it’s taken me a long

time to figure out why

and today i’m going to talk about how

that perception

fuels the cycle of harmful behavior

and how providing safe spaces for

self-discovery

radically alters the outcome of a teen’s

life

before consequences become a

heartbreaking reality

as an adult i teach personal development

through the arts

using painting and poetry for teens that

have extreme

behavioral challenges teens that have

done

heinous acts of violence some of my

students are under 24 hour watch

and are the kind of teens the other

teachers

family members and even therapists have

given up on

but we can’t give up on them and here’s

why

when someone asks me why this

demographic i tell them it’s because

i’ve been in their shoes

i was the bad teen in high school

i was violent to myself and others

part of this came from experiencing

trauma at an early age

i had parents that loved me but my

upbringing

centered around biker gangs in a violent

atmosphere

trying to get a teen who grew up in

violence to

imagine a world where violence doesn’t

exist

is like asking someone to think of a

color

they’ve never seen before but the major

reason i had such a hard time

was because my father died unexpectedly

my mother leaned into alcoholism and we

couldn’t handle each other’s grief

i would go days without sleeping

i had ocd paranoia and at one point

during a five day long stretch without

sleep

i even thought my own mother was trying

to kill me

during all this i wrote poetry and

created art

constantly and as much as i believed

that the arts

saved lives it hadn’t yet saved mine

when i was 16 me and a friend were

house-sitting for her aunt

late that night while music was blaring

from mtv in the living room

you know back when mtv actually played

music

i found myself feeling completely

overwhelmed

so i went into the bathroom locked the

door

and i hung myself with the belt

my friend heard my feet convulsing

against the door

broke it down and cut me loose

after i had already blacked out and

stopped breathing

the years following that suicide attempt

weren’t any easier

now i’m grateful because it put me on

the path to become the person i never

had growing up

as a teen i already knew that if

i survived i wanted to work with other

teens

i wanted to be the person i never had

you see i was already labeled bad

so instead of offers for therapy i got

threats to be sent off locked up

no one ever came to me and asked

what do you need how can i help

and it would have altered everything

i’ve seen how damaging judgments can be

through working with teens and how often

they get

punished for their own trauma

expecting a teen not to lash out in

violence

when their body is in a constant state

of fight or flight

can be futile there’s a wonderful

book called the power of the adolescent

mind

that breaks down the science of this

there’s a wavelength that goes from the

back of the brain to the front

where decision making happens now

in teens this wavelength of processing

moves slow

due to their development but

in a team that has undergone trauma

the wavelength sometimes never makes it

to the front

their bodies are literally captive

to their trauma and i know this to be

true

because i’ve lived it

so how do we help them regain control

over their bodies

well i’ve made a discovery through my

own journey and in working with them

i’ve found that if you provide a safe

space

so they can empower themselves through

their own self-discovery

instead of telling them what they need

it allows them to build new neural

pathways

that redirect the outbursts into

creativity

and start their journey to healing the

results

are incredible and it all centers around

asking what do you need how can i help

you find that out

i got to witness those results four

years ago

when i started offering personal

development through the arts

at a lockdown facility the students

there

were intimidating classrooms were being

destroyed

teachers were being assaulted they were

understaffed and lacking resources

they hadn’t had an art teacher in a

while

the last one quit after being assaulted

by her students

it’s enough to make any facilitator a

nervous wreck

and go in with bias but the situations i

encountered there

were familiar to my own experiences

students who were in violent outbursts

became

separated then punished with no space or

guidance for them to process what was

happening

they were being bound by their trauma

they were giving up

by giving in to the labels tied to their

punishment

the label of a bad teen was being

reinforced

over and over they were starting to

believe it

now i understand that many of you may

not be able to get where these teens are

coming from

but here’s something i think we can all

relate to

how many of you have been given advice

or encouragement and

weren’t in a place to receive it

i know i have you think they’re just

being nice

they don’t get what i’m going through

and your friend

who offered the advice gets upset after

the 20th time of trying to save you

and says okay you want to be miserable

be miserable i think we’ve all been on

both sides of that right

the person who couldn’t receive and the

annoying friend with good intentions

well i was the annoying friend to one of

my

students when i first started teaching

this student never had anything good to

say about herself

and was always getting into trouble for

fights

she was an incredibly talented artist

but refused to receive any compliments

about her

art every time i would offer her praise

it made her want to throw away what she

created even more

one day we were working on an art piece

with the prompt express who you are

she drew herself sitting in a corner

with horrible things written about

herself on the walls

the words were vulgar dehumanizing

and shocking they were so brutal

i was at a loss for words

i mean here we have this beautiful

talented young lady

who thinks of herself in this way

and then i remembered

how i thought of myself that same way

when i was her age

so instead of asking her to redo the

drawing

to say positive things about herself i

asked her

where do you think these words are

coming from

her first response i don’t know i just

feel that way

i said okay and let her be

when everyone left she came up and said

i’ve thought about it

where the words come from my father is

imprisoned for sexual assault

my family doesn’t want anything to do

with me

i said i’m so sorry

then she asks is it okay if i take some

of the art supplies with me

i said sure and i gave her one sheet

a few sharpies and a watercolor palette

a few weeks later i’m setting up the

space before the students come in

and she walks into the room with that

same watercolor paper

in her hands and gives it to me

it was the same prompt express who you

are

except this time she had traced her hand

and wrote all these beautiful things

about herself

and then i see where she’s written the

words

my past does not define

who i am

i look at her and she smiles

for the first time that year she smiles

she detached herself from what’s been

done to her

she did that not me all i did was allow

her the space to discover what she

needed for herself

she freed herself

and that discovery and self-empowerment

had a ripple effect she stayed out of

trouble

and sought opportunities for her future

i realized in that moment that once

teens are given the space to detach

themselves

from the narrative of their trauma they

gain

ownership over their actions the power

to

change their outcome what’s even more

amazing

is not only did i realize it the rest of

the class

started realizing it too once they saw

through each other it was possible

to a teen an adult who’s already healed

from most of their trauma

is not as inspiring but to see each

other doing it

that’s a hope that spreads like wildfire

they become their own heroes

even in situations where it feels like

there’s no way out

i’ve had students in gangs who had

charges for robbery

and when you’re living in extreme

poverty it can

feel like you don’t have an option

one of my students last year robbed

houses

because his mom needed medication and

they couldn’t afford it

that same year our class got an

opportunity

to write and perform a play on

incarceration

at a theater in salisbury north carolina

when the class started to write the play

he wanted to use his story for the play

he wanted the ending to be harsh the

young man was to be sentenced

life ruined by one mistake

so that’s the ending we wrote

two months in were rehearsing the ending

he stops in the middle of running his

lines

turns to the class and says

i have to do something i don’t want to

end up like this character

i won’t

the day before the play we did a run

through of the show at the theater

he came limping in with broken ribs

his face swollen with a black eye

he got jumped for missing a gang meeting

because he chose to do the play

instead and the next night

he did the play proudly in front of a

full house

with the mayor of salisbury in

attendance but

there was an even more important person

in the crowd that night

a teen in the same gang

after backstage that team came up to the

manager

asked how to get involved that he’d do

whatever

it takes he saw the transformation

happen before his

eyes and because it was someone who was

living the same life as him

he believed it was possible he made the

choice

to change his outcome no one

can do that for them but themselves

no advice job opportunities

letters of recommendations are going to

make a difference

if they don’t believe they are worthy of

going for it in the first place

do they need resources yes

but they have to be able to accept those

resources

before they can utilize them

what would have happened to those teens

if they would have continued

living by the narrative of their past

if there was no space given for them to

figure it out for themselves

the idea of that outcome

is exactly what’s happening in

classrooms across this country

so i’m asking you what if

we shifted our narrative from what did

you do

to what happened to you if

you treat a teen who is in the process

of giving up on their life like they are

bad

they will act accordingly when a teen

comes to me i don’t ask what they did to

be sent here

i ask who do you want to be

and every time i see a bad behavior

i look for the need the potential

instead of the punishment

i’m shane maynor and i was not a bad

teen neither are my students

you