Junior Achievement inspires kids to be well-behaved ornamentation
Monday, May 7th, 2007I’m having a heckuva time separating the debacle that was last Thursday’s Junior Achievement of the Upper Midwest (JAUM) Business Hall of Fame event from what must surely be a good organization.
Even though I was skeptical about my daughter’s participation in this event, my mind was open enough to allow her to go to have a good time with her friends, participate in a “grown-up” dinner, and meet — and maybe learn something from? — some of the most prominent current and former business leaders in Minnesota.
Maybe I just don’t know enough about JA. But you’d think an organization with the message “Let their success be your inspiration“ would have allowed the invited children — eighteen in all — to see and hear the life stories of the successful businessmen. So I don’t quite understand why the children were hidden away in a back room while the inductees spoke to a crowd of adult employees, families, and friends.
And certainly JA didn’t Invest. Involve. Inspire. these kids by keeping them at the event for five hours with absolutely no planned activities. Wouldn’t JA, an organization whose primary purpose is to work with children, know that a group of ten-year-olds will not be able to wait quietly for hours on end with nothing to do?
And I can’t imagine that their goal of using hands-on experiences to help young people understand the economics of life would mean offering a group of very tired and bored children money — ten dollars each — to settle down and be quiet.
One might look at that evening and surmise that JA isn’t about the children at all — that it is really about the corporations who donate and send in their employees as volunteers. But to what end? To indoctrinate children into their corporate idea of success? To secure their future workforce? Is that what JA means by their goal to create “good employees, consumers, and citizens?”
I’m not sure what my daughter learned from the evening. I know she was excited and nervous standing in front of four hundred attendees and presenting the award to Dave Koch (former CEO, Graco, Inc.) on behalf of JA. She looked darling — her fancy dress, new white sandals, and a beautiful smile on her face. She was a cute contrast to the towering blue-suited Koch, who bent down and gave her a peck on the cheek. The crowd loved it.
What an achievement.