Effort Oratory
It is the little league championship. The home team is down by one with one out and one runner on base. Ben rushes up to the plate, and just like a bad rendition of Casey at the Bat: �Strike one, strike two, strike three, you�re out!� Ben throws his bat and helmet away in disgust. Even though there are only two outs, Ben promptly announces to his team: �Let�s pack our bags and leave,� only because �the handicapped kid� is up next. But, just then, Ben hears the crack of a bat, followed by a big cheer, and the ball flying over the fence. The home team has won! With a look of utter disbelief, Ben asks a question intended to be rhetorical: �How did he do that?� But, he did get an answer from his coach: �If you had seen him spending hours of time after practice, doing his very best to hit the ball, never giving up even though failure had occurred time and again, you wouldn�t be surprised. And if you had put in that same amount of effort, then you would have done just as well.� You see, these two baseball players were exact opposites in one category which many of us lack: effort. Lack of effort has blossomed into an ongoing problem in our nation. Since effort is no longer a necessity in our lives, the education system does not demand effort, and because of the external an internal causes which drive us away from effort, we need to discover solutions as quickly as possible.
We�ve all heard the saying that necessity is the mother of all invention, but we probably haven�t stopped to consider the fact that necessity is also the mother of effort. A long time ago, our ancestors lived in a different time. It was a time in which people had not grocery stores, cars, or the comfortably heated houses we have today, but it was a time when people had to put every last ounce of effort into survival. Their only alternative was death. Now, we can have an easy job at McDonald�s, live in an apartment, and survival will not be a problem. The necessity of effort has been eliminated in today�s society. All of us know that unless something, like effort, is absolutely necessary for our well-being, we often do not take the time to improve upon it. Unfortunately, many students take this attitude into the classroom. As many of us know, we often exploit the fact that we can do just enough to get by and it won�t show up on our high school transcript. In fact, last year my student council voted out a proposition that would make the all-important pluses and minuses show up on everyone�s transcript and report card. Whatever the �official� reason was, the real reason behind the decision was that they simply did not want to put in the effort that would make the pluses show up; they wanted to do as little work as possible. Those of you who are skilled at barely getting by should realize that if you do more than the minimum, you�re already one step ahead of the majority. You would be surprised how much a teacher�s opinion can change when you strive for the elusive 100 percent rather than the 89.5 that is rounded up to an �A.� And you would enjoy the fact that while other people are trying to find out what they can do to raise their grade by extra credit, you are busy putting that hard-earned free time to work. Think about it. You gain all those improvements just because you put a little bit more effort into the situation. Unfortunately, many students fail to recognize this fact.
Something you may not have heard about our education system is that in the last thirty years, our average grade-point average has increased to 2.9. So that means we�re improving, right? Well, as the people in the Hertz commercials say, �Not exactly.� We all know that in the same time period, the US has significantly dropped to 14th in education. There are more statistics than just that. According to The Committee on Education and the Work force, �A recent international education comparison found that United States� students scored far below both Japanese and British students in all subjects for which there were comparisons. In fact, Japanese students came close to doubling scores of US students in certain subjects.� And, according to the magazine Science Activities, �The Third International Math and Science Study, the most extensive international study of student achievement ever undertaken, ranked the United States 17th in science and 28th in math. After I discovered how poorly we are doing at the international level compared to how well we appear to be doing within our nation, the question, �Why?� immediately came into my mind. It was then that I realized how low our standards are compared to other countries, and how few incentives we have to do well. We need to raise our standards by giving people a reason to try hard, or eve, dare I say, expect them to try hard. Currently, the only rewards we have for those who excel are awards at the end of the year. There simply isn�t an incentive during the year to do well, except, of course, when your parents see your report card. And by then, it�s too late to change. In essence, not only do we have to raise our standards, but we have to create a punishment for not trying, and a greater reward for doing your best.
Over the years, I have found that there are several external causes to lack of effort in what we do on a daily basis. One cause, favoritism, discourages people from trying. On some teams, the coach�s son, and sometimes even his friends, are give preferential treatment over everyone else on the team regardless of how hard they try. Others on the team are discouraged because they have done their best, yet, no matter how hard they try and how much success they have, they will not receive equal playing time. There is a saying, �There comes a time when the odds are against you and the only reasonable course of action is to quit.� Unfortunately, this is what some people end up doing. Another external cause is overbearing requirements placed upon us. A prime example of this could be the Super Bowl. In the two weeks preceding the big game, all the Packers heard was that they were the better team, they were the eleven point favorite, and they were going to win the game. The Broncos were looked upon as the lesser team in much of the country, excluding the Denver area, and of course, my home. Most people didn�t expect them to win. The Broncos, the team with the lesser burden of expectation, won. We must not place overbearing requirements on people so that their own determination will take them towards their final goal.
For all of us, effort begins with the passion that we have for our everyday activities. Think, for just a second, about someone you know loves their job. Dick Vitale and Michael Jordan come immediately to my mind. Whoever came to your mind, that person probably does a good job because of the effort caused by a love for the job, and he or she most likely conveys a good attitude towards co-workers and customers. this attitude change doesn�t only help that single person, but it is absorbed by others, thereby altering the underlying unity of the team. It is that passion that we have inside of us that most defines us. And if we lost that, we lose ourselves. We must make sure that our passion is directed towards trying in order to succeed in life. So, in order to best insure effort, do our job well, and thus have a better effect on others, we must enjoy what we do everyday. This goes right in line with Ozzie Smith�s saying, �Have a job that you love, and you�ll never work a day in your life.�
We can learn about what causes lack of effort,t but ultimately we have to discover solutions to this universal problem. With society the way it is, it is difficult, if not impossible, to make effort an absolute necessity in life. The best solution, therefore, is to make effort necessary to our mental well-being. We have to condone it to our peers, and they have to expect our best effort. As many of us have discovered, it is our peer evaluation that we care about the most. Part of that decision is based upon our successes and failures. Let us redefine success, not to mean how much we have accomplished, but how hard we�ve worked in achieving our goals. For a second solution, our education system is somewhat flawed, in that teachers sometimes place too much emphasis on getting through the book to make us want to learn more about the topics which we are currently studying. Our goals need to be readjusted to spark the interest of students so that they are learning because they want to, not because they are being forced to. When a student is interested in a particular area, he or she is more likely to put in more effort, and thus a student will learn more and do better in the class. For the third solution, we must treat people according to their talents, determination, and limitations so people will not have unfair burdens placed upon them. We have to maintain an effective balance between lack of expectations and overbearing requirements. we must discover who to apply these tools to and how to use them. These are two tools that, when used well, create a drive to do something, but when used poorly, create the exact opposite. We also need to evaluate our own situation, making sure that we are doing things that we enjoy. when we participate in activities or jobs that we enjoy, we put quite a bit more effort into them than if we don�t care about them at all.
Finally, we all need to be aware of how much our lives will improve when the proper amount of effort is give. Effort makes our full ability rise to the surface. As Jeffrey Float, an olympic medalist, said, �The real contest is what you�ve done versus what you�re capable of doing.� No matter how limited someone�s skill is, even as limited as �the handicapped kid�s� seemed at first, everyone who puts in effort will improve and will surprise you now and then. On the other hand, when a person is born with natural inclinations in a certain area and doesn�t attempt to enhance those abilities through effort, then those skills will diminish over time. So, I don�t know about you, but when I go to pick my next baseball team, I won�t necessarily pick the people who are the most talented, but I�ll pick the people who will give it their best effort no matter what the circumstances are. And, if we don�t win the first game, our collective effort will improve each individual as well as the team, which will take us one step closer to winning the next one. And that self-improvement is our ongoing test and the ultimate direction of the human race.