Believing in Kids Saves Lives--A Passionate Keynote Address by Charlie Applestein

[Meredith]

The author of No Such Thing as a Bad Kid asked a room filled with more than 200 mentors from across New England Friday, if, in all their experience, they met a troubled child who could say they had an adult who believed in them.

Not a single hand went up.

“When you really believe in a kid you put fuel in the tank,” Charlie Applestein, MSW, said at the first Northeast Regional Mentoring conference held at the Marriott Hotel in Providence. The fuel Applestein was talking about is “hope.” Bringing hope to young people through mentoring was what the daylong event, hosted by mentoring partnerships from Rhode Island, Vermont, Maine, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, Long Island and national known mentoring expert Dr. Susan Weinberger was all about.

Applestein was keynote speaker at the conference luncheon. He brought a message about the importance of positive attitude and belief in people through a combination of comic role playing and serious observations that had his audience laughing one moment and nodding in agreement the next.

Applestein described to group members two girls who need mentors. Both are teenagers. One wears long sleeve shirts even on the hottest day of the year to hide burn marks inflicted on her as a child. She is in therapy; is unsure of herself and doesn’t have any friends. The second girl was overweight with bad hygiene and prone to acting up.

Applestein then asked group members which of the two girls they would prefer to mentor and why. After the fifth person chose the girl who insisted on long sleeved shirts, for reasons ranging from they felt they could better relate to her to the fact that she is in therapy, Applestein disclosed that the two personalities he described are the same girl. He made his point about how labeling influences choices and expectations.

“Life isn’t what you see, it’s what you perceive,” he said.

With 27 years of experience in child welfare, Applestein is a program director and treatment coordinator for the Nashua Children’s Home and the author of several books. Applestein avoids labeling kids.

“You don’t have a learning disability,” he recalled telling one kid, “You have a road block…That was 50 gallons [of hope] in the tank.”

He talked about a boy he mentored who had little respect for authority, swore profusely and was frequently in the principal’s office. After one of those visits, the boy confided to Applestein that the principal told him he was the only student to ever get under his skin in 30 years.

Applestein turned it around.

“Well, you’re good at something,” he said to the shocked student, “Now we have to find something where you can use it.” He said they came to the conclusion a talk show host would be a good career goal.

Applestein said, “The brain can be rewired,” and he urged using music and simple repetitive phases as way to get kids to control their behavior.

“If you talk in an angry tone, you live alone,” he sang. Soon he had the audience chanting with him “Don’t yell, gently tell.”

Being a mentor sometimes requires acting he said, because “If they knew how you really felt you wouldn’t last a minute,” he said. “But it’s so much more important than being an actor,” he continued, “Because you’re trying to save a life.”

“Passion is fundamental,” Applestein said to a room full of believers.

If you are passionate about making a difference and are interested on changing the life of a child, please contact Mobius for more information at 802-658-1888 or email [e-mail].

Article courtesy of Warwick Beacon by John Howell.