Dedication

If there is a complaint against this generation of middle/high school students it is that they tend to be apathetic. Over and over again from teachers, administrators, and people in youth ministry I hear the lament, "Students today just don’t care about anything."

They are dead wrong. These students are passionate about some things, if you are seeing apathy, you just haven’t found out what they are passionate about.

Tribes of passion. That’s how I would describe today’s adolescents in general. Back even just 10 years ago you could walk on any high school campus and label kids. You’d have your goths, skaters, jocks, band geeks, nerds, 90120s, etc. You could categorize students pretty easily. With that knowledge you could figure out how to motivate whole globs of students at a time. Find the key and you can turn them on. That isn’t so today. Today’s adolescents form small niche` groups that display an extremely diverse economy of passions. You could have one tribe of girls that has a skater, a band geek, and snob, a punk, and a goth. What ties them together isn’t just exterior stuff… it is something deeper. So to motivate that tribe take a different type of key. Therefore, motivating that tribe is harder because… if you want to motivate an individual tribe you may need a whole set of keys. Teachers, administrators, and youth workers see this and go, "Holy cow… there is no way… I can’t do all of that!" and then they stop trying. They just looked at students as a locked door and walk away frustrated… then they call them apathetic.

The secret key to unlocking apathy. I have found today’s adolescents to be extremely motivated and focused on their passions. They tend to be so focused on what they want that whatever happens outside of that passion has little value. Or, more likely, they will devote as little attention to what they need to do so that they can fully enjoy what they want to do. This is why you have students who will practice for 6 hours to be the best at a Halo 2 level but will not open their books to do their homework. What is their passion? Being great at Halo 2. So they aren’t apathetic… in fact they are quite motivated and will forego everything to be the best at what they are passionate about. In other words, while extremely focused and passionate about somethings, adults are frustrated because the adolescents in their life seem apathetic about what the adults think is important when it isn’t in support about what the adolescent thinks is important.

So what is the magic key? In my experience, the key to motivating apathetic students is investment. In general, I have learned that if I invest extra time in a student… they will become motivated about what I am passionate about. To say that better, when the two of us start to share the same passion… when I have shown through my life that I am passionate about something and that I think it is worth my attention… we will begin to start sharing in that passion together. So if there are apathetic high school students that you want to see motivated… start investing your time in them. Learn what’s cool to them. But as time goes on… show them what’s cool in your world.

Singular Focused? I don’t want to oversimplify what I am saying. If you were to read that with a critical eye you’d say… "That McLane guy is a fake… he only wants to know about something so he can get you to do something… that’s manipulation and not motivation." That makes it sound so inauthentic when in fact it is completely authentic. In fact, the more honest I tend to be the better "results" I see. I don’t pretend to be into hunting to invest in a hunter. Or worse, I don’t pretend to like UM football so I can invest in a UM fan. Just like a hunter isn’t only into hunting… no adolescent is into a sole thing.

Here’s my example: Each Tuesday morning, a group of students walk through my back door at 6:15 AM. I can’t figure it out… but they keep coming back. We hang out, talk about life and stuff, and then do a simple Bible study. When I tell others about it they say, "How on earth could you get high schoolers to do that when I can’t even get ______ to take out the garbage?" (Trust me, this group probably whines about taking out the garbage too… they aren’t perfect.) The answer to that quandary is I have no idea how to get them to come because they want to be here… they are passionate about being here. The truth is, even though their coming here early in the morning probably makes me look good… I didn’t do much to start it. It just happened. We started it and I figured it would last a few weeks and fizzle out… but they kept coming. But it is the principle in action… sometimes when you invest a little into a tribe… you hit a button in the tribe and the tribe moves. Apathy doesn’t get up at 5:30 in the morning to go to a Bible study. But passion does.

Don’t sell this generation short. They really are an emergent tribe of world-changers.