What really qualifies you for a job?
It's a question Rebecca Yoder may well have asked herself as she drove across Pennsylvania toward the interview she had set up with a residential treatment facility for troubled teens.
Previously, Rebecca (better known to her friends as just "Becca") had taught elementary students in a private Mennonite school in Lancaster County for several years, and decided to quit her job there, thinking she would pursue working with kids who had emotional needs. In the meantime, a Mennonite junior college in northwestern Pennsylvania, Faith Builders Training Institute, offered her a secretary position. She chose to work there for a year, instead.
She moved back to Lancaster, but still wondered about the possibility of helping kids who desperately needed a mentor: an advocate, who could, in her words, "empower them to make good choices for themselves."
One of her friends saw a job posting for a child care counselor at a residential treatment facility, and contacted Becca. Did she want to apply?
Indeed.
Becca had no formal training in caring for kids, although she had worked for years in children's church in the inner city: no small feat in controlling the chaos of a large group of hyperactive kids, while still teaching a lesson, and communicating love to each child. She also had experience in teaching, but the Mennonite school where she taught did not require a college degree.
Yet she decided to apply, hoping that the children's home would look at her experience and her character, and allow her to learn on the job.
They hired her, and she was ecstatic.
What She Faced
Becca soon learned just how demanding her job was. The child care counselors monitored the teens in round-the-clock shifts. The kids left for school, therapy appointments, and meals, but the rest of the time, counselors were responsible to help them stay with the institution's schedule.
Becca said she realized just how difficult this was for the kids. "I'd tell them, 'I know it's not fair that you have to be so adult about this,'" when she saw them struggling to cooperate with the system, while they lost everything that had given them security.
At first, Becca's supervisor put her on the most stable units of the facility. Her unassuming, sweet demeanor and conservative dress, Becca says, probably made her superior wonder if she could really handle the kids.
Yet Becca told me that she only had to forcibly restrain a kid once in the three years she worked at the facility. She worked hard to develop relationships with the kids. "I knew I couldn't demand respect from them. I had to earn it. Until they had experienced care from me, they couldn't trust me."
What She Gave
She went out of her way to make weekends special for the kids. The institution provided only cold cereal for breakfast on weekends, so she would bring in eggs and bacon and other stuff, and they would make a brunch they all really loved.
The kids genuinely appreciated this. When one of the new kids cussed Becca out one day for making her change before school, Becca overheard one of the other kids calling the girl down for it.
"She makes breakfast for us. She'd do anything for us. Don't you talk to Becky that way!"
Becca found that when she invested in the group, they responded to her discipline. And eventually, her supervisor noticed. She found that she was put on the most unstable units. "I can't explain the calm you bring with you," her supervisor told her.
"I was amazed," Becca shook her head, remembering. "I used to walk in, praying for the peace of Jesus to enter with me, but I can't believe how that really happened. It showed me that the way of Jesus--the way of caring about people, not using force--really works. It helped me, because I had doubts about whether I could really do this job, with what I really believed to be true."
What She Grieved
I asked Becca what was hardest about her job.
"Oh. Losing kids. I cared about them so much they felt like mine, and it hurt so much to let them go. It was a good thing. They had completed the program, but I never knew what they would face when they left. Many of them didn't have anyone looking out for them."
"It felt like I was mourning all the time, and yet I had to keep engaging with the kids who were there."
A few, she said, chose to stay: one guy and two girls, decided to stay until they were eighteen. Most of the kids, though, went through individually-assigned goals until the facility staff felt they were stable enough to go into another placement.
What She Taught -- and Learned
Becca learned from the kids, even as she tried to teach them.
They taught her to be more honest about what she was feeling. Growing up Mennonite, she knew well how to cover any negative emotion, continuing to act kindly even if she wasn't feeling it.
"You're upset," a girl told her once. "Why are you smiling? That's freaking me out!"
Becca had to laugh. And as she lived with the kids, she saw them say exactly how they thought and felt, not caring what other people would do. She realized being nice is sometimes a barrier to really sharing herself--to being bold enough to share truth, even when it makes other people uncomfortable. "They taught me to speak up," she says.
At the same time, Becca pointed out to the kids when sharing their feelings actually alienated other people.
"You're shouting so loud no one can hear you," she told them sometimes, and tried to help them understand how to communicate so that they could gain a hearing from the people who mattered to them.
Becca's goal was always to help her kids "make the best choices for them," as she said to me, repeatedly, passionately. "It's not about me," she'd tell them. "It's not about making sure that you do what I want."
Many of the kids had no reason to trust authority, having been betrayed by parents who weren't there for them, and feeling like the people in the system didn't care about them.
One of the girls told Becca, "My social worker doesn't even know my name. He comes into court, and he gets my name wrong when he's talking to the judge."
Still, Becca tried to help the kids respect the authorities they dealt with, explaining how defiance cascaded domino after domino of negative consequences. She would tell them, "It's about you making the choices that are best for you. Use your will as your asset, rather than your enemy.
One girl, in particular, learned this well.
What She Loved
When I asked Becca what the best part of her job was, she told me a story about a girl who did learn to use her will to work for her.
When this girl came in, Becca could tell that she was sizing up the place, and each worker. She made it very clear to them that she was cooperating only because she felt like it, not because she was obeying them.
This girl told everyone how her brothers had beaten up on her to make her tough, and she was: she had become street-smart, and good at fighting.
Something would break loose, Becca was sure, and it did.
One Saturday morning, she had broken one of the rules, and Becca asked her to go to the All-Purpose Room (APR), a carpeted room where the kids could cool off, for ten minutes. She just laughed, and did not move.
Becca was pretty sure this girl would jump her if she kept pushing, so she called for backup, and two guys came and stood nearby while she went back to try again.
"I was determined to deal with this," Becca explained. "Our unit had gone from being the most violent to being the most stable, and I did not want to go back to the dark ages. I knew I had to have it out, because I would be dealing with her all the next week, too."
Becca gave her two options-- she could go to timeout immediately for ten minutes, and then go to brunch, or she could go to brunch, and then to timeout for twenty minutes.
The girl lay on her bunk, unmoving.
"Ok," Becca told her. "Your options are getting more narrow, because of your choices. You can either walk to the APR now, or I can carry you."
When she still didn't move, Becca waited, then finally walked over and picked her up, and carried her to the end of the hall. The guys escorted her from there.
Becca checked on her, and asked if she wanted to talk, but she was in no mood for that. "That's fine. You don't need to talk. I'll be leaving soon, and you don't have to deal with me anymore."
The girl had gotten out of timeout when Becca was preparing to leave. "I love you! Bye!" Becca said.
"F--- you, Becky!" was her response.
"I love you too." Becca said.
"F--- you!"
"No, really, I mean it. I do love you."
Listening to this, the other girls laughed, and told her what they usually did, "We love you! See you, Becky!" It blessed Becca, because normally the kids would take sides against the staff, but in this case, they supported her. They knew their unit was doing well, and they were proud of their success. They didn't want to lose that, either.
Becca came in the next morning, and saw that the girl who had caused issues the day before was sleeping out in the main area, close to where the staff were, rather than in her room. Becca started the morning routines with the other girls.
Becca asked this girl, "Do you want breakfast? You don't have to come eat. I can bring you cereal if you'd rather."
She looked surprised. "Okay," she said. Becca brought her the food, and then went on with her work. She had a grand time with the other girls, doing a fun weekend activity.
At the end of the day, this girl actually broke down and cried, in front of all the other girls. "I'm sorry," she said. "I've been going through all this stuff, and I shouldn't have take it out on you. I'm sorry, Becky."
Becca was floored. This was the last response she expected. And this change lasted--this girl became one of her strongest supporters. Later, she wrote to Becca, "I don't know if you know how much you changed me."
Becca found that kindness won over this girl, and she learned how to use her leadership to help her peers make positive choices.
"I'm so proud of her. She learned to make decisions that were good for her. Her family situation is not a good one; her brothers are pretty high up in gangs. But she's still doing so well--she's in school, she's going to church."
"She did the hard work," Becca says. "I just got to be there and help along."
And that, friends, is why Becca was qualified for her job.
She understands what will help kids facing poverty, addiction, or broken relationships need: someone to "carry their pain" (her words, again), someone to believe in them, and someone who will cheer them when they succeed.
