Ugly Babies

There’s nothing quite so disconcerting as an ugly baby. You know it’s true. Babies are supposed to be cute, cuddly, and adorable. Even when we know it’s a stretch, we automatically give them the benefit of the doubt; an upgrade to “lively” or “interesting”.

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Yet…every once in a while,  when we peek below the bonnet, lift the stroller top or find ourselves face to face with the babe whose mother is burping him or her on the shoulder… we glimpse what we do not expect. And as much as we know that we’re all God’s children, that we all deserve love, that there’s time and lots of hope for all of us – when we see an ugly baby we react with just a little shudder. We look away. We move on.

So what’s my point? Recently I was in a discussion with a group of colleagues about the need for strong leadership in public education—particularly in our inner cities. Having spent a substantial portion of my career in and around this world, I’ve got a lot of opinions. We agreed that public school leaders have the same requisite skills for success in any field: strong content knowledge fueled by continuous learning; ability to form effective relationships; solid communications; strong work ethic; intelligence; and creativity.  Because school systems are public enterprises with multiple customers and complex business concerns, public school administrators must know business principles such as human and project management, quality assurance, business management and organizational development to be effective leaders.

Finally, we agreed that there could be no success without the belief that all children can learn. In fact the best educational leaders have a vision that all children will learn and achieve.

And then I proposed what I believe is an absolutely essential qualification that you won’t find listed on the job description, highlighted in a candidate’s job vitae nor discussed in the interview. Required: a love for ugly babies.

Our urban systems are filled with ugly babies-children for whom educational achievement has not been a given; whose families experienced limited academic success; who hail from depressed communities and distressed living environments. These are babies who make others cringe because of all that they don’t bring to the classroom. They can be unkempt. Their mothers and fathers, many of whom were ugly babies themselves, aren’t able to help them and may in fact be hurting them. Their pictures aren’t being carried in many wallets and they haven’t been bounced on many knees.  

So a vision that stops with academic achievement is not enough. The best-and most successful educational leaders, regardless of their tenure, status, contracts or politics, have to able to look at these ugly babies in all their inglorious unsightliness and let them know they are loved.  They must carry these children’s visages in their minds when constituents are yelling, school boards are demanding, teachers are stressing and corporations are exacting. When internal and external support wanes and special projects falter.  

Because here’s the truth: ugly babies and their sometimes ugly parents won’t ever care how much the world can offer to them until they first know how much the world really cares. 

With uncompromising love, however, a metamorphosis can occur. Our lens  sharpen as we realize that our repulsion is not for these babes, but for the reflection of ourselves that we see in them. In ugly babies, we see our neglect.  Our superficiality.  Our abuse.  We feel shame that can propel us to act.

The first action is to love them. Love our ugly babies. Only then can we help them let their beauty shine through.