| James Ragland: Cheers for nerds who persevere 01/18/2001 By / The Dallas Morning News I'm a nerd.
Maybe you faithful readers already knew that, but I didn't find out until last week.
I was eating breakfast with two gorgeous women from my high school days, former cheerleaders no less, and they told me they always thought I was a nerd.
A nerd. Me? Bill Gates is a nerd! Mark Cuban is a nerd! Those are the guys tinkering around in the basement trying to figure out how to make a billion dollars. They've got slide rules in their shirt pocket, and Einstein's theory of relativity memorized. Not me.
"You weren't a bad nerd," said one friend, Trina, a successful real estate agent. "You were a good nerd. You were really popular, but everybody always knew what grade you were going to get."
"Yep," said Dawn, the other friend, a successful teacher. "You were one of the ones who always messed the grading curve up for everybody."
Trina and Dawn were two smart cookies, so I found their observation insightful, even though the exact word they used made my jaw hit the floor.
That's Dr. Nerd to you
At the risk of sounding nerdy, I must say their comments reminded me of a book I recently read: The Big Picture (Zondervan Publishing House), by Dr. Ben Carson. Dr. Carson, a well-known black neurosurgeon, has written two other books, Gifted Hands and Think Big.
In The Big Picture, he shares the story of how he overcame many hardships, including poverty, to become chief of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore by the time he was 33.
It's a compelling story by a fascinating man who now performs surgeries on patients that other doctors consider too risky to treat. What I found remarkable, however, is that the world came close to not knowing the potential Ben Carson had bottled up inside of him.
He and all of his classmates thought he was a "dummy," because he acted like one. He failed to apply himself in school and settled for the low grades that mirrored his own low expectations. That all changed when his voracious reading habit came to light one day in the fifth grade. He answered a tough question, and his teacher and classmates were impressed.
But no one was more stunned than Ben Carson. Suddenly he liked the way he felt about himself. And with his changed attitude and improved self-esteem came a wave of achievements that will leave you breathless. It's a book worth reading, especially if you've got a youngster who needs some inspiration.
Glamorizing education
Oh, yeah. He also talks about the "nerd" issue. He suggests that if society starts to trumpet education as much as it does athletics and entertainment, we'll all be better off. If we emphasize how cool it is to study and learn, "nerd" could become a badge of honor.
Unfortunately, too many kids, especially boys, put way too much emphasis on being the next great entertainer or athletic superstar. There's nothing wrong with that goal, as long as they know how incredibly long the odds are and how rocky that path may be.
"They glamorize that [sports and entertainment] because they see them as well-paid professions," said Dr. H.B. Wells, the Dallas school district's assistant superintendent in charge of dropout prevention. "It's a challenge the community faces."
I once thought I'd play basketball forever, too. I won many accolades. "You were a great basketball player," Trina said. But others were better.
And once my trophies began to gather dust, it was time for the nerd to play.
James Ragland can be reached at 214-977-8270.
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