My Student Yelled, "WHERE THE F* MY BROWNIES AT?!?" A Pacer Test Story.
The fitness gram pacer test is a multi-stage aerobic capacity test that progressively gets more difficult as it continues...
I walked into the history teacher’s classroom and a student immediately said, “Ayo! Da fuck mah brownies at?”
I looked at him with an arched eyebrow. The first hints of anger started to bubble in my gut.
He continued, “Fuck is you lookin at, comin in here late wit dem brownies.”
I said, “Kyle, if you continue speaking to me that way, you can forget about having any,”
“Fuck is you talkin bout? I did the work, I get the brownies. Now you talkin funny. I almost died. I’m takin mah brownies.”
“Hold up, let me get this straight. I didn’t have to make these in the first place, and now you’re cursin at me because I’m late. Who do you think you’re talkin to?
“Nah Schuerch, now you playin. How am I gonna do the work, and not get the brownies. You a wack ass N*gga.”
My anger became a furnace. I clapped my hands together and said, “THAT’S IT. Anyone who wants brownies, you can have them in the other room, I’m not opening them here. Kyle, you’re not allowed in that room. You just lost your chance.”
“NAH, THAT’S FUCKING BULLSHIT. Fuck if I care. Fuck you. I don’t need your shit. Fuck outa here. Fuckin bullshit.”
He continued haranguing me as I walked into the hallway. With the f-bombs flying left and right. I finally cracked, “KYLE, FORGET IT. I CAN’T BELIEVE THIS IS HOW YOUR TALKING TO ME. TAKE A WALK DOWN THAT HALLWAY. I’M WRITING YOU UP, ENJOY A SUSPENSION! WALK! YEAH! WALK!”
Then I turned to find my principal staring at me slack jawed.
One Week Earlier
As he ran back and forth across the gym, you could tell the kid was in pain.
His chin cranked up in the air, greedily sucking in air and letting it out in gasps as he crossed the green line on each side of the gym, staying one step ahead of the relentless “beep.”
The pacer test is a brutal test - one which I love. It measures your aerobic capacity in simple elegant fashion. There are two lines 20 meters apart. When you hear the beep, you have to cross the line on the opposite side of the gym until you hear the next beep. Initially, the time between the beeps is long - long enough that you can almost fast-walk the gymnasium floor between the electronic dings and make it in time.
But every seven beeps the tempo slightly increases. Eventually you have to jog, eventually you have to run, eventually you have to sprint. Eventually, you collapse. Like the voice says at the beginning of the soundtrack, the 20m pacer test is an aerobic capacity test, which is a fancy way of asking, at what point can your body no longer process oxygen? At its core, it’s a pain tolerance test.
The national average for a 16 year old boy is around 50 beeps, and the boy running, a boy who we’ll call Kyle, is well into the upper eighties. I thought he would drop out around 10 beeps ago, but that’s the beautiful thing about Kyle, when he’s given a true challenge, he gets this fuck you attitude about it. Even in depths of physical pain, his face says, “you can’t break me,” even though it's a test that breaks everyone.
When he finally gives in and collapses to the floor, belly heaving for more oxygen, his beep score is a 101, over double the national average and third best in the school. I go over and dap him up as he’s still rolling around on the floor. I say, “Now that’s what I’m talkin about. Great job.” He nods and smiles, still gasping for air.
If you’re wondering how I got this kind of buy-in from one of my students, this is the part where I give you a nod and a wink, and I tell you I’m a pretty good P.E. teacher.
Building Buy In
A classic way most kids experience the pacer test goes like this: some fat old gym teacher chooses a random day where he rolls out the speaker and tells the students they’re going to run the beep test today. Kids used to aimlessly bouncing a basketball, suddenly get thrust into a test where they’re supposed to run themselves ragged into a pool of lactic acid so the government can get a snapshot of the population’s fitness. Naturally, most teenagers say fuck that.
They’ll run until they’re minorly uncomfortable, and then they’ll quit, telling the P.E. teacher with a slightly elevated heart rate that they did everything they could. Then, the fat old gym teacher lets them skip to their bag and open up their phone. As a P.E. teacher who has a profound love for fitness and understands the value of knowing how to push yourself, I reject this model.
In my school we prepare for the pacer test like it’s a true sporting event. I start preparing the students for the test over a month out. Everyday they run a small portion of the test. I give the kids individual goals to shoot for. Students who have developed a psychological fear of the test will start with a goal as low as 10 beeps (literally less than 2 minutes of running). For adept runners, I’ll start them as high as 30 beeps. Then, every single class we slowly add a couple more beeps to everyone's individual goals.
I also launch a one man marketing campaign. I constantly repeat the phrase, “I don’t care who you are or what you plan to do, but in this life you have to learn how to be comfortable being uncomfortable.” I repeat the phrase before every pacer test practice. I repeat it over the school announcements. (Yes, I handle the school announcements.) I hammer the short version of the message into the minds of students, “Comfortable being uncomfortable, comfortable being uncomfortable, comfortable being uncomfortable.” It’s a perfect way to frame the pacer test, and it’s the most important trait I want students to leave my class with.
Along with excellent marketing, I add competition to the mix. In a burst of creativity (which I will firmly pat myself on the back for) I figured out how to make an individual test a grade team competition. The structure of the competition works like this: the top seven boys’ scores and the top seven girls’ scores in each grade get added together into one large aggregate score. That way, even if you are the best runner in the school, you don’t necessarily win. The grade team with the largest aggregate score from fourteen kids wins the competition.
It’s an incredible structure, because it creates an environment where everyone encourages everyone in their grade to push. Every extra length of the gym suddenly counts for your team. The best kids don’t get complacent with decent scores, and the worst kids on the team can make the difference between winning and losing. They often do.
During pacer test days, I split classes into two heats. While one half of the class runs, it’s not uncommon for the kids in the other heat to scream encouragement to their teammates. Whenever a particularly noteworthy performance like Kyle’s happens, 99% of the time the class will applaud.
I also allow students to retake the test as many times as they want. It’s not pacer test day. It’s pacer test week. Students get one full week to establish the absolute best score they can manage. Many kids will take and retake the test up to three or four times. I’m damn proud of that fact. When I first started to build this culture around the pacer test, most kids hated it. They wanted to run a mediocre attempt and just get it over with, now they willingly embrace the pain. Everybody loves to win.
And winners, of course, deserve rewards.
This is the part where I give you a nod and a wink, and I tell you I’m a pretty good baker.
Chocolate Thunder Brownies
No cap, I make a bitchin batch of brownies.
I’ve done this competition for 4 years now, and every year I’ve rewarded the winning team with what I call Chocolate Thunder Brownies. The recipe is a long held family secret that you can find right here, and the trick to mastering the recipe is buying the most expensive high quality chocolate and cocoa powder you can get on the market. When I triple the recipe it costs me about $100 to make.
When I pitch to the classes why the Chocolate Thunder Brownies were so good–why it is worth killing yourself on a pacer test in order to win them, I rely on a simple line of questioning. Here’s how one class responded.
I said, “Alright people, talk to me, is it true that white people can’t cook?”
“Yeah! Ya’ll don't use no seasoning! Y'all eating nasty ass plain chicken breast.”
“Mmmm,” I nod my head in solemn agreement. “It’s true, many of my people don’t know how to make dinner taste good. However, I have a question for you, what can white people do well?”
They look at me blankly.
“They can bake.”
The kids start doing their own slow nod. One of them said, “Yeah, that’s true. Yo, ya’ll ever had one of them Levain Cookies? Them shits fire.”
I nod again. “As you all know, I am white”
One kid calls out, “What!?! No way!” The class laughs.
“It’s true–hard as it is to believe, but make no mistake, I make a fire batch of brownies. That’s what you win if your grade wins the pacer test. Chocolate. Thunder. Brownies.”
So along with my constant marketing slogan of “Comfortable Being Uncomfortable,” I also remind them how good these brownies are. I ask winners from past years to describe them. The kids who have had the pleasure of experiencing one of these chocolate delights often explain the rapture of the first bite to their classmates.
I really do have to thank Ghirardelli Chocolate one of these days.
All this to say, between the constant practice, the constant competition hype, and the constant reminder of world-class brownies, one might say Kyle–the kid who blew up on me in the beginning of this article–was a smidge impatient to receive his reward. I had done my job too well.
So when I finally walked into the classroom during lunchtime about ten minutes late (I had been inputting grades) to serve the championship junior grade team their Chocolate Thunder Brownies, Kyle just couldn’t take the wait any more. He blew up at me, and I blew up right back at him.
When my principal saw the exchange in the hallway, he immediately stepped in and said, “Schuerch! What’s going on.”
I explained that Kyle was being wildly disrespectful, and even though he had rightfully earned the reward for helping his team win the pacer test, his behavior was stopping me from allowing him to have any. I said all of this in an angry rush.
My principal told me in a gentle tone to calm down, and reminded me of our consequence protocol. He also said not to let these kids get under my skin like that. I was annoyed that he was lecturing me, but I took a deep breath, and let it out with a long sigh. He was right. I could have kept my cool better. I’m an 8 year veteran, I know how to keep my cool better.
I said, “Alright. Alright. I’m cool. I’m pissed. But I’m cool. That kid is definitely getting a suspension though.”
20 Minutes Later
Here’s something you should know about Kyle. He’s one of my favorites.
To his classroom teachers he’s an absolute nightmare. He can’t read but refuses to admit he can’t. He regularly avoids any classroom work, and constantly talks over his teachers while they’re giving directions. When they attempt to redirect him he regularly curses them out. He may have spent more time suspended than any other kid in the school this year.
But in my gymnasium, he shines.
For me he’s a mix of chaotic energy and wild charisma. The kid goes hard in the paint on any sport I teach. He’s athletic and always wants the ball, but he ardently supports his teammates. When he scores he talks shit to the opposing team, when his teammates score he’ll scream, “FUCK YEAH THATS WHAT I’M TALKIN ABOUT!” followed by an enthusiastic dap. Yes, he’s overly competitive and has a wild temper when he thinks he’s being treated unfairly, but he’s also quick to apologize and knows when he’s made a mistake.
I can’t help but love the kid.
Case in point, after he finished cursing me out in the hallway, he apparently kept walking and cursing until he ran into our dean on the 2nd floor. He immediately approached her and said, “Yo Ms. Paige, I gotta tell you something, I fucked up.” (I got that part of the story from Ms. Paige after the fact.)
While he was telling the dean what he did, I was stewing in an upstairs classroom already starting the immense amount of paperwork it takes to get a student suspended. I was pissed. A kid I loved - a kid who knows I love him - cursed me out when I was trying to reward him with brownies. I was trying to quietly manage my rage while trying to think about how I would handle him reentering my classroom after a week of suspension.
Even worse, when I walked into my 6th period class, (the class that follows lunch) I had forgotten that Kyle had my class that period. He was already in the gymnasium waiting for me. He came up to me with a sorry look in his eye and said, “Yo Schuerch, can I talk to you?”
I was still fired up. “Oh you want to talk to me? Now you want to talk? Now you want to have a conversation? Fine. Let’s have a conversation.” Other kids were starting to arrive in the gymnasium, so I stalked over to the other side of the gym and Kyle followed.
I was about to open my mouth, but Kyle beat me to it, “Yo Schuerch. I need you to know I know I fucked up. I shouldn’t have said that.”
I waited for him to plead for no suspension, for no detention, for no call home, for some kind of softer punishment, but no plea came. He was standing there, looking me in the eye, apologizing with no expectation for anything. He was acting like the man I know he can be.
I took a deep breath. I said,
“Yo. You know I’m human right?”
“Yeah.”
“You know I have emotions right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then how in the world would you expect me to respond when you curse me out? You think I’m just going to hand you a brownie after you curse me out for not getting to the classroom on time? ‘Here Kyle, I’m late to serve you a brownie during my lunch. So sorry, I’m a fucking asshole, here you go.’ Nah. I spent over a hundred dollars of my own money making these things for you and your classmates, and you curse me out cause I’m 10 minutes late? Bro, you would never respect me if I let that shit slide. In fact, the reason you respect me is exactly because I don’t let that shit slide.”
His eyes went wide when I said I had spent over a hundred dollars on a batch of brownies, (and probably at the cursing) and he nodded in affirmation when I assumed his respect. He said, “I know. You’re right. You’re right.”
I stepped up to him and brought both my hands to his cheeks, and put my forehead right against his. Our eyes couldn’t have been less than three inches apart. I said, “Yo, you know you’re one of my favorites right?”
“Yeah, I know.”
“I get to see the best version of you in this school. I get to see you competitive. I get to see you encourage the people around you. I love seeing your effort. Don’t think I wasn’t impressed as hell watching you run that pacer test. I respect the hell out of that kind of effort. It’s one of the best things about you. You know how to give everything you got when you decide to do it. You’re a bad mother fucker, and I’ll always appreciate that about you.”
He looked at me the whole time I said it. Didn’t blink once. I took my forehead away from his and said, “But dude, you gotta control your temper.”
He looked down and softly said, “I know, I know.”
I let the silence stretch and then I took my hands from his face.
“Do better.”
“I will.”
“Aight. We good.”
As the kid walked away, I quickly shot my principal a text,
“Hey boss, ignore the suspension paperwork I sent you. The kid apologized. Properly.”
“Do you want him to have detention still?”
“Oh definitely.”
*4 years ago, I read Kevin Kelly’s article, “1000 True Fans.” The gist of it goes like this. Create a following of people who become fans of what you do. Be so damn good at what you do that people want to give you money so you continue doing it.
Here’s what I do. I teach, and I write stories about it.
If you’re in the position where you don’t mind becoming a paid subscriber, I hope you consider it… though if your initial reaction to that is, “fuck off, I’m just here to read,” then rock on.
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Damn, dude, this one gave me long-lasting chills. You’re on fire this year. (And loved the nonlinear storytelling structure.)
I am new to your posts and greatly admire your courage and perseverance for the good of your students. Do you have a post done previously you can recommend to help me catch up with you. I am a bit slow being 85 and having gone to public school K - 12 in the late 1940s and 50s, graduated in 1957. I am plugging away here at my classic film study project and my goal at this stage in my life is to share with the kids that are underserved with films like 12 Angry Men and It's a Wonderful Life. I found your substack and see that you are a realist who is also an idealist. You believe in the capacity of your kids to see what is good, hard as it can be. Interested in learning more. Thank you. Onalee McGraw, Ph.D, Director Educational Guidance Institute.