The Way of the WASP: Summer Jobs and Character Building

“Hardship is vanishing, but so is style, and the two are more closely related than the current generation supposes.” - E.M. Forster

In our current era, empirically, “Preppy” no longer refers to the growth earned in a world class academy, but instead donning tartans and bow ties. (Ditto “Ivy”.) If I can be even more stroppy, we live in an era when far too many role-modelling adults practice performative anti-intellectualism and worse, anti-character. And since we are gilding lilies here, add that—in part due to their costs—the explicit point of colleges is increasingly to prepare graduates for the slog of the best paying jobs. Provosts must demonstrate that pesky positive ROI.

So despite this, or perhaps because of this, and with apologies to George Orwell, if there is hope for character building in the next generation, it lies in summer jobs.

And while more important than ever, this is not a new thought. Decades ago, our great friend Harwood Ellis left his career as a teacher at a prestigious Boston area prep school (where his father was headmaster) to take over a Maine coast camp (which admittedly was equally prestigious), because he believed he could better build boys’ character in the two months during the summer than he could the rest of the year.

Whether organically or deliberately, one can see snippets of this ethos playing out, summer after summer, where the next generations are:

• Experiencing responsibility by being responsible for the lives of kids out on a mountaintop or sailing trip during a lightning storm

• Being the first to get out of a tent on the seventh consecutive rainy day when leading a canoe trip.

• Making a very, very expensive rookie mistake at the boatyard.