Redefining Academic Excellence with Jennifer Ledwith

You're listening to Mick Unplugged, hosted by the one and only Mick Hunt. This is where purpose meets power and stories spark transformation. Mick takes you beyond the motivation and into meaning, helping you discover your because and becoming unstoppable. I'm Rudy Rush, and trust me, you're in the right place. Let's get unplugged. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another exciting episode of Mick Unplugged. And if you are in academia, if you have kids, if you have nieces or nephews, anyone in school, this is for you. She's the blueprint for brilliance, empowering minds, breaking barriers and redefining what academic and personal excellence looks like. From classrooms to boardrooms, her message hits hard and inspires deeper. She's brilliant. She's bold. She's beautiful. She's relentless. She is Houston's finest. It's Jennifer Levitt. Jennifer, how are you doing today, dear? I'm doing well today, Mick. How are you? I am doing wonderful. Thank you so much for taking time out of your busy schedule. It means the world to me that you are here to spend time with us. And Jennifer, you know, on the show, I love to ask people about their because, that purpose, that passion that fuels them every day. So if I were to say, Jennifer, today, what is your because? Why do you keep doing what you do? My because is to create the conditions to help my students to succeed. Made up of the students who lack the confidence to pursue what they really want to go after. And my because is to help my students to attain a level of freedom through smart financial decisions when it comes to being able to go to college. and also just the freedom that comes through being able to read well, being able to attain knowledge, the freedom that comes from education, my students, making sure that my students have that. That's my because. And I want to go somewhere that you just said the freedom that education provides. I don't hear a lot of folks talk about that, but it's very, very powerful. The people that are watching or listening, Talk to us about what you mean by educational freedom. So educational freedom. When we go to college, no matter what we study, we hope to be able to make a difference in the world. That's why we embark, we go to college. And for some people, going to college is a ticket to an MRS degree, a ticket to a high paying job, a ticket to entrepreneurship, a ticket to participating in creative professions. Whatever that choice is, that is that person's choice. But nobody enters college thinking, oh, no, I want to also have a 50 pound weight attached to my leg called student loans to prevent me from being able to pursue my dreams. So just the freedom and the education is supposed to give you freedom. When you're educated, you have choices. And but when you have that heavy, heavy burdens of a tremendous student loan debt, it restricts the your abilities to make these great to take advantage of all these opportunities that your education can provide for you. I love that. And that spoke to me. And I think people need to understand that as well, because you're correct, especially in today's world. Like education now is not like education when I was going to middle school and high school. Right. It was we were separated by, you know, all the smart or the super smart people were in this group. And then it went all the way down to those who we said you get out of here. Like, that's how it was. And we didn't have access to the information that that is there now. Like when I was in school, there was no Internet. There was definitely no social media. So I think it's harder for professors, for teachers, for leaders to keep children distraction free because there's a lot of distraction now. So, Jennifer, I'd love for you to talk to us about that. Like, how do you keep children distraction free, but also give them the flexibility to tap into these resources that we didn't have? OK, so I believe in, you know, all kinds of technology can be used for good and good and used for bad. And we just have to figure out how to help students learn how to use it, use the technology positively. I like to tell people that I charm teenagers for a living. And one of the ways that I get teenagers to do things in spite of all of the distractions. And one thing I have to tell you, my students may be faced with even more distractions because I meet my students online. So we're meeting through the medium that we're using to meet is the tool of distraction. Right. But what I do with my students is I talk with them. I ask them about their interests and I'll tell them funny stories about my interests and my background. And I learn about why I have to understand why my students have a why. Whenever my students have a compelling why, and I don't know what that why is, the why could be, I want to be able to get a scholarship to such and such university. Or when my dad drove me to the test, I know that when my dad drives me to the test, he's going to tell me that if you do well on this test, I'm going to give you X amount of dollars. I'm not judging, but I learn what motivates my students. And I always remind them about what motivates them. And I'm always listening to them, making sure that I'm able to accommodate what they need. I make sure that I respect them. One thing I think adults may have a hard time doing is apologizing to children. I have no problems apologizing to children because I'm human and I make several mistakes a day. And just, I think for them to know that someone is interested in them and someone is interested in their well-being and concerned about their interests and how they feel, you know, they'll come and they'll tell me, oh, Miss Jennifer, I was awarded this scholarship or I scored or I earned this test score. I earned this grade. The first thing I ask before I tell them my thoughts, because usually I'm very, very excited. But the first thing I do is I ask, how do you feel about that? And I think for them to know that someone cares about how they feel about certain things, I think that offers them buy-in. In fact, my students beat me to class. And I think it's because they know that they're going to get that care. They're going to get that concern. But they, yes, they will get the lesson as well. They will get the lesson as well. I love that. I love that. And so with most of what you're doing being online and we're in a time now where, and again, it's not bad, right? It's just how we evolve as society where everybody's about shortcuts and hacks and how can I get to this quicker? How do you keep your students engaged and disciplined when everything isn't a shortcut at this stage of learning, right? Like you're building foundationals. There's no shortcut to the foundation. Yes. Right. Well, I just let them do it. If they go do the shortcut and, you know, sometimes the shortcut works and I'll tell them, hey, as long as your method is yielding correct results, you're comfortable with it and you can do it consistently. I'm going to leave you alone. But because I've done this for over 20 years, I know what's not going to work. And so what I do is I just say, OK, you want to use that shortcut? Go do it. Go ahead. Do it. And tell me what happens. And then I see what happens and they'll come back. I'll give an example. One of my students, we were preparing for SAT and SAT math on the entire test. Students can use a calculator. And what I have been trying to teach him all along is, you know, you need to be able to do some of this stuff without the calculator because there are questions that the calculator isn't going to be as useful as you'd like it to be. And he was like oh no Oh Miss Jennifer I a teenage boy And I said OK And then he went and practiced and he came to me He said oh Miss Jennifer this was so hard And I was like oh what happened You have the calculator And let me be clear I am not an anti anti person But I was like what happened You have the calculator Ms Jennifer that calculator was useless So a lot of times when they're trying to do the shortcuts and trying to do the hacks, I'm always there to remind them of their goals. Here's the real truth about AI. AI didn't change my businesses because it's cool. It changed my businesses because it removed friction. My teams move fast. Podcast production, media, deals, leadership development. We have systems everywhere. 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Girl, you need to do this, this, this and this. I'm not going to do that. I just start with, because the thing is, by the time my students come to me, they've been in school for, you know, 11 or 12 years. They've been on this earth 15, 16, 17, 18 years. They do have some knowledge. I don't want to, and I want to respect their knowledge. I want them to know that I honor their knowledge. And I will ask them, okay, how do you want to approach this? Do you want to try it on your own first or do you want me to walk you through my process? And then sometimes even I'll ask, would you like to walk through your process and then have me critique you while you do it? So I give them options. I want them to know that I'm listening to them. In the back of my mind, I know the response. I know what they're going to tell me. But what I have to do is I have to get them in a space where they feel comfortable enough to be vulnerable enough to open up to me and allow me to give them that help. I love that. And I just learned something. So, you know, when I took the SAT, I may or may not have had a perfect score on the math part of the SAT. I'm not, you know, may or may not have. But you couldn't use a calculator. You can use calculators on the SAT and ACT now? Yeah, you can use calculators on percent of the math sections. Allow the calculator. I would have been dangerous. I would have been dangerous back in the day. Let me tell you something. Well, no, I'm going to tell you this. Actually, what they do is they write the tests in response to the students having the calculators. So the questions are a little harder because they write questions. They're expecting you. Yes, yes. Okay, okay. I still would have been dangerous. Still would have been dangerous. But I want to talk through this, talking about, you know, preparing for exams and tests. You know, I think probably one of the misconceptions, and we talked about it offline, is that, you know, someone needs to wait till they're in the 11th grade or 12th grade to start working with. But it's actually better, sometimes even more beneficial if they're starting earlier. So talk to us about, you know, when someone should be a part of the programs that you're developing. Okay, that's a good question. All right, I want to offer this perspective. I graduated from high school from a major football powerhouse high school. I'm in Texas. And currently, that high school is a perennial contender for not the district title, not the regional title, state title. It is expected that my alma mater, it makes an appearance in Arlington at the state championships every year. That's an expectation. And when I graduated from high school, I was very excited because I thought that I was going. There's nothing wrong with football. I went to all the football games and everything. I grew up in all of that. My grandfather coached football. But, you know, I wanted something different when I went to college and I had no clue. I guess I was like little male from the country. I decided to attend the University of Oklahoma. And I attended Oklahoma in the Bob Stoops era when we went to a ball game every single year. And so I want people to think about how football is made, how those successes are made. The successes are not made when, you know, team makes the Orange Bowl or they're marching down, you know, they're at the Rose Bowl. or even when at the high school championship where somebody throws a Hail Mary pass and it is successful, it's completed, and that wins the game. That's not the success of those programs. So in my community, there are two main, just like most communities, there are maybe two main roads. So one of the main roads, I can drive down one of the main roads on Saturday afternoon. In fact, this past Saturday afternoon, and I see those little boys out there playing football. And their families are out there. They have the tents, they have food trucks, they have everything going on to support those babies in football. And then when I turn down another major road, I see the same thing happening maybe on a Sunday. And I say that to say we start early and there's a pipeline. There's a pipeline in my community that creates these perennial contending teams for football. And I need for people to think about thinking that same way. People need to bring that same energy to education. When they are younger, the main thing is that they have to be able to read. They have to be able to comprehend. And I'm going to tell you something. The prevailing attitudes in school and in society is that from, you know, birth to the third grade, students are learning to read. And then from third grade on the students should be reading to learn Now what happens when the students haven learned to read by third grade and then they left out there reading to learn Well I going to tell you what happens. What happens is up to the parent because as well-meaning as our educators are, they are not going to care about this literacy issue more than you do. They are not going to care about your child being able to read more than you will care about your child being able to read. And I'm not casting anybody as a villain or hero or anything. I'm just saying that this is your child. This is your priority. You have to make just like those parents, get those babies down there to play football or hockey or golf or swim or competitive dance or competitive cheer. People have to bring that same energy to literacy. And when I talk about literacy, it is do your children comprehend what they are reading? Not can they call words? because I can read, my sister is a chemical engineer. One day I was being silly. I don't know what passes for fun in my family. But one day I was reading her textbook for thermodynamics. And I was reading a paragraph and I read it aloud and I pronounced every word perfectly. And then I looked to her and I said, hey, what did I just read? I have no clue what I just read because I don't have the background knowledge. I didn't take that kind of advanced whatever physics or whatever to be able to understand that. So that's what we have here. We have we have to make sure that our younger kiddos are getting the background knowledge to be able to perform well. Because when I look at my students who are doing well as 12th graders, like we're at a point now where they just have to walk through the door. They just have to submit the application and they're going to get the scholarships. When I think about those students and what happened well, it was the reading. So I have programming to help students. We meet multiple times a week and parents can pay a monthly subscription fee and they're getting classes that are based in reading, writing, math, test prep, essay writing. I have workshops for the family. So about like how to pay for college. What are some things you can be doing now to prepare this comprehensive program and regular progress reports so parents don't have to wait until the student is in the summer before the senior year. I get people calling me the summer before the senior year and they're like, hey, little Johnny needs to bring up his test scores. I'm like, OK, let's join his test scores. And I see him. And I tell you this, Mick, the highest a student can score on the ACT is a 36. The lowest is a zero. People call me. Their kids have 16s. At Sierra, I discovered top workout gear at incredible prices, which might lead to another discovery. Your headphones haven't been connected this whole time. Awkward. Discover top brands at unexpectedly low prices. Sierra, let's get moving. What if your mobile network could harness the power of high-speed Wi-Fi? It could if you had Xfinity Mobile with reliable Wi-Fi first and 5G when you needed it. Having Xfinity Mobile and Wi-Fi on the same team? That's the real MVP. Xfinity. Imagine that. Right now, existing Xfinity Internet customers can get an unlimited line included for a year. Learn more at XfinityMobile.com. And they say, yes, summer before the senior year, before we're supposed to be submitting these scores to get scholarships, to get college admissions. They call me and they're like, I don't know what happened with little Johnny. Johnny was in all the advanced classes and he was getting A's in the advanced classes. And it's like, well, you know, but tell me a little about what Johnny reads. My son doesn't like to read. OK, well, tell me about little Johnny's homework. He does his homework at school. Well, tell me about his tests. Well, you know, he's always going and, you know, doing the retakes. So in my program, I have a program and it's actually called Scholar Ready, but the name of the program is College Ready. And College Ready is designed to help those students little by little consistently. We're out there. Hey, we're out there on the field. practicing consistently. So when it's time to get to that senior year and we're throwing passes that are being caught and that are winning in the game of college admissions, we're going to the bowl games, we're winning the championships. And we're starting with them as early as seventh grade to get them prepared. We want to make this, of course, students are working on it, but also we want to make this a family effort as well, because I've done this for over 20 years and I want to win. and sometimes, and what I've discovered is, yes, it's good to, yes, we do have to do the things toward the end with the 11th and 12th graders, but let's also build that pipeline with those kiddos in seventh, eighth, and ninth grade so we can win this game. I'm telling you because just like athletic scholarships, academic scholarships are starting to tighten up later and later too, meaning sometimes if you're waiting till your senior year to apply, they've already hit the quoted for that year. And you're going to have to wait for selection rejection, as I like to call it. You're going to have to wait for somebody to say, oh, I'm not going to go to this school before you even have a scholarship open up. I love what you're doing there. I want to talk to parents right now. And Jennifer, you're the expert on this. So I have three kids and my youngest one is in grad school now. So we've all gone through the scholarship process and the test taking process. But I'm going to lay out each of my kids are uniquely different when it comes to standardized test taking. So I start with my oldest, my daughter, who is a good student, works really hard to get good grades. And so as she studies is how she takes tests too. So if she's a B student in a subject, you can expect her to fall in that B area in test taking too. If she's an A in something, you can expect her to have to test A in that. I'd say pretty standard, right? Like that's how it's going to be. What she studies, what she learns, what she retains is how she's going to perform on the test. My middle child, my oldest son, I shouldn't say this out loud, but I love all my kids equally, naturally is the smartest of the three, meaning he's going to take a class test, not have to study a lot, make an A, right? His short-term memory can memorize anything, But those standardized tests, though, Jennifer, he's going to be very average. And Jay, you know that, like, we can laugh about it later. But classroom tests, going to make 100 every time because his short-term memory is great. Standardized tests, freaks out. It's going to be average, right? My youngest son, Kamen, again, I love all my kids equally. He is going to do the minimum to get what he needs done. So if I tell Kamen, hey, you got to make a B in everything, he's going to make a B. And he's going to say, but dad, you remember you said all I had to do was make a B. But Kamen on standardized tests is a freaking genius. I don't know where this has come from, Jennifer, but that is Kamen, right? Like he's going to give you enough effort so that he's not in trouble in the classroom. But those standardized tests, he's not going to give you more effort, but he can score really, really well. I love for you to talk to parents about understanding who your kids are and how not to freak out sometimes. Because I think as parents, we see the end result and then we try to course correct after. But if you know who your kids are and understand that all things aren't created equal, classroom does not equal standardized tests. Standardized tests sometimes doesn't equal classroom. Like talk to the parents about knowing their kids and how to be OK, but then how you can help them once you understand who they are and how they take those tests. How do you understand your students, especially when you have multiple children, because none of them, you already know, you can feed them the same food. They can grow up in the same house, attend the same schools, and they're going to be completely different. So how does that work when it comes to standardized tests? Don't make assumptions. Because some of the things that you learn about your students, you don't want to learn too late that, oh, my student does really well on a classroom test. But boy when they took that ACT that was a revelation Don assume Just have them take a test early And you know you don necessarily have to have them go into the actual official testing environment Practice tests are available online. Administer the practice tests to the student. And what ACT does offer a paper based exam that you can get online as a PDF. and College Board offers digital exams where, of course, the software will score it for everyone. Have them take those tests early. Now, some students need to take it in an official environment so they can see that this is really real, but other students are okay just doing it kind of informally at home or wherever. Have them and then have them test early so you can know where they are. And then you need to talk with them about their goals. And I know for me as a student, what was helpful for me in terms of pursuing, in terms of being very hungry and driven about my college application process, because I am incredibly persistent. But one thing is I'm persistent about what I want to be persistent about. When I was in high school and I was in 12th grade and I was taking calculus, like I just kind of blew it off because in my mind, I was done with high school. That wasn't the best thing. It wasn't the best thing to do. But when it came to my application process, I was incredibly persistent because I knew my goal. My goal was to go away. And I knew the only way for me to achieve that, I had to sit and do the things that were required to do that. And so parents need to talk with, you know, you have them take those practice tests. You look at the test scores. And when you have them take the practice test, explain to them that we're having you take this to have an understanding of where you are. It's not an indictment or a confirmation of your intelligence. It's not. It's kind of like when I go to the doctor's office, I have to step on the scale. Do I want to step on the scale? Nope. But I have to step on the scale because that is an indicator to help the doctor understand the state of my health. Same thing here. We want to know where you are with your tests. And then when you start, you know, and you say, okay, well, here are the test scores. And then you talk with the student about his or her goals. Okay, so like your graduate student, your graduate student is in graduate school. So somewhere along the line, he knew that he needed to go to graduate school. So maybe at some point, maybe he understood, hey, I'm going to have to go to graduate school and then go to graduate school. And this is the kind of lifestyle that I have. Like I would talk with my students about the kind of lifestyle they want to have after college. And then we just work backwards. I talk to my students and I tell them, hey, you look like you like nice things. So let's just talk about what your life is going to be like after college. And then I'm like, OK, well, let's talk about what that's going to cost. And then we start talking about the cost of college and, you know, OK, if you get a student loan, this is what this is going to look like. And this is how it's going to impede your ability to live that life where you're, you know, flossing and stunting for the gram and all of that. You know, that's going to affect that. And then we just and we say, OK, well, this is this is the kind of life that you want. This is what it's going to cost. So what are you willing to do now in order to defray the cost? And just listening to them. And it may be sometimes it's easier to have that conversation, to have a third party, to have that conversation. Because I know one parent had that conversation. I'm retiring next year. I don't care what you do. And I'm not sending you to this school because of blah, blah, blah. And, you know, he was saying the same thing that I was saying, but I was just saying it in a different way. So that's what I would do. I would start with this. Hey, have a student take the exam, have that student, you know, walk them through the end. What is this? What does your life look like after college? Talk with them about the cost, help them to understand what they're willing to do now to make it happen. And for and you have to know your child. So some students, I meet with students online and we're one-to-one online. Some students thrive in an in-person class. If that is your student, that's your student, do that for them. Some students have crazy busy schedules. So your daughter sounds like the type of person who probably took a lot of advanced classes. And she probably worked very, very hard at her advanced classes. And she probably doesn't need to really prepare during the school year. She probably should have prepared in the summertime. because she's one of those students who's going to do what you ask her to do. And so she's going to be torn between test prep and AP English. But that's what I would say. You broke it down. I think a lot of parents got a lot of insight right there on the things that they can be doing right now to help their students, their children, who are the future, really start to prepare. So where can people find and follow you, Jennifer? I'm going to make sure I have links everywhere. on this site and all the clips that I post as well too. Okay. To find me and to contact me, they can reach me at scholarready.com. That's the word scholar, the word ready, one R in the middle, .com. And they can click the contact us page and you can follow the information there. I also am on YouTube and that handle is at scholarready, same spelling, scholarready, one R in the middle. And I offer courses to parents and students alike at Eventbrite. And I think it's under Scholar Ready. Love it. I'll make sure we have links to everything there. I'm going to get you out of here on my quick five, rapid fire five questions. You ready? Okay. All right. What was the high school you went to in Texas? North Shore Senior High School. All right. How many championships did they win while you were there in football? Zero. All that championship talk. They ain't won nothing. They ain't even a powerhouse. Seeley said they run all of y'all out there. Eric Dickerson told me they used to beat y'all like y'all stole something. That's what he told me. That's all I'm saying. Eric Dickerson at Seeley. He said Seeley ran y'all. And then my guys at Carter High School said y'all never wanted to see them in the playoffs anyway. So throwing that out there. Anyway, back to this quick five. What is your favorite Houstonian meal? Favorite Houstonian meal is, I cannot eat this anymore because I have developed all of these food allergies, but my very favorite is my grandmother's gumbo with shrimp and crab and turkey necks and chicken and sausage and okra. That's my favorite. There you go. Love it, love it, love it. What's one subject that you hated in school that you now see the value of? My gosh, business communications, business communications. I was like, why do I have to take this class? Like my secretary is going to be writing my emails for me. And it's like, no, but that class was so valuable. I could have one day where I have five vice presidents and 10 secretaries and that class would still be required for everything that I do. That was one of my majors in school, business communication. Look at that. Valuable. There we go. All right. When the story of Jennifer Ledwith is being written, what's one word you want to define your legacy? Persistent. I love it. I love it. Jennifer, thank you so much for spending time with us today. Everybody, ScholarReady.com. Make sure you are following. Make sure you're reaching out. Let Jennifer know you heard us on this podcast today, too. Just appreciate the value that you're giving and the insights that you're helping parents with their students with, Jennifer. You are needed and I am thankful for you and all the things that you do. Thank you, Mick. You got it. To all the viewers and listeners, remember your because is your superpower. Go unleash it. That's another powerful conversation on Mick Unplugged. If this episode moved you, and I'm sure it did, follow the show wherever you listen. Share it with someone who needs that spark and leave a review so more people can find their because. I'm Rudy Rush. And until next time, stay driven, stay focused and stay unplugged.