by Stephen Popoff

Have you ever wondered who is telling young students that they’ll never make it?

I’m sure you’ve heard the claim. Anybody who has been to a high school graduation in the past 20 years has heard it. At least one of the students will mention in his or her speech that I was told I’d never make it but look at me now. How is this possible in today’s world and who in the hell is telling these students that they’ll never make it?

The Dragonfly Report reached out to several teachers in over 100 school districts to see if we could get to the bottom of it. We asked over 350 teachers if they had ever heard firsthand a teacher, coach, or administrator tell a student that they’d never make it. Not one teacher responded that they had but some mentioned that it was probable that quite a few teachers and staff could have implicit biases. 

But these students aren’t talking about adults with implicit biases. They are stating that someone actually told them that they wouldn’t succeed. Are they making this up and if so why? Could it be that the underdog story just made them look good? We really wanted to get to the bottom of it. 

We searched through many high school graduation speeches on YouTube throughout the United States and made a note whenever the speaker would state the familiar I was told I’d never make it. We reached out to several of these former students and a pattern emerged. 

All of the former students we reached out to mentioned a substitute teacher named Ms. Crabtree as the mean teacher who told them they’d never succeed. We confirmed that there actually was a certified teacher named Melinda Crabtree who goes from district to district as a substitute teacher belittling the youth of America. 

We discovered that Ms. Crabtree had been asked not to return to many school districts but was currently subbing somewhere in rural Idaho. 

So the next time you’re at a graduation or similar event and hear the familiar I was told I’d never make it, don’t roll your eyes cynically. They probably had Ms. Crabtree as a substitute.