My journalism syllabus is coming along, as, per usual, I'm trying to cram in lessons that show why a country needs a free press (it's not obvious to my students - they've never really thought about it before) with lessons in how to report a news story (skill work, legs on the ground, and utterly new to them), and then write it (tight, declarative sentences, no drama or grammar errors) with, now, new media added to the mix, plus guest lectures and films, and so, per usual, I can just feel myself spilling over the limit I have on their time.

My first teaching job wasn't even teaching, it was coaching a jv lacrosse team at Suffield Academy in Suffield, Connecticut. What a fantastic little school. Not so little actually. Anyway Bill was teaching math and coaching there, and when I married him and moved to campus, it so happened they needed a JV lacrosse coach, so I was recruited. We had a GREAT team, especially because of Courtney Robinson: fierce, fast, and skilled, this little maniac was an extraordinary athlete, and on the JV only because she was just a freshman. She had short dark hair and sparkling eyes and resembled Demi Moore young. And she was funny. A little wild. Anyway I had a brilliant coaching strategy - get the ball to Courtney, so we kept winning, and I couldn't wait for practice every day. Then one day, practice was lousy. Some girls showed up late, plus they didn't remember what I'd taught them the day before, and I was incensed. Bill sat me down. He said, Hey, you're a great coach, and your enthusiasm is priceless. But before practice, the girls on your team are thinking about Spanish class or math, and the minute they leave you, they have to switch gears and think about their art projects. Eh? You have to remember where you fit in. They have bigger lives; you're just a piece. Don't spill over.

This is why Bill's such a great soccer coach. He's succinct, he doesn't spill over, and his athletes tend to wish they had more soccer time, whereas plenty of athletes actually wish their coaches would back off a little bit, and their teachers too - because we all demand too much. We want the kids to be alive and ON IT in our classroom, and then to bear down on the homework we assigned, and then to think about our subject whenever - and often. My journalists this fall will have to read the assigned chapters and report and write their stories and blog about them and read the New York Times and follow Rachel Maddow and Mitt Romney and meet me on Sunday afternoons to watch "All the President's Men" and  it's already too much.

I have to, for the 25th time, go back and retool this syllabus. I can't spill over -- it's not fair to the kids, plus it's bad education: it's practically asking them to pretend they've read what they haven't, to pipe up in class with half baked comments, faking it. Let me tell you, Courtney Robinson did not fake anything, but she could royally fake you out on the lacrosse field. Once, I brilliantly decided (you can tell where this is going) to teach a defensive tactic by demonstrating it. Courtney, I said, cradle the ball past me here, and everyone, watch as I stop her by boxing her out thus - oh. Never mind. I did not stop her. I tried to move as quickly as she, stepping deftly, and I fell on my ass. Seriously it was like a movie. She blew past me so quickly she blew me over. Then she gave me a hand back to my feet without ever losing the ball from her crosse. She was so cool, this kid, and now it occurs to me that there's one area of teaching in which I've learned to spill over, and I learned it from Courtney.

Now, although it's entirely unrelated to any official teaching or coaching I do, I tell my students various things their parents have told them, little lessons they may have ignored, doing their teenaged job of ignoring their parents, so I try to spill the lessons into their little heads, just in case. After graduating from Suffield, Courtney Robinson was killed in a car accident. I never knew the details. I thought it was a country road, maybe, in Nevada maybe. I don't know if there was booze or excessive speed or what. I don't even know if she was driving.

It doesn't matter, what matters is I tell my students every year and I'm going to tell them this fall: Tonight please read Chapter 4 in your text, and work on your rewrites, etc. etc., AND ALSO: write me a promise you will do whatever it takes to be safe in a car. Who knows what maniacs are out there, speeding or drunk. Be on the lookout. Obviously you don't ride with booze in the car. But now also Do Not Text. Drive like an athlete - be alert. Who knows, if I had ever asked Courtney to write that down .... Who knows. Chances are nothing. But who knows.

Our team that year was undefeated. Our later defeat and grief was tempered the tiniest bit by Courtney's mom's creating The Courtney Robinson '88 Outdoor Leadership Program at Suffield, in Courtney's memory.