Low-crawl Leadership

The power of mutual suffering

Last week I spent a couple days in Delaware for an engagement with the Delaware Valley Classical School (DVCS), a Christian school led by Mr. Anthony Urti. I gave an evening talk about the role of the body in education—the chief arguments for which most of you reading this will already be familiar. The next morning the upper school turned out on the school’s playing fields for a four-hour immersion in our (Iliad Athletics) approach to education—it is a particularly physical approach.

Some of the students were more than a little nervous. They had seen the pickup truck with pullup bars and large black locust logs extending over the tailgate on their way to school. Now as they filed out to the field they saw the logs staged and pullup bars assembled for action. A few brave faculty members accompanied them in sweats and beanies, braving the frosty weather.

We started with the fireman’s carry. I described for them the opening scenes from Virgil’s Aeneid, where the Trojan hero Aeneas carries his aged father on his shoulders (fireman’s carry) and leads his young son by the hand. Aeneas is known for the virtue of piety. Carrying his father and leading his son, Aeneas binds the older and the younger generations together with his own physical strength and leadership. It is a beautiful image of piety, one defined by loyalty and service to one’s family.

Also, it is this piety as loyalty to his kin that qualifies Aeneas to lead Troy’s survivors out of destruction eventually to found Rome. Aeneas physically bears the burden of civilization from the ruins of his ransacked city. Civilization builders have always been physically powerful enough to carry the generations forward on their shoulders.

In our camp we did not extend the Aeneid analogy to the point where Aeneas reaches Dido’s kingdom. That episode will work better in someone else’s camp.

We taught the students to lash tripods and they learned the invaluable properties of para-cord. They learned to measure distance with their own stride, establishing a pace count, and used compasses to shoot azimuths to a variety of landmarks. We were short on time and therefore focused on just a few of the fundamental skills, those things just one step removed from raw nature.

But it was during the workout that something in particular caught my attention. I was working with one group of students while another of our coaches was engaged with the other group. I looked over my shoulder to find that his group was low-crawling across the field. As I watched, most of the group reached the finish line and stood up dusting off the dirt and grass clinging to their elbows, chests, and legs.

The main group caught their breath as the stragglers toiled toward the finish line. I should mention now that to my knowledge no faculty member needed to be present for this experience. From our perspective, they are of course welcome, but we don’t insist on it and I don’t believe the head of school did either. So the faculty that were present for that morning’s grueling workout had chosen to be there and participate alongside their students rather than taking a break or catching up on grading.

We all watched one of the very last to finish the low crawl. It was one of the teachers and he was clearly exhausted. Out in the dirt in plain view of all his students, he drove one elbow in front of the other dragging his body painfully forward to reach the finish line his students had already reached. You might think that his students relished the sight of their teacher lagging behind them, not being as good as them at something when so often in the classroom it is he that teaches and holds them accountable.

On the contrary. They did relish what they were seeing, but not out of gratified spite. Instead, both groups of students started cheering for him and, as he reached the finish and stood up, they (myself included) applauded and watched him with real admiration as he panted for breath. They all knew that he could have chosen the comfort of his office and tie and avoided the cold, the public exposure and physical suffering out there on the field. They knew that he had chosen that discomfort to be with them. And whether it occurs to them in this form or not, I suspect that the next time they are sitting in his classroom, they will have just a little more respect and attentiveness for him. After all, he willingly chose to toil in the dirt alongside them. He’s a real one.

The whole school exhibited this kind of dedication to duty and selflessness. The head of school (pictured with a log below) did not exempt himself from the exercise and it’s no wonder that his teachers exhibit the same kind of leadership and rapport with their students. It sounds too simple to be true, but with this kind of leadership people can work wonders. Laboring in the dirt alongside them forges a bond that is essential to achieving the trust and confidence needed to accomplish great things. It’s as simple and effective as it is rare and difficult to do.

In the end, no discussion of character in the Aeneid will matter or be remembered by these students without the illuminating influence of teachers like those who labored alongside them in the dirt. Our approach includes, rather, depends upon the physical precisely in order to tee up the occasion for this kind of display of virtue. Just talking about it is never enough.

Teachers might in fact see themselves in Aeneas. Aeneas founds a new civilization after emerging from the ashes of Troy, carrying his father and leading his son. He transmits the Trojan ideal to a new generation by braving the battle alongside the remnant and then leading them forth (educare in the Latin) to a new home.