Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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 Mic 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. That's Jennifer Ledwood. 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 success. An MRS degree, a ticket to a high paying job, a ticket to entrepreneurship, a ticket to participating in creative professions.
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Chapter 2: What is the purpose behind Jennifer Ledwith's educational mission?
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, If 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 there's, you're building foundationals. There's no shortcut to the foundation.
Yes. 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.
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're preparing for SAT and SAT math on the entire test. Students can use a calculator.
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Chapter 3: How can parents support their child's academic journey effectively?
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. And usually when they come to me, they've tried to do something. They try to get a better grade, try to write an essay on their own. They have tried to prepare for a test on their own and they did not get the results they needed.
So I, you know, and I say, well, you know what you tried before. And sometimes I'll even offer it, open it to them. I said, I'll ask them, do you want to try it your way? Or do you want to show, do you want, would you like for me to show you how I do it? And that's usually what I do. Like, usually I don't say, boy, you need to do this, this, this. 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 now. 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, OK, 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 that 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, 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 can 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 because they write.
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Chapter 4: What role does technology play in modern education?
And I'll 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. 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 called 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. Okay, 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, we're throwing passes that are being caught and that are winning the, 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 it's,
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 until your senior year to apply, they've already hit the quota 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 started 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.
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Chapter 5: What strategies can help students stay focused amidst distractions?
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. And to all the viewers and listeners, remember your because is your superpower. Go unleash it.
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