Why Every Educator Should Watch Last Chance U

The university where I teach launched a new football program a few years ago, nearly half a century after another George Fox (then-college) team played its last down. I joined a number of my nay-saying colleagues in believing the football team might signal the end of all things right and good at our Christian liberal arts school: that the introduction of an additional 100 or so athletes on campus would change our culture irrevocably; that the football team would siphon money from academic programs; that coaches would insist on special treatment for their players; that a Jumbotron located near academic buildings would detract from the esteemed pursuit of knowledge.

Several years in, my concerns seem unfounded. Our school’s academic programs are still vibrant, and the fleeting chance of seeing myself on the Jumbotron has made graduation in our new football stadium much more exciting. I’ve had positive interactions with coaches and with players, save for one first-year student in my composition course, who checked out of class early in the semester, plagiarized a few papers, and didn’t return to college in the spring. More on him in a moment.

In July, Netflix dropped its second season of “Last Chance U,” a documentary that follows the football team at East Mississippi Community College, a small school in Scooba, Miss., where young men who fail at Division I programs can redeem themselves. EMCC also operates as a transition for students who aren’t ready for big-time football, and for those who need more academic support. They are a perennial football powerhouse, winning multiple national championships.

But “Last Chance U” is less about football than it is about the lives of young men, often from impoverished backgrounds, who long to play football, and who have found at EMCC people who help them fulfill that dream. The documentary focuses on those supporting characters, too, including a foul-mouthed coach who deeply loves his family, citizens of Scooba whose lives revolve around the football team, and — my favorite character on the series — a woman named Brittany Wagner, who provides academic support for the team, helping them study, making them go to class, holding them accountable so they will graduate.

My sense is that most professors could be a little more like Ms. Wagner. I know I could. She demands a lot from the young men, helping them believe they can be successful students if they try (and, if they bring pencils with them to class and study hall). She is deeply dedicated to the players’ success, yet also cares for them, telling players who visit her office that she loves them, that she is invested in their personal lives.

What I like most about Wagner, and about “Last Chance U” as well, is that the young men at EMCC are seen not merely as dunderheaded football players, but as dynamic, complicated people who have faced tremendous barriers to their own success. Instead of simply portraying stereotyped black men seeking sporting glory, the documentary allows us to see how their socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds, their familial structures, even their religious cultures have shaped them. The students are humanized, something we as educators too often fail to do when we see only dumb jocks in our classes, or drama geeks, or sheltered homeschool students. “Last Chance U” is a compelling, necessary reminder that each person comes to us not as a blank slate, but with eighteen or more years of life and experience. Wagner understands this, clearly. I want to understand this, too.

Which brings me back to the football player in my class. For most of his semester in first-year composition, this student pushed all my buttons. Not only by plagiarizing his work or turning in shoddy essays, but by being cock-sure, insolent, and dishonest about getting his work done. He also wore headphones during several class sessions, and seemed surprised when I suggested he remove them out of respect for me and for his peers. I started feeling relief when he didn’t show up for class — which was often.

But then I heard more of his story from his academic advisor. I learned that he came to GFU to play football, only, but sat on the bench most games; he’d been a big shot at his small school, and having a diminished role on this team devastated him. He’d been an academic all-star at his high school, too, and was discovering that being a big fish in a small pond hadn’t prepared him for college. His privileged perspective was disorienting, causing an identity crisis that was playing out every day in classes and on the football field.

I’ll be honest: my initial response to this student — irritation, rather than compassion — was based in some part because he was a football player. But “Last Chance U,” and in particular Ms. Wagner, reminded me that a holistic approach to teaching acknowledges and embraces that for some students, “football player” is only one part of their overall identity, that the role does not define them, that they are also complex people with gifts beyond the gridiron.

As I enter into my 18th year of teaching at George Fox, I want this to be integral to my teaching, and to the relationships I build with each of my students, whether they play football — or, more likely, do not. Their stories matter, and should inform everything I do in the classroom — something I realize much more clearly now, thanks to the Lions in Scooba, Miss., and to the story-telling of “Last Chance U.”