A discussion about business ethics, character traits, integrity, and values

I taught high school for a year. If I could talk to those students again, this is what I would say:

One reason so many of you struggle is that so few of you are nice to each other. Too many of you, if not outright mean, are indifferent. You hide behind vanity and mask your fear with desperate attempts at being cool. Because you’re so young, you think that what you do today doesn’t matter to anyone else. It matters. How you treat each other matters, to you and to them.

You may hold a simple key, a word or some small action, that could permanently lift a peer, or forever crush one. A genuine smile, a sincere compliment, honest affection, the little things you hide from all but your closest friends, your clique, those things are not just yours. That kid in the next desk, the guy in the back row of choir, the girl passing by in the hall - you hold a treasure that belongs to them, that can only be given by you. Be nice to each other. You don’t want to grow up like the rest of us.