Janie Boschma

This week I’m going to step out on a ledge.

Every Tuesday and Thursday morning, I walk along the backside of the university’s Campus School (that forgotten academic building attached to Zorn where the buses pick up) to go to and from class. Tuesday’s travels struck me a little differently than usual.

Most of the trip was the same. The bus dropped me off 15 minutes after the hour (late as usual, thankfully my class starts on the half-hour). At any rate, I walked my way around Campus School and inside Schneider Hall. I sat intently through my 75-minute thought class, which definitely challenges the students participating to think highly critically and in my case abstractly to get the ideas, notions and theories being discussed, which does have relevance to this column.

After the class finished, I made my similar routine out of the building back to the bus. Along the way, I passed by the playground behind Campus School. There, the children at the daycare were being … well kids. Playing tag, digging through the sandbox, riding around on Big Wheels and doing all of the activities associated with being a kid. That is when an abstract thought dawned on me.

I thought to myself, what would happen if we let kids rule the world? What would happen if they were the leaders of our countries?

Now this proposition is way, way out there. It is about as crazy as the thought that a non-partisan from western Wisconsin could possibly get elected president of the United States. Let me be the first to tell you that my thought sounds absurd, but absurdity aside – what if?

If kids were put in charge, there would definitely be some changes made to the way things are run. Some changes would be for the better, others would probably be not quite as positive.

For starters, if we allowed kids to rule the world, the planet would be a much more colorful place. Crayola color pencils, crayons and markers (the thick ones) would be standard (not the RoseArt kind; those just don’t cut it). We would get to do away with the dull boring ink pens and gray pencils we use to write with day-to-day. Bright construction paper cutouts would hang in the windows and multi-colored paper chains would wrap around perimeters of rooms. More importantly, nobody would judge you if your hands were covered in red, green, blue and yellow finger-paints.

Red Kool-Aid mustaches would become the next fashion trend, along with mismatching clothes (oh wait, that trend already exists among most girls, my bad). But fire engine-red Tyrannosaurus Rex T-shirts with green shorts and muddy tennis shoes would definitely be acceptable attire.

The world would have no need for cars, bikes with baseball cards flapping through the spokes of the rear-tire would be sufficient, entertaining and needless to say much more environmentally friendly.

On that note, our world would become cleaner. Children have always had recycling and conservation drilled into their head. I know that when I was a kid, I was more worried about recycling and cleaning up a park than I am now. They would be the ones who are going to get this planet cleaned up.

Child leaders would also make the world a safer place. There would be no need for guns, bombs or nuclear weapons, just the need for a wicked powerful right leg. Kid leaders would settle their disagreements over a friendly game of kickball on the playground, not by killing each other on the battlefield.

People would become less agitated and less stressed with kids in charge. Mandatory afternoon naptime and two 15-minute recess sessions would help with that.

We would also have our creativity challenged by kids, who are much more creative than adults. It is all too easy to forget how many different things a refrigerator box can be besides a refrigerator box.

My girlfriend’s 7-year-old brother helped me believe this world might be better off if kids were in charge. He, like most children, goes with the flow. He takes time out of his busy day to enjoy life and without a doubt make people smile. He would be better in charge of the world than some people I know.

But since he and his friends can’t be in charge, we should at least take note of their actions. They’re care-free, colorful, creative happy individuals, and we should take a little bit of that and apply it to ourselves.

We need to slow down in this incredibly fast-paced world and dig around a little bit in the sandbox, take a spin through the neighborhood on our baseball card-powered bike, make some mac-and-cheese and color a picture.

Now, if you will excuse me, I’m going to go sip on a Capri Sun and watch “Arthur.”

Dostalek is a senior print journalism major and editorial editor of The Spectator. Dishin’ With Dostalek appears every Thursday.