What Comes Next Project

Tidying up can do more than 'spark joy.' It can help your kids be academic rockstars.

Tidying up can do more than 'spark joy.' It can help your kids be academic rockstars.

Let's face it, cleaning your house can be a pain, but the after effects come with way more benefits than you might realize.

Photo by rawpixel on Unsplash.

I know, I know, even the word "clean" probably just made you groan aloud. And it's not like you haven't meant to get your living room, bedroom, kids' rooms, and office sorted. In fact, you've probably watched the entire Marie Kondo series on Netflix and thought: "my family's definitely going to do that this year."

If you've been putting off tidying up though, here's something to think about: cleaning up your space won't just make you feel better, it sets up your kids for success in school.

Research shows that keeping a tidy house has a positive effect on kids' productivity and learning.

Photo by Santi Vedrí on Unsplash.

A 2001 study conducted at The University of Michigan followed kids from school-age to adulthood and found that kids whose homes were rated "clean," were far more likely to do well in school and earn more money in adulthood.

That's because "Keeping a clean and organized home reflects an overall ability and desire to maintain a sense of order in a wide range of life activities," Rachel Dunifon, the head author of the study, wrote.

More recently, research out of Princeton and UCLA has provided evidence that clutter in the home is a deterrent when it comes to living our best lives. Because our brains can only focus on so much information at once, the presence of mess in the home can pull focus, leading to both distraction and stress. And that goes double for kids, who are just learning to focus.

"The area of the brain responsible for organization, planning, and working memory [among other things], does not become fully consolidated until around age 25," explains Merriam Sarcia Saunders, a psychotherapist and expert in the treatment of ADHD.

"That means children don't have a ready access to the ability to organize. They must look to the adults in their life to scaffold that ability and teach those skills until the child can begin to generalize them into their daily routine."

If the adults don't step up to teach their children these valuable skills, children likely won't pick them on their own.

This is not to say that your house always has to be sparkling. Life happens, and often makes that impossible. But a home that's disorganized on the regular can lead to problems.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash.

Even the cleanest homes can get disorganized. Not making decluttering a priority, however, can create problems in the long run.

"A disorganized environment with clutter strewn about could be quite over-stimulating for a child," Saunders explains.

It can make it difficult for kids to concentrate, settle down, or even fall asleep at night. And if a child lives in a home that's disorganized enough that they can't find their things, they may feel lost and out-of-place on a larger scale.

"The constant inability to find necessary things like matching socks, clean clothes, that second shoe, a cherished toy or perhaps important documents like homework and permission slips, can increase stress hormones to a chronic level," adds Saunders. "At the least, it can ultimately cause a child to simply stop trying as they can never find what they need."

However, you can begin giving your kids the tools they need to succeed in life by making them an integral part of keeping the house comfortable and organized.

Photo by Chayene Rafaela on Unsplash.

Children, Saunders points out, learn by watching others and then doing themselves. So when parents involve their kids in the cleaning process they're learning what to strive for.

"A clutter-free environment allows for better focus, which can lead to increased creativity and productivity," she explains. "Organization and routines, especially for children, provide a sense of structure which is calming, and often leads to better habits for eating and sleeping."

Ready to get that house clean? Here are just a few tips that will help you help your kids have a surefire chance at a better academic life.

Image by StockSnap on Pixabay.

The first thing you might need to do is lower your expectations just a little, Saunders explains. While many parents tell their kids to "clean your room," it's important to understand that children are likely to have no idea what that actually means. And if they've never had a truly organized room before, it may be asking too much too quickly. Organization is a skill. And that means it's got to be practiced in order to become second nature.

Start by working with your kids to organize their toys in clear plastic bins, Saunders advises. Put clothes in baskets. If your kids can see where their things are supposed to go, they'll be more likely to put them away. If your children are young, consider labeling each bin and basket with pictures. And consider getting rid of things that your kids may not like or rarely use. Less toys doesn't mean less creativity!

"Once the room is clean, ask them to put away just one, tiny thing — a pair of socks, a belt, one toy — and praise them for a job well done," Saunders adds.

"The next day, organize the room again, and this time ask your child to put away two things. Add one thing each day, remembering to praise, until the task no longer feels overwhelming."

This will give children a sense of accomplishment and pride. And it's a nice way to teach them that they have control over some things, as well.

No matter how stressful life can get outside the house, coming home will make them feel calmer and less anxious. And that's a good thing when it comes to sitting down to do homework.

Image by nastya_gepp on Pixabay.

The calm of clean may even set your kids on a path to helping others. Jayera Griffin, a 14-year-old from Chicago, for example, has started a program called Free Laundry Day. With the help from her local laundromat and Clorox—as part of their What Comes Next Project—she's made it possible for people in her community to get their laundry washed for free every week.

No doubt her drive to give back in this way started in a clean home.

But no matter what your children's future looks like, it's sure to be brighter if they have a clean place to come home to every day.

Clorox believes clean has the power to transforms lives, which is why they've partnered with Upworthy to promote those same traits in people, actions and ideas. Cleaning up and transformation are important aspects of many of our social good stories. Check out the rest in the campaign to read more.

Communities

After seeing a man struggle to pay for pet food, this couple created a pet food pantry for the community

Photo courtesy of Kenneth and Jill Gonsalves
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It can be expensive to have a pet. It's possible to spend between $250 to $700 a year on food for a dog and around $120-$500 on food for a cat. But of course, most of us don't think twice about the expense: having a pet is worth it because of the company animals provide.

But for some, this expense is hard to keep up, no matter how much you adore your fur baby. And that's why Kenneth and Jill Gonsalves decided to help.

Kenneth had seen a man scraping together change in a store to buy pet food, so he offered to buy the man some extra pet food. Still, later that night he couldn't stop thinking about the experience — he worried the man wasn't just struggling to pay for pet food, but food for himself, too.

So he went home and told his wife — and immediately, they both knew they needed to do something. So, in December 2020, they converted a farm stand into a take-what-you-need, leave-what-you-can Pet Food pantry.

"A lot of people would have watched that man count out change to buy pet food. Some may have helped him out like my husband did," Jill says. "A few may have thought about it afterward. But, only someone like Kenny would turn that experience into what we have today."

"If it weren't for his generous spirit and his penchant for a plan, the pantry would never have been born," she adds.

A man with sunglasses hands a box of cat food to a woman smiling Photo courtesy of Kenneth and Jill Gonsalves

At first, the couple started the pet food pantry with a couple hundred dollars of pet food they bought themselves. And to make sure people knew about the pantry, they set up a Facebook page for the pantry, then went to other Facebook groups, such as a "Buy Nothing group," and shared what they were doing.

"When we started, we weren't even sure people would use us," Jill says. "At best, we were hoping to be able to provide enough to help people get through the holidays."

But, thanks to their page and word of mouth, news spread about what they were doing, and the donations of more pet food started flooding in, too. Before long, they were coming home to stacks of food — and within a couple of months, the pantry was full.

Yellow post-it note with handwritten note that reads: "Hi, I read your story on Facebook. Here is a small donation to help. I have a 3-year-old yellow lab who I adore. I hope this helps someone in need. Merry Christmas. Meredith" Photo courtesy of Kenneth and Jill Gonsalves

"The pounds of food we have gone through is well, well, well into the thousands," Jill says. "The orders from our Amazon Wish List alone include several hundred pounds of dry food, a couple of hundred cases of canned food, and thousands of treats and toys. But, that does not even take into account the hundreds of drop-offs, online orders, and monetary donations we have received."

They also got many 'Thank you notes' from the people they helped.

"I would like to thank you for helping us feed our fur babies," one note read. "My husband and I recently lost our jobs, and my husband [will] hopefully [find] a new one. We are just waiting for a call."

Another read: "I just need to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. I haven't worked in over a month with a two-year-old at home. Dad brings in about $300/week. From the pandemic to Christmas, it has been tough. But with the help of beautiful people like you, my fur baby can now eat a little bit longer, and my heart is happy."

Jill says that she thinks the fact that the pet pantry is a farm stand helps people feel better.

A woman holding a small black dog and looking at the camera is greeted by Jill Gonsalves Photo courtesy of Kenneth and Jill Gonsalves

"When we first started this, someone who visited us mentioned how it made them feel good to be able to browse without feeling like they were being watched," she says. "So, it's been important to us to maintain that integrity."

Jill and Kenneth aren't sure how many people they've helped so far, but they know that their pet food pantry is doing what they hoped it would. "The pet owners who visit us, much like donations, come in ebbs and flows," Jill says. "We have some regulars who have been with us since the beginning. We also have some people that come a few times, and we never see again."

"Our hope is that they used us while they were in a tough spot, but they don't need us anymore. In a funny way, the greatest thing would be if no one needed us anymore."


Today, the Acushnet Pet Pantry is still going strong, but its stock is running low. If you want to help out, visit their Facebook page for updates and to find ways to donate.
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Culture

Four big takeaways from National Geographic's new 'Fauci' documentary

National Geographic/YouTube

National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Dr. Anthony Fauci

When I first saw the preview of National Geographic's documentary about Anthony Fauci, I was confused. My assumption was that the documentary was made to profile his role in the COVID-19 pandemic response as that's how he became a household name. How did the filmmakers know they would need to get footage of Fauci at the very beginning of the pandemic, when no one knew yet what it would become?

The answer is: They didn't. This film was never intended to be about this pandemic at all. The profile of Anthony Fauci was planned by award-winning filmmakers John Hoffman and Janet Tobias in 2018 and they began filming in the fall of 2019, several months before anyone had even heard of SARS-CoV-2. The filmmakers originally planned to highlight Fauci as a lesser-known public servant, focusing primarily on his work throughout the AIDS pandemic.

What they ended up with is parallel stories of Fauci's AIDS work and Fauci's COVID response, and their "lesser-known" subject becoming a superstar during the making of the film. In fact, the press release for the film included the following, which is an unusual disclaimer but one the filmmakers felt necessary in the current climate: "Dr. Fauci had no creative control over the film. He was not paid for his participation, nor does he have any financial interest in the film's release."

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Tory Burch
Tory Burch Empowered Women
Empowered Women

Military spouses often choose their spouse's career over their own. This organization is changing that.

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When Sue Hoppin was in college, she met the man she was going to marry. "I was attending the University of Denver, and he was at the Air Force Academy," she says. "My dad had also attended the University of Denver and warned me not to date those flyboys from the Springs."

"He didn't say anything about marrying one of them," she says. And so began her life as a military spouse.

The life brings some real advantages, like opportunities to live abroad — her family got to live all around the US, Japan, and Germany — but it also comes with some downsides, like having to put your spouse's career over your own goals.

"Though we choose to marry someone in the military, we had career goals before we got married, and those didn't just disappear."

Career aspirations become more difficult to achieve, and progress comes with lots of starts and stops. After experiencing these unique challenges firsthand, Sue founded an organization to help other military spouses in similar situations.

Sue had gotten a degree in international relations because she wanted to pursue a career in diplomacy, but for fourteen years she wasn't able to make any headway — not until they moved back to the DC area. "Eighteen months later, many rejections later, it became apparent that this was going to be more challenging than I could ever imagine," she says.

Eighteen months is halfway through a typical assignment, and by then, most spouses are looking for their next assignment. "If I couldn't find a job in my own 'hometown' with multiple degrees and a great network, this didn't bode well for other military spouses," she says.

She's not wrong. Military spouses spend most of their lives moving with their partners, which means they're often far from family and other support networks. When they do find a job, they often make less than their civilian counterparts — and they're more likely to experience underemployment or unemployment. In fact, on some deployments, spouses are not even allowed to work.

Before the pandemic, military spouse unemployment was 22%. Since the pandemic, it's expected to rise to 35%.

Sue eventually found a job working at a military-focused nonprofit, and it helped her get the experience she needed to create her own dedicated military spouse program. She wrote a book and started saving up enough money to start the National Military Spouse Network (NMSN), which she founded in 2010 as the first organization of its kind.

"I founded the NMSN to help professional military spouses develop flexible careers they could perform from any location."

"Over the years, the program has expanded to include a free digital magazine, professional development events, drafting annual White Papers and organizing national and local advocacy to address the issues of most concern to the professional military spouse community," she says.

Not only was NMSN's mission important to Sue on a personal level she also saw it as part of something bigger than herself.

"Gone are the days when families can thrive on one salary. Like everyone else, most military families rely on two salaries to make ends meet. If a military spouse wants or needs to work, they should be able to," she says.

"When less than one percent of our population serves in the military," she continues, "we need to be able to not only recruit the best and the brightest but also retain them."

"We lose out as a nation when service members leave the force because their spouse is unable to find employment. We see it as a national security issue."

"The NMSN team has worked tirelessly to jumpstart the discussion and keep the challenges affecting military spouses top of mind. We have elevated the conversation to Congress and the White House," she continues. "I'm so proud of the fact that corporations, the government, and the general public are increasingly interested in the issues affecting military spouses and recognizing the employment roadblocks they unfairly have faced."

"We have collectively made other people care, and in doing so, we elevated the issues of military spouse unemployment to a national and global level," she adds. "In the process, we've also empowered military spouses to advocate for themselves and our community so that military spouse employment issues can continue to remain at the forefront."

Not only has NMSN become a sought-after leader in the military spouse employment space, but Sue has also seen the career she dreamed of materializing for herself. She was recently invited to participate in the public re-launch of Joining Forces, a White House initiative supporting military and veteran families, with First Lady Dr. Jill Biden.

She has also had two of her recommendations for practical solutions introduced into legislation just this year. She was the first in the Air Force community to show leadership the power of social media to reach both their airmen and their military families.

That is why Sue is one of Tory Burch's "Empowered Women" this year. The $5,000 donation will be going to The Madeira School, a school that Sue herself attended when she was in high school because, she says, "the lessons I learned there as a student pretty much set the tone for my personal and professional life. It's so meaningful to know that the donation will go towards making a Madeira education more accessible to those who may not otherwise be able to afford it and providing them with a life-changing opportunity."

Most military children will move one to three times during high school so having a continuous four-year experience at one high school can be an important gift. After traveling for much of her formative years, Sue attended Madeira and found herself "in an environment that fostered confidence and empowerment. As young women, we were expected to have a voice and advocate not just for ourselves, but for those around us."

To learn more about Tory Burch and Upworthy's Empowered Women program visit https://www.toryburch.com/empoweredwomen/. Nominate an inspiring woman in your community today!

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