Writing in an opinion piece on 1 June in Today’s Zaman, the English language version of one of Turkey’s most widely circulated newspapers, Ricardo Hausmann questions government policies around the world that point towards education as a growth strategy. Education, he says, has had mixed success in raising worker productivity, and it is worker productivity that increases income. He admits that he doesn’t have the answer to how such productivity can grow – that success must depend on “something in the water” (his words!) – and that, tellingly, if we focus on education as a growth strategy, then this means we are “giving up on everyone that has already gone through the school system – most people over 18, and almost all over 25.”

Well, for a former Venezuelan minister of planning – and current Director of the Center for International Development and Professor of the Practice of Economic Development at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University – Mr Hausmann is curiously myopic about ‘education’. Sadly, he is not alone. The Latin ‘educare’, from which our modern verb ‘to educate’, and hence the noun, ‘education’, are derived, contains within it the concept of training, rearing and growing; we have, however, over the centuries, hijacked the term to become synonymous with ‘schooling’. Moreover, the challenging (but very welcome) pursuit of access to schools for all children across the world has had a negative corollary – it has cemented our perception that education – in the shape of schooling – is only for children.

Given these widely-held perceptions, it is understandable that Mr Hausmann should fall into the trap of equating ‘education’ with ‘schools’, but it is nonetheless disappointing. If education consists solely of schooling – with all its many faults and its age-limited scope – then of course it will have a limited (though still significant) contribution to national growth and productivity. If we examine the concept of education more critically, however, and if we challenge the underlying assumptions that are holding us back from our understanding of education as an empowering tool and crucible for growth – socially, economically, physically, morally, emotionally, cognitively, spiritually, politically … the list goes on.

The UN describes education as a fundamental human right and “essential for the exercise of all other human rights”. It acknowledges that adults as well as children need educational opportunities, and describes education as “a powerful tool”. Learning is hardwired into our human make-up; it brings us alive and helps us to grow in ways we sometimes could not have imagined. When we break free of the limitations that historical and social perception has placed on our understanding of education, then we can truly embrace its power.

Let us not allow these limitations to hold us back.

In the days and weeks preceding the recent UK General Election, there were moments when the frenzy of messages being communicated by the parties and the candidates led almost to overload on the part of the electorate. There were messages about what politicians and parties had done (or had not done), were doing (or were not doing) and would do (or wouldn’t do, as the case may be). Soundbites filled the airwaves, as did unquestioned assumptions; statements made were presented as unevaluated fact, and yet if everything spoken had been taken at face value, the abundance of contradictory and often diametrically opposed ‘facts’ could most probably have caused some sort of mental breakdown in the listener or observer.

How, then, was the would-be voter to sort the true from the false or the wheat from the chaff, and to unearth the kernel at the heart of the statements? How was she or he to understand the essence of the arguments and come to a judgement about their veracity or otherwise?

The first step, of course, was to pause and consider that ‘truth’ is often a complex matter. It can be a combination of perspectives, hues and nuances, many of which have been formed subtly and through experiences, often passed down through society from parents and grandparents, and marked by their (and our) particular circumstances. We all have unique journeys in life, and we all see the world slightly differently as a result – the mistake we can make sometimes is that we do not always realise this.

When we do see it, then we realise too that we have to work to understand ourselves and others if we are to be able to make appropriate judgements about the statements we hear from those who seek to lead the country. We need to unearth and question embedded assumptions, and when we do, we can begin to appreciate that issues are rarely as straightforward or as polarised as we might have imagined. There are shades of colour in everything we experience, and these shades are equally present in the perceptions of politicians. To learn how to see the shades … that is the beauty of learning how to think critically.

One of the enormous strengths of the UK education system – for which it is rightfully renowned across the world – is its focus on teaching critical thinking. As we embark on a new parliamentary session, with new decisions to be made, and new paths to be chosen, it is incumbent on all of us, from politicians to educators, to remember the value of critical thought and reflection in our great democracy. After all, we are all in this together – and if we are wise and thoughtful, together we can find a way to forge a common, shared direction, which ultimately is for the greater good.

I am always slightly reluctant to make political comments, even in the run-up to one of the most hotly contested UK general elections in memory, but it was at the very least worrying (and probably far, far more frightening than that) to hear a child telling a politician last week that he would vote UKIP (The UK Independence Party) “to get all of the foreigners out”. This xenophobic attitude – which has prompted a great riposte in the form of (very well-received) national posters explaining that immigrants have actually added a huge amount to the UK in recent decades – is of deep concern. How is it that despite the globalising effect of communications technology, in which they are so often so deeply immersed, some members of our younger generation do not have a global mindset – a sense of belonging to a greater whole and to a wider humanity? How is it that they have not been able to rise above divisions of nationality and connect more sympathetically with fellow human beings from other nations?

It is asking a lot, of course, particularly when so many adults – across the world, it must be noted – bear the emotional and historical scars of division, and when the media is so full of stories of hatred and discord, emanating from disputes and differences of ethnic, religious and cultural background. But when we delve into the question of immigration, it is hard to escape the conclusion that we are all immigrants of some kind, no matter how long we or our ancestors have occupied a certain land. Even that ancient fish, creeping up out of the primordial slime to begin its long evolutionary journey towards intelligent life, was technically emigrating.

Perhaps the failure to recognise this lies in our teaching of history in schools, for not making this point. Perhaps the failure lies in our teaching of geography, for not exploring in more detail the migratory patterns of humans through the ages. Perhaps the failure lies in our teaching of languages, where – as numbers of linguists fall at school and at university – we have clearly failed to engage young people in seeing the relevance of speaking another tongue. Perhaps the failure lies in our teaching of citizenship, cultural studies and religion. Perhaps it lies even in the teaching of Maths, the drive of which over the past decades has been to become more and more locally relevant rather than set in a global context.

Wherever the failure lies, something – somewhere – has gone dreadfully wrong. The effects of a lack of a global mindset in our young people are manifested in ignorance, xenophobia, lack of empathy with others, and a deep suspicion of the unknown … all of which ring alarm bells as presages of future conflict. We cannot afford this. Moreover, when we embrace fully the notion of a global mindset, the world opens up. Education becomes universal, mobility becomes the norm, and responsiveness to the needs of the world becomes possible for all. Our potential blossoms.

We do not want our young people to grow up any longer and think that others do not belong in the same place that they belong. We want them to believe in the universality of humanity, and to live this life. It may not always be easy working out how truly to develop this global mindset in our youth, but the first step is to believe that we must.

Election fever has gripped the country’s media in the UK; indeed, it is hard to avoid the glee of broadcasters and reporters who are revelling in the stories that the impending general election on 7^th May is generating. Politicians are touring the country kissing babies – and feeding lambs – and the polls reveal that the count is going to be tight and perhaps genuinely unpredictable. Still, despite the enthusiasm of the Duracell-bunny-like media pundits (or perhaps because of it), it can be extremely tempting for ‘ordinary’ people simply to switch off, to wonder what it all has to do with them, and to doubt that their single vote is even worth casting.

Well, whatever we think of the media coverage, here are 5 reasons why we should all vote:

People have died to give us the right to vote. The World Wars of the 20^th century were all about freedom, including the freedom to vote, and the suffragettes spent years campaigning to give Women the vote. If we don’t vote, or we waste our vote, we dishonour our past.

Voting gives us collective power. Our preferred candidate may not always win, but if we take our responsibilities seriously and research the candidates carefully – their parties, their policies, their opinions, their integrity – then we are better able together to make the right choices for people who will represent us in Parliament. If we don’t, we can’t.

Our MPs are local as well as national – they are supposed to help fight important local issues with national clout – voting for them means that we expect them to work positively within our own local community.

Voting reminds Governments that they are chosen to represent the people. The more people who vote, the more keenly the Government must recognise that it is the people of the country who have placed them in a position of power, not the machinery of politics itself. A lower turnout distances a Government from that tie to the people.

It is our responsibility in a democracy.  Not every citizen in every country has the right to vote. We, on the other hand, have the right to vote for whomever we want in free and demonstrably fair elections, and – above all – this is we why should value this opportunity to vote and exercise our right to do so.

It is not long now until 7^th May. Plenty of time to reflect and prepare to cast our votes.

“When you’re smilin’ keep on smilin’
The whole world smiles with you”

So wrote (and sang) Louis Armstrong, and who amongst us hasn’t experienced the power of sharing smiles and happiness with others? Since 2012, today (20 March) has been designated the UN International Day of Happiness, and this, the relevant Resolution explains, is why:

“The General Assembly,[…] Conscious that the pursuit of happiness is a fundamental human goal,[…] Recognizing also the need for a more inclusive, equitable and balanced approach to economic growth that promotes sustainable development, poverty eradication, happiness and the well-being of all peoples, Decides to proclaim 20 March the International Day of Happiness”. 

Go to the website of Action for Happiness, which co-ordinates social action and personal activity for the International Day of Happiness, and you will find a list of ways in which to achieve happiness. It is not for the cynical (obviously); read it and take it at face value, in the spirit in which it was intended, and reflect:

Giving

Relating

Exercising

Appreciating

Trying Out

Direction

Resilience

Emotion

Acceptance

Meaning

Very neatly, of course, it spells out ‘Great Dream’ … and why shouldn’t happiness be a ‘great dream’? Happiness as a concept is much maligned and scorned; it is often seen as something superficial, often linked to material goals. Substitute ‘contentment’ for ‘happiness’, however, and come a little closer to understanding deep, powerful happiness – a state of existing, thinking and doing where we can fully be our confident and secure selves, and where we can positively influence the lives of others.

Of course, as with most things that are worth anything in life, happiness doesn’t happen without effort. Happiness is as much about the doing as it is about the being.

So, today, as you go about your daily tasks, seek to ‘be’ happy and ‘do’ happy. The world will be that little bit better as a result – and that’s a promise.

I have so far resisted taking a stance on the phenomenon of selfies – those snaps of oneself, taken and posted on social media, despite the fact that they are ubiquitous, a recognised word in Oxford Dictionaries Online since 2013, and increasingly institutionalised, as is evident by the development of mainstream paraphernalia to ease the selfie-taking experience. (Have you purchased your ‘Handheld Monopod Selfie Stick with Phone Adapter’ yet?)

The reason for not taking a stance is that snapping selfies is not a one-size-fits-all experience; people take selfies for all sorts of reasons. At one end of the spectrum is, no doubt, the self-obsessed narcissist; at the other is the connector of friends and family through shared visual experience. Most selfies probably result from a mixture of motivations that places them somewhere on the continuum between these two positions, and are probably relatively harmless, if (depending on the content/context/accompanying description) potentially a bit tiresome.

The recent furore about the rise in ‘brelfies’, however, has made me wonder whether there might be some way to turn selfies into a positive power for good. ‘Brelfies’ – selfies taken by women breastfeeding their infants – have caused a storm in the past week or so. Are they an important step in the empowerment of mothers, or inappropriate nakedness – sharing gone too far? This is a topic to which I do react – breastfeeding is an entirely normal activity, and – if anything – needs to be promoted and celebrated visually far more strongly than at present, to compensate for its absence. UNICEF agrees – one of their key recommendations in their Breastfeeding Manifesto is that governments should “Develop policy and practice to support breastfeeding in public places”, and they call on governments to “do all they can to protect women’s right to breastfeed in public places and encourage greater social acceptance of this important and natural practice”. Brelfies, in fact, could actually do some good.

And this got me thinking … perhaps there could be a third dimension to the motivations behind selfies – not just the narcissistic or even the communal, but the motivation of the global citizen. Far-fetched? Perhaps … but then, we learn from what we see and hear around us, and the more an idea is promulgated, the more widespread and accepted it becomes. When we enter a smoke-free bar, we register still the public health value in the smoking ban; when we recycle our newspapers, we do so not just out of habit but because we know it is good for the environment. Imagine bringing that dimension to our selfies … imagine selfies of women at work around the world, consciously posted (in part, at least) because this connects them and emphasises the importance of gender equality. Imagine selfies of 16 year old girls at school. Imagine selfies of old people being well cared for.

Think what we could achieve if we post pictures of what is possible in our world today; think how we could unite people through different but similar experiences across the globe. Imagine a virtual platform of selfies which could celebrate, motivate and inspire.

The next time you – or someone you know – takes a selfie, consider why, and remember this third dimension. After all, a dash of global citizenship will do us all good.

The IMF have spoken: in a staff discussion note published a few days ago, entitled ‘Fair Play: More Equal Laws Boost Female Labor Force participation’, the authors outline research which supports women’s involvement in the workplace in all countries of the world. Their main finding is that “less legal discrimination against women is strongly associated with higher female labor force participation”; moreover, the evidence suggests that when more women participate in the workforce, the country thrives economically. The report reminds us of the conclusion of the World Economic Forum’s 2014 Global Gender Gap Report, namely that a positive correlation has been found between gender equality and per capita GDP and the level of a country’s competitiveness, as well as the human development indicators for which we all should be striving.

The authors of this recent report express their findings cautiously, not wishing to offend: “In recommending equal opportunities … this study does not intend to render a judgment of countries’ broadly accepted cultural and religious norms”; when they speak of the power of removing legal obstacles to gender equality in the workplace, they temper their conclusion: “legal changes enable women to enter into economic activity, which may change social attitudes. It should also be emphasized that the policy recommendations in this note with respect to creating equal opportunity should be considered against the backdrop of countries’ broadly accepted cultural and religious norms.”

Understandable though this is – a natural desire not to upset, perhaps, or a more subtle move towards evolution rather than revolution – it is nonetheless unfortunate that the authors could not be stronger in their recommendations. All the evidence they cite demonstrates clearly that economies and societies thrive with greater gender equality. No country is free of bias or prejudice; the authors of the report are certainly not advocating following a particular model. Their conclusions point strongly, though, to the – surely now indisputable – fact that when men and women are treated equally, the world is a better and more prosperous place, in every sense.

This is a message we all need to hear, repeat, and work to translate into reality. The IMF’s conclusions help us along this path.

The UK Telegraph’s newspaper interview with Tom Bennett, published today, is worth a read. It follows on from widely publicised recent comments make by Andreas Schleicher, Director of Education and Skills at OECD, which attempted to debunk various myths about the top-performing school systems … again, these too are worth a read. What both educationalists share in common, it seems to me, is a desire to orientate teachers and policy-makers away from a belief that one size (or even one system) fits all in educating young people, and we should remain open and appropriately sceptical as we attempt to assess the effectiveness of any initiative in education.

Of course, part of this is a drive towards greater and more effective (and impartial) research in schools and amongst young people. The more we can track outcomes, the more certain we can be that individual interventions (or combinations of interventions) actually work in helping young people to learn more and become more ‘educated’. Research undoubtedly has its limitations – by its nature it largely generalises, and not every young person, in his or her specific circumstances, is ‘generalisable’. If our goal is to ensure that every single young person across the world has access to the education strategies and resources that help him or her to become the best he/she can be, with the ultimate aim of being able to contribute as best possible to their local, national and international community, then we have to acknowledge that even detailed, ‘cast-iron guaranteed’ research outcomes will not necessarily work in reality with every individual.

Yet the more we know, the more likely we are to be able to approach our goal. The more (proven) tools that teachers have in their repertoire of ways to nudge their students into learning, the more likely it is that those learners will thrive. Great and experienced teachers have learned over the years how to understand and respond to the particular needs of their pupils; every day in their classrooms, mini-research projects unfold and develop, consciously or otherwise, as they test out how to stretch and support their students in different measures, appropriate to their needs. Educators and educational systems have so much that they can learn from one another; when this learning is planned, considered, tested, weighed and weighted, then it stands to reason that it can be enormously helpful to others. As we mature in our understanding of how children learn and how education systems prosper, then it is to be hoped that we will develop our ability to think critically about education and share our insights on a platform where they in turn are evaluated critically, for the greater good, ultimately, of our young people and their education.

A goal worth working towards indeed.

The Equaliser (which I watched recently on another longhaul flight) is not necessarily a film I would recommend – the body count is high, the pre-movie warnings about the propensity of adult themes are accurate, and while Denzel Washington plays his part well, one is left rather morally uneasy at the thought that one bad deed deserves another … even if that second bad deed rids the world of an unsavoury character (or several).

However, the first few seconds of the film grabbed my attention and held it. Before any of the storyline unfolded, before the bodies starting piling up, and before even the characters had graced the screen, the audience was presented with a quote by Mark Twain:

“The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.”

Real truth lies within this quote: at the risk of stating the obvious, we do not exist and can achieve nothing if we are not born; moreover, unless and until we realise our direction or purpose in life, we are unlikely to make the most of our time on this planet. When we can see and understand our goal, we are far more likely to pursue it and to achieve it. It stands to reason, therefore, that the day on which this goal becomes clear to us is an important one.

Of course, it is not necessarily easy to pinpoint at which moment – on which day – this realisation occurs. Has it, indeed, already occurred? Are we sure? If we aren’t sure, then did we just miss or overlook it? If we are sure, then how can we tell that that was the real thing? Or is our moment of realisation still to come?

Well, maybe we know what we are meant to do in life … or maybe we don’t. In either case, it does us no harm to keep our eyes open to what life brings us every new day, and to keep checking in with ourselves – and others – that what we think we should be doing during our time on this planet is in fact what we should be doing. We may never know for certain, but if we keep vigilant, every day, then we have a far better chance of working it out.

And then, of course – and how reassuring and empowering this is – each new day becomes one of the most important days of our life. Treasure it.

On a recent longhaul flight, which is about the only opportunity I have to watch movies, I was very taken with the espionage thriller, ‘A Most Wanted Man’. Based on the novel by John Le Carré of the same title, it was Philip Seymour Hoffman’s last leading role before his death in February 2014, and he was most convincing as Günther Bachmann, the man running the slightly shady, under-the-radar team whose aim was to develop intelligence about potential security threats in Germany and beyond. As an example of character acting, it was excellent, and well worth watching.

What prompted me to write about the film here, though, was not a new-found desire to review the latest Hollywood releases; rather, it was a phrase in the film which jumped out at me, and which made me think. Years of seeking the moral message in anything I see, read or experience have perhaps attuned me to identifying key moments and messages in films and books, but the fact that this particular phrase was repeated – and emphasised – later in the film gave me the sense that it was not accidental on the part of the writer and director. I would need to read the original book to see if this was Le Carré’s intention from the outset; whether or not it was, and whether or not he explores in greater depth the ambivalences around the behaviour of our intelligence forces as they seek to protect us, the effect of the phrase in the film remains.

The phrase uses a comparative adjective to indicate why the protagonists are doing what they do, and there is a point at which, despite coming from different angles, two key protagonists agree that they do what they do because they are trying to ‘make the world a safer place’. This phrase is especially and tragically relevant in the wake of the dreadful Charlie Hedbdo murders in Paris, and it struck me particularly because for over a decade now, I have spoken out about the role of education in our society as being to try to ‘make the world a better place’. I have two main messages that I give to young people about their education: first, that they owe it to themselves to make the most of this education – to grow, to stretch themselves, to become the best people they can be; secondly (and ultimately), that they are doing this in order to help make the world a better place.

Hearing the same conviction but with a different comparative adjective – and, fictional or not, one imagines this conviction to be held by real-life protagonists in the same field – made me wonder what would happen if we reached out and sought more comparative adjectives to slot into the phrase. What about helping to make the world a fairer place? A healthier place? A more tolerant place? A cleaner place? Different comparative adjectives will resonate with different people; each of us could very probably pick his or her favourite – the one which we find most inspiring and energising.

Just one adjective would suffice, given that none of us can take responsibility for doing everything in life. Think, though, what you could do with a single comparative adjective. If each of us were to commit to a single comparative adjective in the phrase ‘to help make the world a …. place’, just imagine for a moment what could happen. Just think of the change we could make, together.

Pick yours today – and seek to make a positive difference in 2015 and beyond.