Apr 25

Time to move beyond the politics of education

Yesterday I attended the annual conference of the Scottish Council of Independent Schools (SCIS) in Edinburgh, and as usual at such events, was given great food for thought. SCIS represents over 70 independent member schools in Scotland, and the debate ranged across various topics, including the publication on that same day of a report demonstrating the positive economic impact – to the tune of around £466m – of the Scottish independent schools’ sector on the national economy. Coming as it did on the same day as the annual census released by the Independent Schools Council (ISC) which noted that numbers of pupils in independent schools throughout the UK have grown again over the past year, this was a clear indication of the strength and success of the sector.

What was particularly interesting at the conference, however, was that the debate returned time and again to how, as educators, we can ensure that we are able to do the very best for ALL children. Schools have an aim and founding principle which transcend their requirement to educate the individuals in their care; schools – all schools, without exception – are part of the fabric of our society, and they exist in order to prepare the next generation, and generations to follow, to play a fulfilling and effective role in our world. The world needs our children to be incredibly well-educated – to be self-aware, to have a social conscience, to understand where we have come from, and to be able to think critically and creatively about where we go next. Our schools are crucial in this developmental process.

It is all too easy for schools to become enmired in politics and prejudices about other schools, different approaches, and for healthy competition between schools to descend into harmful point-scoring. If we are to move forward – and put each child firmly at the heart of our education system, for his/her sake and for the sake of all of us – then we need to move beyond petty politics. It is the child who matters – the child and his or her impact on the world, which we must nurture by spending time understanding his/her needs, and what the future will require of all of us.

I firmly believe that the willingness to achieve this is there in all of us – let us be bold and act upon it.

 

Apr 17

Supporting indigenous communities – a win-win for all

My latest communication from Indigenous Community Volunteers in Australia, whose website can be found here, prompted me to reflect again, very positively, on the power of connecting and sharing experience, and the immensely encouraging effect on individuals and on communities when people reach out and collaborate with one another.

The vision of ICV is of an Australia “where all Australians live in harmony and where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people share the same rights, respect and access to opportunities and rewards, and where their culture is valued and recognised as an asset to Australian society.” This they do by connecting people – volunteers come to Aboriginal communities at the invitation of the communities themselves, and share skills and experience, with the aim of enriching understanding and developing, very practically, a platform for further growth in expertise and proficiency in whatever area the individuals or communities think beneficial, be it in technology, gardening, medicine – or any other area.

One of the fundamental truths I have learned during my time in schools and in education more generally is that for partnerships to be effective, they must be genuine and reciprocal. Teachers teach best when they learn every day from their students; schools working with other schools do not succeed if they believe that they are there to impart knowledge – their success comes when all parties recognise that they are on a journey together. So it is with the experience of volunteers in Aboriginal communities – they have as much to learn as the indigenous communities themselves. Indigenous Australian culture has survived for over 40,000 years – the oldest identified culture in the world still in existence today – and it would be naive to think that its descendants had nothing to teach the world of today.

Our world is rich and varied, and there is so much of it to explore and appreciate. Of one thing I am certain – we owe it to ourselves and to others to reach out and connect. It is our responsibility both to share what we have learned, and to be open to understanding and sharing further the knowledge that others have accumulated.

Together we are stronger and better – and we take one more step towards living in greater harmony.

Apr 07

Celebrating our uniqueness

I marvel frequently at how amazing human beings can be. It is a helpful – and true – contrast to the multiple messages we receive every day from different directions about how human beings can have a dark side of cruelty and violence; it is also an incredibly useful discipline to inspire to action – a goal that aspires to enable other human beings to fulfil their own potential and to work for the common good of all humanity. Being inspired by a vision of human ‘amazingness’, (to use a word coined by a former pupil) is a solid foundation for action that will lead to that vision being realised, and it makes perfect sense that the more people who strive towards this goal, the more likely we are to achieve it. Together we are stronger – and after all, if we do not have a goal or a focus in life, how will we ever achieve it?

So it was with this in mind that I myself was inspired yesterday when I came across a prose poem entitled ‘You are very special’. I have not yet been able to track down an author or an origin, but will continue to seek. This section encapsulated the message of the poem in particular:

 

 You’re different from any other human being who has ever

lived in the history of the universe.

You are the only one in the whole of creation who has

your particular set of abilities.

Nobody in the universe can reach the quality of the

combination of your talents, your feelings, like a roomful of musical instruments;

some might excel in one way or another,

but nobody can match the symphonic sound when all are played together.

Throughout all eternity no one will ever

walk, talk, think or do exactly like you.

You are special.

 

We have a special challenge as human beings – to recognise and value the uniqueness and individual specialness of others, while striving to blend this uniqueness into a community that works together in harmony. Together we are stronger – together while celebrating our uniqueness we are stronger still.

Let us be inspired to thought, reflection and action today.

Mar 08

International Women’s Day – a day for equality, not just for women

The first International Women’s Day was celebrated in 1911, and then – as now – it was (and is) an opportunity to highlight and celebrate the achievements of women, and to focus attention on the work that still needed (and needs) to be done to ensure that women have equal rights, in whatever context they work and live. The Day is widely acknowledged, with thousands of events all over the world; it has become a fixture in the world calendar.

There is no doubt that investing in women pays off – when women are more equal in pay and status to men, economies flourish and societies grow. This is not down to the women alone, of course, and it would be a mistake to think so – equality demands understanding and action from all people in order for it to be truly worthy of its name. Women alone should not – and indeed cannot – be solely responsible for equality throughout the world – it is a drive that demands of us all that we commit, take part and make it happen.

This is why it is as important to educate boys and men about equality as it is girls and women; this is why it is important that young people are enabled to have sensible discussions about the history of gender difference and that they are encouraged to work together – in mixed gender as well as single gender groups – to seek innovative and creative solutions for the future that transcend this difference. Individually, we will make strides forward in our reflection and appreciation of gender equality; together, ultimately, we will be stronger.

International Women’s Day is such an important day as we continue to strive to make progress as a human race towards more harmonious living. Let us remember that it is a day for all of us to celebrate and commit to equality.

 

 

Feb 25

Why people are important in education – but so is technology

I had a very good experience recently when I phoned a Government department to sort out a claim: the (pleasantly reassuring) computer voice asked me to say in a few words what it was I was calling about, repeated back to me a very accurate summary of my issue, and then took me through a series of questions designed to ensure that I was directed to the appropriate section. When I was passed through to a human voice, I was glad to be speaking to someone who could actually do something about my problem, but grateful too for the technology which had directed me, and had actually made solving my issue much simpler. It had saved me time and made me feel good – a win-win all round.

I did of course want to speak to a person in the end – I needed personal interaction to be able to explain my issue and receive advice. We all respond to other human beings caring and helping us; it was therefore no surprise to read on the website of US Education News that educators in Iowa and Vermont have worked out that “students who develop meaningful relationships with teachers are more likely to succeed.”

This is not of course the only thing that matters – the same educators stress that “students need to feel like what they are learning is relevant to them in order to stay engaged.” This is where technology comes in. If it can ease communication and help focus on solutions, as in my recent experience, and if it can engage, interest and respond to human needs, then it can make a huge difference in education.

Technology has come on in leaps and bounds since the invention of the first Turing machines of the 20th century, and it has reached a point now where it can significantly enhance learning and add new dimensions to this learning, rather than simply make mechanical tasks more automated. We are at a stage now where we can think incredibly ambitiously about what technology might do for us in education, and can have a reasonable chance that this is already under development, or is at least within the realms of practical possibility.

Spend a few moments today thinking those incredibly ambitious thoughts.

 

 

 

Feb 20

Developing a fuller awareness: International Mother Tongue Day

Friday of this week marks International Mother Tongue Day, which has been celebrated since February 2000, with a clear mandate from the UN to promote tolerance through recognising the diversity of linguistic communication in the world. This statement on the UN’s page devoted to the Day is striking: “Languages are the most powerful instruments of preserving and developing our tangible and intangible heritage. All moves to promote the dissemination of mother tongues will serve not only to encourage linguistic diversity and multilingual education but also to develop fuller awareness of linguistic and cultural traditions throughout the world and to inspire solidarity based on understanding, tolerance and dialogue.”

One of the greatest challenges facing the human race is being able to connect effectively and work together for the common good of humanity and for our planet. Technology is enabling us to overcome the difficulties of vast distance, and is helping to introduce us to other cultures and other ways of life, so that we can understand them better; if we can also appreciate language not as a barrier to communication, but as an enriching factor in this understanding of others, then we will move one step closer to the greater unity that we need to find in our world. Our task is conceptually demanding, both cognitively and emotionally – we must learn to appreciate that each human being is uniquely different, and to value this deeply and honestly, while understanding at an equally deep level that we are all fundamentally the same. Essentially, we have to learn to transcend the physical – and linguistic – appearances of difference, and seek our shared common values, and the core that unites us as humans.

It goes without saying that we all have a role to play in this task. We cannot leave this to the few – no matter how inspirational they are as leaders. This is something that we must all do – and must encourage others to do, in families and in schools. The first step is always one of awareness – let us be prompted in this by our reflections on this year’s International Mother Tongue Day.

 

Feb 17

The courage to make a difference: Nasrin Sotoudeh and her fight for justice

It is easy to forget sometimes that we are immensely privileged to live in a society where we can take justice and freedom – of action and speech – for granted. No society is perfect, of course, and nor is any system of law or government, but on the whole, living in Australia, or the UK, or the US, or most of what we describe as the Western world – we can feel pretty secure that we will be treated fairly most of the time by our law-makers and law-enforcers. As the story of Nasrin Sotoudeh reminded us last year, however, this is not the case everywhere.

Ms Sotoudeh was imprisoned in 2011 in Iran after receiving a sentence of six years for spreading propaganda and “damaging national security”. A human rights lawyer by profession, she had defended political dissidents, and had come to feel the full power of the regime turned against her as a result. In prison, she was subjected to long periods of time in solitary confinement, and was refused visits from her family and her own lawyer. She was not allowed to attend her father’s funeral. Her family suffered too, and it was when the authorities banned her daughter from leaving Iran that in October of 2012 she began a hunger strike that was to bring her perilously close to death.

Our world is more connected now than ever it has been in the past, and with worldwide attention focused on Nasrin Sotoudeh’s case – led, as is often the case, by the admirably persistent Amnesty International – the authorities in Iran eventually lifted the restrictions on her family which had caused her to take such drastic action, and she gave up her protest. Her hunger strike highlighted to the rest of the world the lengths to which repressive regimes will go in order to restrict freedom of speech, but it has also shown that such regimes will listen when we all pay attention.

Sometimes it takes a brave person to stand up for what is right, and Nasrin Sotoudeh is deserving of our admiration. She was finally freed on 19 September 2013, and we must should not forget her – she has more work to do. She falls into my definition of an inspirational woman; I hope she falls into yours too.

 

Feb 10

We have work to do …

I read a potentially rather depressing report recently about a survey of British teenagers post-GCSE (aged around 16), who were looking ahead to their futures and commenting on what was important to them, what they envisaged doing with their lives and what skills they thought they would need. The main takeouts of the survey, as reported in The Independent, were that roughly two-thirds of the cohort valued a high salary above all, while around a third only wanted to do something that helped others. In addition, only 35% were concerned that their employers were socially responsible. As far as their personal skills were concerned, only 7% thought that numerical and analytical skills would be important in 30 years’ time, and although 44% recognised the importance of communications skills, only 23% felt that creativity was important.

Surveys are notoriously difficult to write, and even more difficult to interpret, and reports on surveys – even KPMG’s own press release about this particular survey – are easily skewed to editorial whims. This survey, of 289 students in state schools, gave a snapshot of what those particular students thought, but we have no information about their backgrounds, to understand them better, or to be able to interpret better why they might have chosen certain responses, nor have we any comparative data to understand how this cohort, or any wider cohort of this age, compares either with what they themselves previously thought, or with what other cohorts have gone before them have thought.

With all these caveats in place, we can still recognise that more of these students value a high salary than value a career that helps others, and only 7% seem think that analytical skills are important. On both scores, we should have something to say: for the human race to succeed, we are all going to have to learn that we must do something that helps others, and in order to do this, we are going to need every ounce not only of our creativity, but also of our critical analytical abilities.

We shouldn’t be too hard on these young people who responded to this survey, however. In an economic recession, income is important, and high incomes are associated with success – and do, after all, allow people to support others – their own families and communities. And maybe the survey was phrased in such a way to suggest that those analytical skills were tied to standard, easily automated tasks, which we might expect to diminish over time. Several of the other results were interpreted as positive – “ambitious and entrepreneurial” were the headlines of the press release.

Equally, though, we should not be complacent or dismiss the results. We have work to do to show our young people that working selflessly for the good of others is important, that strong, humane values should define us as as people, and that by developing their critical faculties, they will be well-placed to learn this and to make the most of their capacity to do the right thing in life. This work starts in families and in schools. As this survey shows, we certainly have our work cut out for us.

 

Nov 22

Why life really is like a box of chocolates

In the 1994 award-winning film, Forrest Gump, the eponymous hero (played, as anyone who has seen it will remember, by Tom Hanks) utters the words “My momma always said, ‘Life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get'”. It is a film worthy of its many Oscars, Golden Globes and so on – it is a compelling tale which challenges conventional views of what human beings can achieve, and it makes us laugh, cry and think. The rather poignant words about the box of chocolates have stuck in common parlance as a result.

The phrase, “Life is like a box of chocolates”, can be interpreted in a multitude of ways, and is often assumed to reflect the variety that life has to offer. Certainly, when I look at the enormous range of paths anticipated by our Year 12 leavers, as they await their HSC results in December, I can see an enormous and refreshing variety of options. We want our young people to grow up to become the unique individuals they can be – and life offers them this chocolate-box variety.

In reality, however, the box of chocolates is nothing without the action of selecting the actual chocolates. To experience the chocolate, we must choose it and commit ourselves to it by taking a bite. Sometimes this is a leap of faith, and we do not necessarily know what taste sensation awaits us. Sometimes we like what we taste; sometimes we don’t. Sometimes we learn to like what we thought we would not like.

Chocolates hide an inner delight – the outer coating can give us a clue, as indeed can the guide on the side of the box, or the recommendations of people who have chosen before us. But essentially they are there (in moderation, of course) for the choosing – for us to make our choices. As our Year 12s make their final steps towards life beyond school, they should remember Forrest Gump, and be inspired by the thought.

 

Nov 08

The male-female divide in sport

An article in this Tuesday’s Sydney Morning Herald caught my eye very early that same morning – it was a story about Melissa Barbieri, former captain of the Australian national women’s football team, who finds herself without funding after taking a year out to have a child. In order to keep playing in the W-League, and – she hopes – regain a place in the national team, she decided that she had to raise funds and so had planned to auction off some of her precious souvenirs from her time as an international player. The small sum of $5,000 should do it, she reported – and she is not alone in seeking to self-fund, as her teammates are doing all sorts of jobs on the side, including cleaning windows.

This is a difficult subject to discuss. One the one hand, playing football need not be a full-time job, and can allow for other (paid) employment, although clearly at state and national levels any sport requires dedication and time far beyond that of a mere recreational activity, thus limiting the potential for earnings. Moreover, lest we concern ourselves too much with the sentimental impact of selling memorabilia, we must remember that Ms Barbieri has a choice – she too could raise money by cleaning windows if she wanted. And we should also not forget that football is a physical activity. Pregnancy and child-birth will in many cases inhibit the capacity of an individual to be able to perform in sport at the same level as other women. This is a valid consideration when it comes to allocating positions and remuneration.

And yet … something feels very uncomfortable about this story. Perhaps it is because of what is not said in the article – the scale of the salaries paid to professional sportspeople who are men, for instance, and the uphill struggle that women’s sport faces to receive the same amount of media coverage as men’s sport. Despite small triumphs – more tv coverage and sponsorship this season than before – there is still a long, long way to go before we can say that we are as excited about women’s sport in this society as we are about men’s sport. This, of course, is also down to each and every one of us; we have choices and a voice when it comes to expressing preferences for watching sport.

So … the messages we must take away are these: let us be positive about what has happened to improve gender equity in sport over the past few years; let us not be accepting of continuing difference on such a vast scale as exists still; and let us not think that the time has yet come for us to let down our guard – there is work to be done in this world.