Schools are collapsing. The only way out is through. As a collapse aware educator I constantly am embedding capacity building for collapse into everything I teach.
Excellent provocation, Will. You are absolutely right about the paralysis. I see it in a wide range of clients, from educators to sustainability leaders to business owners. They know their role is not only misaligned but actually causing harm. They see that they are part of a broken system that is perpetuating a false idea of the future.
The good news is that more people are becoming aware daily. Once they see they are in good company with peers who feel the same way, they can take steps to work with others where they are. Your cohorts of educators facing this together is exactly the kind of connection and action that is so urgently needed!
Thanks, Maya. The connections people are making in the workshop are profound for many. It's still not about "fixing" as much as building the capacities we need to navigate collapse together.
It’s so true! I’m reading Imaginable by Jane McGonigal and she talks about “normalcy bias” and says, “If you don’t want to be shocked or blindsided by possible future crises or disasters, you have to overcome your normalcy bias and convince your brain that these strange events can happen—no matter how “unthinkable” they seem to you today.”
What’s bizarre to me is how at this point though is how “strange events” are actually the norm and still so many people have their head in the sand. It applies to so many scenarios in the world, the workplace, and schools.
It's incredibly hard for us to get outside of our collective boxes. Especially in education, right? And yet it feels like the only path forward is truly "out of the box" right now.
Great points in this thread, Zoe and Will. It's not ignorance. Will, you call it emotional paralysis, a nice simile for Zoe's contention that we are now normalizing natural disasters. Otherwise, we'd have to admit what you suggest up front, that we are not the masters of the universe. By extension, we have normalized the current educational system to prevent admitting that our kids are not prepared for what they will face. Paralysis is one way to describe the response.
Even Chris Lehmann's latest post dances around the issue. He suggests that his kids will not be prepared for the future, but he tries to maintain a balance, or normalize the past, by claiming that schools have performed a service for many kids whose lives would have been grim without their education. Perhaps he is talking specifically about his Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia. It is another normalized narrative that kids from disadvantaged homes and neighborhoods are much better off even with the limitations of a traditional education. I don't debate that, but I would respond by saying that the experience could have been so much better in a different type of system, one that you have described for several years.
BINGO!I am in full agreement…. Which makes the overriding question then ( to my mind at least) is it possible to extricate and reform one component when the mothership is imploding from its own morass….
Wow, this is a brilliant analogy. I'm going to be thinking about this all day.
Schools are collapsing. The only way out is through. As a collapse aware educator I constantly am embedding capacity building for collapse into everything I teach.
Excellent provocation, Will. You are absolutely right about the paralysis. I see it in a wide range of clients, from educators to sustainability leaders to business owners. They know their role is not only misaligned but actually causing harm. They see that they are part of a broken system that is perpetuating a false idea of the future.
The good news is that more people are becoming aware daily. Once they see they are in good company with peers who feel the same way, they can take steps to work with others where they are. Your cohorts of educators facing this together is exactly the kind of connection and action that is so urgently needed!
Thanks, Maya. The connections people are making in the workshop are profound for many. It's still not about "fixing" as much as building the capacities we need to navigate collapse together.
In many ways, it is the connecting that is the fixing.
It’s so true! I’m reading Imaginable by Jane McGonigal and she talks about “normalcy bias” and says, “If you don’t want to be shocked or blindsided by possible future crises or disasters, you have to overcome your normalcy bias and convince your brain that these strange events can happen—no matter how “unthinkable” they seem to you today.”
What’s bizarre to me is how at this point though is how “strange events” are actually the norm and still so many people have their head in the sand. It applies to so many scenarios in the world, the workplace, and schools.
~Zoë
It's incredibly hard for us to get outside of our collective boxes. Especially in education, right? And yet it feels like the only path forward is truly "out of the box" right now.
Great points in this thread, Zoe and Will. It's not ignorance. Will, you call it emotional paralysis, a nice simile for Zoe's contention that we are now normalizing natural disasters. Otherwise, we'd have to admit what you suggest up front, that we are not the masters of the universe. By extension, we have normalized the current educational system to prevent admitting that our kids are not prepared for what they will face. Paralysis is one way to describe the response.
Even Chris Lehmann's latest post dances around the issue. He suggests that his kids will not be prepared for the future, but he tries to maintain a balance, or normalize the past, by claiming that schools have performed a service for many kids whose lives would have been grim without their education. Perhaps he is talking specifically about his Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia. It is another normalized narrative that kids from disadvantaged homes and neighborhoods are much better off even with the limitations of a traditional education. I don't debate that, but I would respond by saying that the experience could have been so much better in a different type of system, one that you have described for several years.
Right...I'm coming to realize that it's not about getting out of the box as much as admitting there is a box to get out of in the first place. Sigh.
BINGO!I am in full agreement…. Which makes the overriding question then ( to my mind at least) is it possible to extricate and reform one component when the mothership is imploding from its own morass….
I'm coming around to the belief that it's not. The consequences of that answer trouble me greatly.
I love this piece. I'm going to use it for my Administrator and BOE Retreats next month.
Let me know how that goes!