This week’s post comes from Jenee Henry Wood who leads learning at Transcend. The post was published originally as part of their “Roads to Reinventing” blog series focusing on the central question “What now feels possible for education that didn’t before this massive disruption?”
Mary Bowman describes her homeland with grace: “We, the Lakota, live in Ȟe Sápa, The Black Hills. This is an ancient and very spiritual place for us….beautiful pine trees, rugged mountains, and prairie land. We hold very important ceremonies on this land.” She goes on to describe the beauty of the Badlands and the indignity of Mt. Rushmore, “that abomination” that sits at the spiritual home of her people.
There are about 100K remaining Lakota in the United States. COVID has hit Indigenous communities with ferocity. Indigenous families understandably worried that their children wouldn’t be safe returning to school in the fall. So they did something we associate with the most privileged communities – they started a learning pod.
The Lakota Oyate Homeschool Co-op
After posting a message on Facebook, Mary – a Lakota teacher – and a small group of parents, grandparents, and teachers received 140 messages from Indigenous families wishing to unenroll from their public district and re-enroll in the district on the neighboring reservation. During spring remote learning, high numbers of district students were disengaged – they just weren’t logging on. The district had no plans to reimagine the model for the fall. But the Oglala district would allow for pod-based remote learning embedded in the Lakota language and cultural curriculum.
It strikes me that these Lakota families were motivated by two realities: first, the lack of deliberate national or state action to make schools safe; and second, the importance of cultural – not just physical – safety for Lakota youth as a prerequisite for learning. Marie High Bear, now a pod teacher and mother to a young son, recalls, “My son didn’t feel as though he belonged [in his district school]…he was teased by the other kids for his long hair. I’ve had to explain to him that his baby hair is sacred to us.” For these reasons, Mary, Marie, and others in the community got together to design a learning model that would keep children physically safe and rectify centuries of inequity. “I’ve been an educator for 16 years working with indigenous kids in the public school,” Mary reflects. “I’d always say, ‘Work hard and you can change your life.’ I never got the buy-in, they just didn’t believe it. Plus, they would walk with their hands behind their backs all day, single-file. That’s just not how we treat our children.” Mary knew that this homeschooling pod could signal a longer-range shift for Native families by serving as a template for a more permanent Indigenous alternative education.
this homeschooling pod could signal a longer-range shift for Native families by serving as a template for a more permanent Indigenous alternative education.
The Lakota Oyate Homeschool Co-op is grounded in the cultural knowledge and ways of being of the Lakota people. This shows up in everything from systems and procedures to core academics. The school day begins by smudging the school house, a ritual of burning sage and cedar, a practice that aims to “cleanse our minds, and make positive thoughts so that we can walk in a good way for our people, each other, and the Creator.” The pod has six children, ranging from 2nd-5th grades. They are taught together in this multi-aged group, which is supported by a whole community of family members. Marie serves as the “proctor” and Lakota Language and Culture teacher, working one-on-one when needed and leading the group during non-virtual learning portions of the day, such as nature exploration and hosting elders. Core academics like math and science are pursued in hands-on, practice-based ways. Students also spend time in nature during science learning, and math is grounded in culturally-relevant practical examples – a future lesson will be on how to erect tipis for maximum occupancy and egress. After the morning sage and cedar burning, the group then moves to a talking circle where the child with the feather or rock holds the floor. This is designed to be a reflective space for setting intentions grounded in Lakota values of respect, generosity, bravery, and courage. The children might reflect on the question, “What is a way that I can be generous today and share with others?”
As Marie describes the pod’s typical day, she keeps referring to the ways in which their learning community centers Lakota knowledge instead of relegating it to the boundaries of the day, as it had been in the traditional system. In March 2018, after decades of Native pressure, South Dakota adopted the Oceti Sakowin, a set of essential understandings and standards aimed at addressing cultural diversity and raising consciousness to empower Native American students. Marie shares that the implementation of these standards was relegated to “specials,” once a week language classes, guest speakers, or other random experiences. This knowledge wasn’t embedded within the core DNA of school (e.g. daily rituals, curriculum) in ways that were relevant to Native and non-Native learners alike. This learning pod presents the opportunity to do what decades of advocacy couldn’t – center traditional knowledge on Lakota terms. As Mary Bowman says of the assimilative nature of American education so far, “The boarding schools tried to make us forget, but we aim to remember.”
This learning pod presents the opportunity to do what decades of advocacy couldn’t – center traditional knowledge on Lakota terms.
I was also delighted by the presence of nature – dwelling in and learning from it – within this pod. Young people spend time outside studying plants and flora. They learn about the healing powers of natural remedies and the fundamental balance of all living things. They learn about geology and Lakota Star Knowledge, an ancestral tradition used for sacred events such as solstices and to observe the seasons in their sacred order. They eat lunch in a circle outdoors. They tell stories about the buffalo during story time, as Marie encourages them to illustrate what they hear. There is a wholeness to this learning environment that engages young people cognitively, sensorily, spiritually, and physically. In the age of COVID, with millions of children staring at screens, this is a rarity. For the Lakota, this vital aspect of their cultural and spiritual lives is left at the door in mainstream schooling.
I was introduced to The Lakota Oyate Homeschool Co-op because they are recent recipients of an Enduring Ideas Award, a fund of Teach for America’s Reinvention Lab that I Co-Chair with Sunanna Chand. This co-op is such an intriguing example of reinventing because it adds a much-needed dimension to our discussion on learning pods, equity, and the path for public education in a post-COVID world. While it is too early to render a verdict on pods, the most popular narrative frames them as tools of privilege – yet another way for more affluent (and mostly White) families to hoard resources and opportunities for their kids. In some cases, that narrative is fair and true; in others, it’s incomplete. In this instance, the learning pod is almost an historical corrective.
In this Lakota community, the road to “reinventing” is about reconnecting to knowledge and ways of being that have been long marginalized and undervalued by the traditional system. Mary Bowman, who is also a fellow with NACA Inspired Schools Network, which works to build Indigenous community schools, believes this pod is the way of the future. While her dream of establishing a Lakota community school predates COVID, she sees this as an unprecedented opportunity to prove what is possible in creating equitable, culturally affirming learning environments. I see this community making tremendous leaps towards Affirmation of Self & Others, Connection & Community, Relevance, and Whole-Child Focus through their deep commitment to culturally-responsive pedagogy. These leaps – while important in their own right – also enable better academic learning. Both Marie and Mary describe how a learning environment that fosters deep connection, sense of self, and pride creates the conditions for better academic progress and far fewer behavioral challenges. For Co-op students, a deep sense of belonging is the foundation for academic engagement and true learning. This community’s learnings could very well influence the public school district and create the demand for more Lakota-run community schools, grounded in Indigenous knowledge and facilitated by Indigenous teachers.
When I stepped away from our conversation, the school day that Marie High Bear described somehow felt familiar to me, even though I’d never been to this classroom-in-the-living-room. I realize that many of the innovations communities are seeking – particularly the “whole child ones” – try to capture the sense of wholeness, mindfulness, and respect for other ways of knowing and being that are at the center of Lakota life. As we move forward in reinventing learning, we must continue to ask ourselves: what counts as valid evidence and knowledge, and from whom does it count?
WHAT THE LAKOTA OYATE HOMESCHOOL CO-OP IS TEACHING US ABOUT ROADS TO REINVENTING:
The science of learning and development confirms that having a sense of belonging and eliminating identity threats is a prerequisite for learning; the Co-op brings this lesson to life by creating a safe environment, grounded in Lakota language, and culture where learners can thrive.
Innovation isn’t always about inventing something new: this powerful example of applying Indigenous knowledge in new contexts suggests a road grounded in reconnection and remembering.
Learning pods can support the traditional model of school and districts to evolve.
Many “modern” school design innovations highlight practices that have long been part of Indigenous cultures; we must be mindful of which kinds and sources of evidence and knowledge are deemed valid.
HundrED has been curating these collections of 100 innovations every year since 2016 as part of their effort to support the spread of “pedagogically sound, ambitious innovations” in multiple contexts. To create the collection, 150 academics, educators, innovators, funders and HundrED staff reviewed nominated programs based on each program’s impact and scalability.
In their report on the 2021 Global Collection, Christopher Petrie, head of global research and Katija Aladin a researcher at HundrED described the latest collection as including many innovations in “areas where there is often a lack of—or a gap—in traditional school education; for example, empathy, social skills etc.” Notably:
63% of the innovations focus on holistic skills like empathy, mindfulness, etc.
55% target the development of 21st century skills
47% develop traditional academic skills
41% Require digital devices to augment learning
35% Use pedagogical approaches that involve playful learning
Many of the innovations were created within the last five years, but five were created before 1999. Among the 2021 collection are organizations from many different parts of the world including:
Genius Lab is a for-profit organization founded in 2013. It has designed more than 600 STEAM and maker education courses in use in over 800 kindergartens, primary and secondary schools with branches in 30 cities around China. It’s “Genius Hour” provides a 21-day online camp consisting of course modules focusing on science, engineering, and design.
Educate Girls has identified 5% of villages that hold 40% of India’s out-of-school girl population. They work in partnership with the government and community volunteers to empower these girls to go back to school. Since its establishment in 2007, Educate Girls has enrolled 750,000+ girls in school.
NaTakallam builds on the expertise of refugees in several different contexts to connect them with opportunities to provide language instruction and translation services to users worldwide. Currently, NaTakallam’s conversation partners offer language sessions in multiple Arabic dialects, French, Persian and Spanish.
The Metis Collective offers a fellowship program for local innovators with ideas for reimagining teaching and learning. The fellowship provides access to a design thinking approach to innovation, a learning community, and coaching. The program has supported 63 Fellows who have created learning experiences for over 1.3 million learners across Kenya.
Agora replaces the courses, tests, schedules and homework of conventional secondary schools with challenges, collaboration and coaching in order to give 12-18 year-old students control over their own education. As one article described it, Agora is a school with no classes, no classrooms, and no curriculum. Founded in 2014 in Roermond, there are now 12 Agora’s in the Netherlands and beyond.
Fundación Paraguaya’s Self-Sustaining Agricultural School Model combines classroom learning in agricultural methods and business practices with hands-on training in the schools’ enterprises. Those enterprises include organic vegetable gardening, dairy processing, beekeeping, tending to goats and chickens, and managing a tree nursery, a rural hotel, and roadside stores. Fundación Paraguaya is now responsible for four self-sustaining schools in Paraguay.
In a recent article in Forbes, Tom Vander Ark outlined 15 “invention opportunities” that can support the development of equitable high-quality learning opportunities in the future. Among the fifteen, are challenges to create an “accountability 2.0” and develop the mechanisms that can bring people together to share diverse perspectives and support community agreement on the aims and purposes of education. These mechanisms are essential for fostering the common understanding and collective responsibility that fuel the social movements we need to dismantle systemic racism, create equitable educational opportunities, and transform education.
Re-defining accountability itself serves as a first step in developing these new mechanisms. For too long, accountability in the US has been synonymous with answerability: Answerability reflects the beliefs that individuals and groups should be accountable for meeting clearly specified and agreed-upon procedures and/or goals. Yet the focus on answerability ignores responsibility another crucial aspect of accountability. Responsibility reflects the belief that individuals and groups should be held accountable for living up to and upholding norms of conduct and higher purposes that are often ambiguous and difficult to define in advance.
Individuals and groups should be held accountable for living up to and upholding norms of conduct and higher purposes that are often ambiguous and difficult to define in advance.
Although carefully specifying outcomes that need to be achieved and establishing consequences for failing to meet those targets can increase efficiency, it also ignores many other valued outcomes, and it can undermine the discretion and expert judgment that may be needed to make many decisions. When taken to extremes, this approach spawns a compliance mindset and leads to efforts to game the system that make it look like the goals have been achieved when they haven’t.
At the same time, simply leaving individuals and groups alone is not the same thing as supporting the development of individual or collective responsibility. Developing responsibility also involves developing the capacity—the investments, materials, abilities, commitments, and relationships—needed to carry out responsibilities effectively. In short, accountability comes from the capacity to support a balance between answerability and responsibility.
Finland’s PISA scores have slipped a bit in recent years, its education system still excels in many respects and continues to stand out as one of the most equitable high-performing systems. Even though many analyses highlight the autonomy of teachers as central to that performance, those analyses often fail to mention several other key aspects of Finland’s education system that support the development of the relationships, trust, and common understanding in education so central to developing collective responsibility and achieving equitable outcomes:
A well-established social-welfare state that supports all members of society by connecting education, health, social services, and other sectors
A national curriculum framework and a strong, coherent infrastructure of facilities, materials, assessment and preparation programs to support teaching and learning
A curriculum renewal process in which stakeholders from all parts of society participate in reflecting on and revising the curriculum framework
The use of a variety of high-quality informal and formal assessments that inform efforts to improve practices and performance throughout the education system
The Finnish approach to assessment plays a particularly important role in supporting the development of common understanding and common aims. That approach includes diagnostic and classroom-based assessments that elementary teachers can use early in children’s school careers to identify those who may need some additional help with academics and to ensure that all students stay on track. In secondary schools, well-known exit exams anchor and focus the system. The National Board of Education in Finland also regularly gives tests to samples of students and schools, providing an overview of national and regional performance in key subjects, such as Finnish and mathematics. Although the National Board doesn’t use that information for ranking (and can’t, because not all students and schools are assessed), it shares school-level information with the schools that participate and municipal-level data with the municipalities involved. In addition, the National Board makes these sample assessments widely available for free, so that any teacher, school, or municipality that wants to administer these tests can do so. As a consequence, even without national testing, Finnish schools and municipalities have government-paid tools that link directly to the core curriculum that they can use to benchmark their performance against regional and national samples.
Under these conditions, students don’t have to pass tests that require them to demonstrate proficiency by third grade; they hardly ever “fail” or have to be held back; and most students reach at least a basic level of educational achievement. At the same time, this approach both supports considerable autonomy for educators and schools and builds the common connections that steer the system toward broad education goals without having to rely heavily on rewards or punishments.
This approach contrasts sharply with those in contexts like the US that focus almost exclusively on answerability by using tests to hold teachers, school leaders, and schools “accountable” for reaching specified benchmarks and other outcomes. Rather than using assessments to look back to see whether educators did what they were supposed to do, educators and system leaders in Finland use assessments to look forward and to see if people, classes, and schools are headed in the right direction. Such an approach doesn’t require data on every single aspect of student, teacher, or school performance, but it depends on making sure no one gets too far off course. It means using assessment to look for outliers and listening for signs of trouble, not to check on each individual, or make sure everything is done a certain way or in a certain timeline. In the process, Finland supports the development of the collective responsibility central to guiding education into an unpredictable future.
Rather than using assessments to look back to see what educators did we need to use assessments to look forward and to see if people, classes, and schools are headed in the right direction.
New technologies, artificial intelligence, and many other kinds of innovations can help to improve education. But those technical achievements will not accomplish much without the personal commitments and broader social movements that can transform our communities. If we are truly going to develop collective responsibility in education, then we have to develop collective responsibility for education. We have to hold ourselves, our elected officials, and our communities accountable for making the changes in our society that will end segregation and discrimination, create equitable educational opportunities, and provide the support that everyone needs to thrive.
This is the sixth in a series of interviews inviting some of the authors of earlier Lead the Change interviews to review their previous responses and consider how they might modify/ adjust/add to what they wrote based on their experiences and insights since publication. The fully formatted interview can be found on the LtC website along with the original interview from 2015.
Lead the Change: How, and in what ways, has your work evolved since the first publication of this piece? What ideas/points still hold true? Which might you revise?
Helen Janc Malone: First of all, congratulations to the Educational Change SIG on 100+ issues of the Lead the Change Series! Kudos to Drs. Santiago Rincon-Gallardo, Kristin Kew, Osnat Fellus, and Jennie Weiner on their editorial contributions to take the series to the next level. When the newsletter first started, we sought to create a place for members to dialogue about the latest research, emerging questions, and possibilities for further field advancement. I am humbled that the series continues to serve as that platform.
In the 49th issue I spoke in part about the out-of-school time field and the importance of bridging youth development and educational change fields, “What this means is that educational change must pay attention to how we create both the conditions and vehicles for authentic experiences that support student learning and development at the center.” My views from five years ago have only been reaffirmed—linking fields that serve the same students in order to complement experiences of school and out-of-school learning is essential.
There has been significant research in both fields that could inform and reinforce each other’s approaches on the relationship between system design and opportunities to high-quality education access, and by the growing evidence about the importance of cross-actor collaboration as a vehicle for educational change. The research on out-of-school time learning, for instance, has offered new approaches to cultivating authentic student voice in education, to building strong school-community partnerships, and to equity and access in learning. Educational change has started to address the importance of family and community voices within schools and in supporting teaching and learning. Taken together, we now have substantial evidence about connecting the school day with nonformal and informal learning, with strong family and community engagement, and with community services that provide well-rounded, positive, and developmentally appropriate learning experiences through the day.
Having spent nearly twenty years contributing to various domestic and international research networks and creating outlets for knowledge translation, I have observed evolving conversations about the need to authentically engage community partners in educational change efforts in order to facilitate student learning, especially in the face of rising societal inequities that manifest themselves most starkly through persistent resource and opportunity constraints. Today’s unprecedented times in some ways, demand that we further create intentional spaces for research exchange while simultaneously interrogating our collective assumptions about whether our existing structures support the desired outcomes we seek for the most vulnerable student populations.
LtC: What do these shifts suggest to you about the field of educational change more broadly?
HJM: As someone who has been a part of youth leadership development work, comprehensive school reform efforts, out-of-school time learning, community schools strategy, and educational change field, I have witnessed within these spheres a commitment to change that is adaptive and responsive to various actors within and outside schools. At the same time, I have observed that education policies enacted in the U.S. and abroad approach supporting students, and in particular, vulnerable populations, using simultaneously cyclical, continuous, and emerging perspectives. Cyclical, because in education policy, we have witnessed an oscillating dynamic of public dollar investments in the instructional core as the sole driver of educational change and looking broadly at the role various actors play to support teaching and learning. The investment priorities have at times positioned dollars for an in-school approach as an either/or proposition to a coordinated services approach. Yet, we know from practice, the answer is that students benefit when we as a society invest both teaching and learning for equity and supportive learning environments outside of the classroom.
<p value="<amp-fit-text layout="fixed-height" min-font-size="6" max-font-size="72" height="80">While public policy has navigated the narrow/broader debate to educational investments, there have been long standing, though perhaps more discrete sustained efforts to create authentic whole child services that advance learning and positive youth development. Communities engaged in these efforts display a core belief that teaching does not happen in isolation, and that a holistic approach stands to benefit students, families, teachers, and communities. And finally, especially during time of focusing events, we have observed moments of (re)discovery that necessitate a broader approach to education. These shifts of what approach will lead to the most meaningful and lasting educational change will likely continue into the future unless we flip the debate and start with a foundation centered on equity and students and the facilitating factors that support thriving children and youth. And, that piece is on us to lift up in our research, in practice, and in informing policy.While public policy has navigated the narrow/broader debate to educational investments, there have been long standing, though perhaps more discrete sustained efforts to create authentic whole child services that advance learning and positive youth development. Communities engaged in these efforts display a core belief that teaching does not happen in isolation, and that a holistic approach stands to benefit students, families, teachers, and communities. And finally, especially during time of focusing events, we have observed moments of (re)discovery that necessitate a broader approach to education. These shifts of what approach will lead to the most meaningful and lasting educational change will likely continue into the future unless we flip the debate and start with a foundation centered on equity and students and the facilitating factors that support thriving children and youth. And, that piece is on us to lift up in our research, in practice, and in informing policy.
“Teaching does not happen in isolation…a holistic approach stands to benefit students, families, teachers, and communities.”
LtC: What most excites you about the direction of the field of educational change is going?
HJM: In the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic there is an opportunity to re-imagine education that supports all students, and in particular, student populations that the current system does not serve well. Rather than create a ‘new normal’ that maintains the status quo, we (collectively) could approach this moment from a redesign frame and think deeply as to what we want in and from our education environments. This includes determining the conditions we want for learning, approaches to schooling, to the students’ experiences themselves. We have an opportunity to closely examine the purpose[s] of schooling, the pedagogical approaches to learning, the role external partners play to support and facilitate student development, the fiscal [in]equity in education, as well as systemic alignment with and across a student’s day and life. How we respond to these areas of consideration will be shaped by who is in the conversation. We need to be sure that the proverbial table includes voices that ultimate benefit from the educational changes we collectively seek – children, youth, families, teachers, and community partners. Local communities should be an essential partner in these conversations. Systems are not designed to change overnight, and in many ways, they are designed to resist rapid and discontinuous change, so having conversations regarding the future of education should be the focus of our present, in order to maintain a sense of urgency, obligation, and necessity, while also coupling practice, research, and advocacy to advance new directions.
The Educational Change SIG is well positioned to lead these conversations, as the core of what we do is to explore, examine, and engage in the change processes at all levels. Some of the scholars highlighted in the Lead the Change series have both led and researched within- and cross-sector systemic changes that redefined the narrative on teaching and learning, roles and responsibilities, lifted up local voices and sought educational justice. We could model the conversations that surface deep structural work, to learn from each other across continents, and to lift up innovations that we see make a significant difference in students’ lives. As a global community, we have the power of collective voice to share lessons of the past, the possibilities for the future, and considerations for education at large.
“As a global community, we have the power of collective voice to share lessons of the past, the possibilities for the future, and considerations for education at large.”
LtC: What advice might you have for those interested in affecting change and improvement?
HJM: There is a renewed urgency in our work. As John Kingdon’s (1984) classic work, Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies, reminds us, we have a policy window, an opportunity to potentially see new policies enacted at all levels that address the needs of learners. As noted in the previous question’s response, we are in a global moment where countries across continents are taking a deeper look into their teaching and learning practices, their systems, designs, institutional arrangements, and funding for education. There is a pressing need to be informed by innovation, research, and promising practices. As a global SIG, affecting change starts with listening, sharing, and collaborating. First, we have a shared responsibility to engage the field to look for allies in learning that play a critical role in students’ success and positive development. Second, we have a responsibility to bring attention to the political, social, and historical dimensions of educational change. The SIG’s scholars have done due diligence in examining the educational change process from various aspects, structural, institutional, and individual. Their scholarship can contribute to our shared understanding of the why, what, and how of education improvement and policy change for the current moment. And, as I noted in the 49th issue, we have an opportunity to join other SIGs in a collective voice for the change we seek in our communities and across systems.
LtC: What are the future research directions that should be addressed in the field of educational change?
HJM: I’ll note three that immediately come to mind given the current global context. First, we should take note of who is leading during these times of rapid change. In many respects, the immediate responses to directly support students has been at the local level, with school districts, principals and staff, teachers, families, and community allies working together so that students have access to food and basic supplies, health services, WiFi, and online lessons for continuous learning. We should unpack the ways our schools and local communities innovated during these challenging times, what can we learn from their responses about leadership, about change management, about innovation, and look for ways to authentically engage local voices in the shared research so that our work is informing local contexts and we in term, learn from them.
Second, educational change intersects with cross-sectoral issues—equity, racial justice, climate—and thus, we stand to benefit by learning from these issues and associated social movements to understand the macro forces that are shaping what we see inside classrooms, as well as how we can rethink education in the broader context. And, third, this period has given us an important inflection point to examine whether our ‘go-to’ leadership and change theories we apply to understand various education phenomena remain both relevant and adequate given the transformative nature of recent events, or whether this is an opportunity to expand upon the leadership theories, as well as to develop new frameworks and theoretical underpinnings to guide educational change in the future.
ABOUT THE LTC SERIES: The Lead the Change series, featuring renowned educational change experts from around the globe, serves to highlight promising research and practice, to offer expert insight on small- and large-scale educational change, and to spark collaboration within the Educational Change Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association. Kristin Kew, Chair; Mireille Hubers; Program Chair; Na Mi Bang, Secretary/Treasurer; Min Jung Kim, Graduate Student Representative; Jennie Weiner, LtC Series Editor; Alexandra Lamb, Production Editor.
This week’s post features a Lead the Change (LTC) interview with Dr. Pak Tee Ng, Associate Professor, at the National Institute of Education (NIE), Nanyang Technological University. At the NIE, Dr. Ng previously served as Associate Dean Leadership Learning and Head of the Policy and Leadership Studies Academic Group. His main work is in educational change, policy and leadership. His latest book is “Learning from Singapore: The Power of Paradoxes” (Routledge, 2017).
Lead the Change: How, and in what ways, has your work evolved since the first publication of this piece? What ideas/points still hold true? Which might you revise?
Pak Tee Ng: My previous interview in Lead the Change Series was published in 2015. Most of the questions then were about the key success factors and developments in the Singapore education system at that time. Since then, in 2017, I published my book called “Learning from Singapore: The Power of Paradoxes”, which is part of the Routledge Leading Change series edited by Andy Hargreaves and I. In my 2015 interview, as well as my 2017 book, I pointed out a very important philosophy in the Singapore education system: “Education is an investment, not an expenditure.” We invested heavily in our public education system and professional development of our teachers. We ensured our children would receive good education even during periods of tough economic conditions. Our education system worked to shift its focus from quantity to quality. Instead of obsessing over examination results, we tried to help students appreciate what they were learning, to apply their new knowledge in real life and to experience joy in learning. The education system provided more pathways to nurture different talents and fulfill different aspirations. Those points are still valid today. Singapore’s education system is always a work in progress. There is still much room for improvement. But let me give readers an update regarding the more recent initiatives in Singapore through a few examples.
First, we changed our national Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) scoring system. Instead of absolute points, students with scores within a certain range are now awarded the same grade. In doing so, we hoped to reduce the keen competition and high stress levels among students because they would no longer need to chase after every point. We also scrapped some mid-year exams at the lower primary levels. Teachers can use the time originally reserved for examinations to engage students in activities that develop them holistically. At the secondary level, we introduced subject-based banding in the place of streaming. In streaming, students in a particular stream take all their subjects at a particular pace. In subject-based banding, students can engage in subjects in which they have strengths at a faster pace than some of their peers. We hope to give students more flexibility to take various subjects based on their strengths and learning pace.
Second, we are also promoting a culture of lifelong learning in the country through the SkillsFuture initiative, a movement that encourages Singaporeans to learn and acquire deep skills continuously throughout life. This is a national effort to shift the focus from academic performance as the primary measure of success and towards mastery of deep, practical, skills relevant to industries and the future economy. For example, many Singaporeans use SkillsFuture credits (essentially financial sponsorship from the government) to learn how to better function in a digital workplace.
LTC: What do these shifts suggest to you about the field of educational change more broadly?
PTN: In my book, I explained the importance of a paradox in Singapore, which I called “timely change, timeless constants.” There is change, and there is continuity. Education in Singapore has to change to keep up with the times, but there are certain evergreen principles in education that we do not change. For example, in Singapore, an evergreen principle is that we see education as investment rather than an expenditure1. Keeping evergreen principles, in itself, is an important principle in the field of educational change. We need both change and continuity. To change or not to change, that is a question that needs both courage and wisdom to answer.
“We need both change and continuity. To change or not to change, that is a question that needs both courage and wisdom to answer.”
Education is highly influenced by technological advancement and changes in industries and work. New jobs appear and traditional ones disappear. Everywhere in the world, education has to change to keep itself relevant and to prepare children for the future. But because we must change continuously, we must exercise good judgement on what to change, rather than to jump on the bandwagon of any new reform. Sometimes, when everyone seems to be constantly and mindlessly changing, those who stand firm on solid fundamentals, stand out! For example, why does the release of international test rankings so often move educational systems, that were often previously unwilling to evolve, to change? Why should such tests become wake up calls? We should take education seriously, with or without international comparisons!
In my book, I also mentioned another important principle. Education reform is usually a contested process because every intervention has its benefits and consequences. Different stakeholders have different ideas about change and thus there will be tensions among these groups as they negotiate solutions. And yet, despite these tensions, for half a century, Singapore has been able to reform its education system quite systemically and systematically. These reforms include giving schools more autonomy and moving away from an examination-oriented system. Despite differences in opinions, there is generally coherence in the system and change is implemented with order and method. Therefore, the main question here is whether reform is shouting slogans superficially or fighting missions meaningfully. Slogans fade away, replaced by new ones in perpetual cycles. Missions rally people to bite the bullet of change to benefit the next generation. So, academics in the field of educational change must take care so advancement in the field does not become ammunition for slogan shouting, but rather becomes the driving force for purposeful change. Real substance, which focuses on really improving learning and teaching, lasts. Fads, which distract us from such improvement efforts, don’t.
LTC: What most excites you about the direction of the field of educational change is going?
PTN: I think that if the field of educational change can succeed in advocating for the importance of formulating far-sighted education policies (rather than knee-jerk reactions), based on sound fundamental principles (such as equity and excellence) and implemented tenaciously over the years, that will be exciting. I have observed some jurisdictions that have flip-flopped too often in their education policies. That is difficult for stakeholders, especially the professionals on the ground, who need stability to create a conducive environment for students to learn. We need change that is meaningful and purposeful, and that is given the necessary time to bloom.
“We need change that is meaningful and purposeful, and that is given the necessary time to bloom.”
An evidence-based approach to change is important. But I am more concerned that evidence-based decision-making is sometimes actually decision-based evidence gathering. Someone has made up his or her mind about something and is just looking for ‘evidence’ to support their case. Therefore, I think other than researching for evidence, or developing more measures of performance or comparisons, it would be exciting to develop a deeper and more philosophical discourse about educational change. Many jurisdictions make changes structurally in response to performance measures and comparisons. Not that many districts currently address fundamental issues such as meaning and joy in learning, or student well-being and character education.
For many of us who work in this field (and indeed in any other field), we have benefitted from more senior academics who advised us or opened doors for us. This is not about the direction of the field per se, but I think it will be exciting if there is a systematic way of paying it forward. One way is what this SIG has done for a few years through its mentoring of students and early career faculty! The SIG provides a platform for mentors and mentees from different parts of the world to come together. I think it is great for growth, understanding, and continuity in the field. As an example, I served as a mentor last year and I had a mentee from the United States. It was great as I had an opportunity to understand her work and I brought her in contact to some others working in the same field. I hope to see such mentoring expand its scope and influence.
LTC: What advice might you have for those interested in affecting change and improvement?
PTN: Do not change for the sake of change! Do not charge forward blindly just because the fast-pace change in the world seems to mandate change at a fast pace in education. I am not suggesting that schools and systems should look for excuses not to change, or to take a “back to basics” approach for everything. However, it is good that we sometimes examine certain fundamentals to either refute, revise, or reaffirm them. So, a discussion about improving access to education and/or student well-being is more inspiring than how one jurisdiction can outdo another in international comparisons, although the latter can appear more pressing due to political pressure or media attention. The way to stay strong under such pressure is to commit ourselves to fundamentals and proceed on a sure footing, even when progress seems slow. The main question is whether one would like to do good or just appear good. Of course, it would be great to be able to do good and appear good at the same time. But when it is a choice between one or the other, one chooses to focus on doing good, rather than appearing good.
Improving education is a long process. Change is seldom, if at all, neat and orderly. We need to be patient and adaptable. The approach to change is also important. We should increasingly draw upon the expertise of the professional teaching community. The professionals in school should feel they are engaged and empowered in the change process. They should not be made to feel that change is done to them. As a result of greater teacher input, the innovations that emerge in schools will be more organic and appropriate to the operating context and gain wider acceptance.
Most importantly, those who are interested in affecting change and improvement should embrace a very positive spirit of education. They should believe passionately that they are not merely doing a job, but they are, as an education fraternity, contributing to the future of the next generation. Education is not just about transferring knowledge and skills. It is about building lives.
LTC: What are the future research directions that should be addressed in the field of educational change?
PTN: During my 2015 Lead the Change interview, I pointed out that while many educational researchers bemoaned policy makers’ failure to pay attention to research, perhaps academics (including myself) also ought to examine the nature of our academic output. I think that point is still valid and perhaps even more pertinent than ever. In the area of nutrition, I am not sure how I should understand the field’s various research reports, each saying different things, for example, about the benefits or perils of consuming egg yolks or red wine. So, what does a person who is more confused than enlightened by all these reports do? Just rely on common sense and eat in moderation! In the same way, I think academics, who would like to advocate change, have to work together on a common message that is easily accessible and understood by all stakeholders.
Academics can be powerful advocates of positive educational change by highlighting areas that require attention (for example, the needs of the disadvantaged), but they also have to work well with policy makers and other stakeholders so research findings can really hit sweet spots in practice. Moreover, we have to re-examine the meaning of ‘impact’ in educational research. For tenure considerations, academics aim to publish papers in high-impact journals. That is not wrong. But often the general public does not understand the content in these journals given the esoteric way it is communicated. Therefore, academia becomes an ‘exclusive club’ in which only some have access. We would not want a defense lawyer who was good at collecting evidence to speak in lawyers’ jargon rather than plain language to a jury. In the same way, I hope that educational researchers who do good work can translate that work to a lay audience. One future research direction is to make research relevant and accessible. This is not the role of just one researcher. It should be the collective quest of all academics.
“One future research direction is to make research relevant and accessible. This is not the role of just one researcher. It should be the collective quest of all academics.”
While doing the final refinements to this interview piece, Covid-19 struck. In many parts of the world, many students learned at home through the use of internet. Over a short span of time, teachers who were not inclined to use information and communications technology (ICT) in teaching were forced to do so. Many picked up skills of using online learning tools because of necessity. Covid-19 also threw into sharp relief the divide between families who were well equipped for home-based leaning, and those who were not. Well-designed research will be critical to understand the experiences of teachers, students, parents, and school leaders as they all adapted to the change. What worked? What did not? What were the challenges? What were the lessons learned? Well-articulated findings will be very helpful to policy formulation: what has changed, what still needs to be changed, and what changes, if they were positive, need consolidation after the pandemic. A point has been made that teachers should not simply replicate their lessons in the virtual medium, but to develop new and more effective ways to help students learn. That is a good point. So, what are these new and more effective ways? Why are they more effective?
The world is shaken up by Covid-19 and policy makers are looking for guidance in making decisions regarding schooling during and after the pandemic. There is a time for quick reaction during the pandemic so that learning could continue in some form, but there is also a time for careful deliberation regarding long term change after the pandemic. Academics should step up as thought leaders. Reflect. Research. Argue. But make the discourse simple. Make it clear.
Notes
1. During the 2008-9 global financial crisis, Singapore’s economy was badly affected but the education budget increased from S$8.0 billion before the financial crisis in 2008 to S$8.7 billion during the crisis in 2009, so that Singaporeans would be ready to take up new challenges when the economy picked up [read Ng, P. T. (2017), Learning from Singapore: The Power of Paradoxes. New York: Routledge, pp. 50-51]. During the current covid-19 pandemic, the government raised the quantum of various school-related subsidies and bursaries, and topped up SkillsFuture credit for Singaporeans to pick up new skills for better job prospects. For more information about Budget 2020, please read https://www.singaporebudget.gov.sg/budget_2020
ABOUT THE LTC SERIES: The Lead the Change series, featuring renowned educational change experts from around the globe, serves to highlight promising research and practice, to offer expert insight on small- and large-scale educational change, and to spark collaboration within the Educational Change SIG, Kristin Kew, Chair; Mireille Hubers; Program Chair; Na Mi Bang, Secretary/Treasurer; Min Jung Kim, Graduate Student Representative; Jennie Weiner, LtC Series Editor; Alexandra Lamb, Production Editor.
As schools in the US and other parts of the world make difficult decisions about how to reopen this fall, Thomas Hatch looks at some of the concrete steps that, over time, could make schools healthier places and transform the basic parameters of schooling. This post expands on comments made at the Education Disrupted/Education Reimagined convening sponsored by WISE and the Salzburg Global Seminar in April and summarized in a volume sharing the conference proceedings.This post was published originally on Thomashatch.org
Have the wide-spread school closures changed schools forever? The history of school reform efforts shows that schools are much more likely to change slowly and incrementally than they are to suddenly transform, even in the face of a deadly virus. Yet we can take advantage of what we know about how students learn and how schools change to address a critical problem with the design of conventional schools: Schools are a better medium for spreading disease than they are for supporting meaningful learning.
Learning depends on healthy, safe conditions for students, educators, and all those who work in schools; but schools cram too many people into too little space, and the typical lay-out of age-graded classrooms along labyrinthian hallways limits collaboration, exploration, and engagement with the world. We’ve made things worse in the US by leaving buildings in disrepair, and failing to provide adequate ventilation, air conditioning or heating, particularly in low-income communities. Add on a draconian schedule with little time for exercise, lunch, or other healthy activities; and then ramp up stress levels with high stakes tests where students have to sit in rows in silence for hours facing a ticking clock.
But things can change. We can make schools safer for students and staff as schools reopen, and we can create a foundation for much healthier and more powerful educational opportunities in the future.
We can make schools safer for students and staff as schools reopen, and we can create a foundation for much healthier and more powerful educational opportunities in the future.
Focus on learning that matters
The school closures and the inequities of access to online learning immediately launched a spate of proposals for dealing with “learning loss.” Many of these proposals rely on intensifying work on academic subjects, yet these proposals ignore the mile-wide and inch deep curriculum and age-graded pacing that make it almost impossible for those left behind to catch-up. Addressing academic learning loss begins by concentrating on a small set of key skills and concepts and providing educators with the tools to ensure that every student actually meets those learning goals.
Although academic needs have to be met, the challenges that students face as they return to school go far beyond academic achievement and a “less is more” approach to academics creates the efficiencies that provide time and space for supporting other critical aspects of children’s development. Back in school, learning will be enhanced by creating educational opportunities for students to reflect on their experiences during the outbreak; to develop coping strategies; to rebuild positive relationships with their peers and teachers; and to get engaged in meaningful and constructive work in areas they care about. When that happens, educators can shift their focus from covering the entire curriculum to addressing the critical needs of every child.
Addressing academic learning loss begins by concentrating on a small set of key skills and concepts and providing educators with the tools to ensure that every student actually meets those learning goals.
Break down the barriers between learning “inside” and “outside” schools
As we remake schools to help stop the spread of the virus, we can stagger schedules to fit students’ sleep patterns and development as they get older. We can make sure that students have regular chances to take the breaks and get the exercise that we know benefits learning and productivity. As we limit the number of people using school facilities at any given time, we can rotate students in and out of schools and expand support for students’ learning far beyond school walls. In addition to online learning, we can take advantage of possibilities for education outside on playgrounds, in the natural world, and in the neighborhood in gyms, museums, libraries, community organizations, and businesses. In the process, we can shift the focus from getting children into schools to enabling them to explore the world.
Expand the power of the education workforce
To increase the reach and power of teachers who have been limited largely to working with students in classrooms, we can engage a host of people who have the time and the capacity to play a positive role in learning inside and outside schools. Organizations like City Year and Citizen Schools already demonstrate how to mobilize volunteers young and old who can provide targeted academic support as tutors, act as mentors, or guide students’ in projects, apprenticeships, and community service. Numerous proposals could help meet the demand, whether it’s through the kind of education “Marshall Plan” discussed by Robert Slavin or by expanding National Service and Americorps as outlined by David Brooks, John Bridgeland and Alan Khazei, or bills being developed in the Senate.
Condense schooling and increase learning
All of these changes are within our reach right now. They do not require new curricula, massive professional development for teachers, or new technologies. Reimagining education depends on re-orienting our priorities, making schools healthy and safe, and focusing first and foremost on students’ needs and interests, particularly those of Black, Latinx, and immigrant students, students from low-income communities and the communities hardest hit by this pandemic. But as we change our priorities and take these initial steps, a more radical possibility emerges: Condense the school day.
Instead of extending the school day and requiring students to spend even more time on basic skills, we can concentrate more efficient academic support in more limited time slots, with educators able to utilize sophisticated materials and coordinate contributions from colleagues with specialized expertise as well as volunteer tutors, mentors, and online and offline guides. In a sense, every day could be a half-day, opening up opportunities for students to have lunch, get outside, and participate in a host of school-based, community-based, or online activities; to get any counseling they need; to pursue their own education interests; and to participate in activities that foster a much wider range of developmental and educational goals. Such an approach rejects the tacit assumption that limits education to schooling and embraces the possibilities for supporting students’ learning and development wherever and whenever it occurs.
ENJOY THE BREAK! IEN will be on hiatus until September when we will return with more news and views of schooling and education around the world
This week’s post features a Lead the Change interview with Brahm Fleisch, Professor of Education Policy in the Division of Education Leadership, Policy and Skills at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. Fleisch has been a District Director in the Guateng Department of Education and advisor for the national Department of Basic Education in South Africa. His books include: Managing educational change: The state and school reform in South Africa, and The Education Triple Cocktail: System-wide Instructional Reform in South Africa. His recent work focuses on impact evaluation of large-scale instructional improvement models.
This is the fourth in a series of interviews inviting some of the authors of earlier Lead the Change interviews to review their previous responses and consider how they might modify/ adjust/add to what they wrote based on their experiences and insights since publication. The fully formatted interview will be posted on the LtC website of the Educational Change Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association.
Lead the Change: How, and in what ways, has your work evolved since the first publication of this piece? What ideas/points still hold true? Which might you revise?
Brahm Fleisch: Since the publication of our first piece in Lead the Change, our collective knowledge of educational change in the context of the large-scale instructional improvement in the Global South (and South Africa in particular) has been bolstered by seven years of experimental research. This research programme is a response to the challenge currently faced by many resource constrained systems (World Bank, 2019), in which children are enrolled in and attending school, but are, in the majority of cases, also failing to learn to read or to do basic mathematics. The focus of our research is to identify scalable rigorous and robust change knowledge to address this challenge. The core of what we have learnt is the efficiency of a particular change model, what we have come to call, the “education triple cocktail” (Fleisch, 2018) (a reference to the successful drug treatment for HIV/AIDS). Drawing on international experience, the model combines (a) prescriptive lesson plans, (b) the provision of quality learning materials and (c) on-site instructional coaching. Our experimental studies show consistent, positive, and compelling evidence of the model’s effectiveness in multiple settings (Fleisch & Schoer, 2014; Fleisch et al., 2016; Fleisch et al., 2017; Cilliers et al., 2019; Kotze et al., 2019; Fleisch & Dixon, 2019).
We have demonstrated the value of mix-method impact evaluations (MMIE) that include qualitative case studies nested in representative sample cluster randomised control trials. It is our view that MMIE has the potential to contribute to building a more rigorous educational change knowledge base. Examples of the qualitative research include our study (Fleisch & Dixon,2019) that explores lesson plan mechanisms and how they link to the reconstruction of micro and macro teaching time. Alsofrom’s (2019) case studies also show the central role instructional coaches play in addressing teachers’ emotions of change.
At the centre of our contribution is not only findings of ‘what works’ (measured as effect sizes), but an opportunity to understand ‘why’ they work. For example, case studies show teachers both adopt and adapt lesson plans they are given, and that, contrary to assumptions about de-skilling, most teachers find scripted lesson plans to add to their professional authority and instructional repertoire. The coherence embedded in the education triple cocktail approach helps teachers to shift their thinking about instructional time and space in the classroom. Other case studies point to emotional labour of instructional coaching and thus show the central role coaches play in addressing teachers’ feelings of failure and anxieties about change as well as in building professional accountability.
LtC: What do these shifts suggest to you about the field of educational change more broadly?
BF: There is a growing recognition that the change problems that have animated much of the field of educational change in the past three decades were primarily learning, school, and system problems of the Global North, particularly North America, Europe, and Australia/New Zealand. Both the change problems and potential productive approaches to addressing these problems look very different from the perspective of poorer parts of Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, and South Asia. Successful systems in East Asia again have a unique set of challenges. Scholars are increasingly recognizing that to speak of a single and coherent field of educational change is difficult. That is not to say that productive dialogues across geopolitical contexts are not possible. Quite the contrary.
There is a growing recognition that the change problems that have animated much of the field of educational change in the past three decades were primarily learning, school, and system problems of the Global North
That said, I think we need to speak of change knowledge that addresses common contextual realities. In much of the Global South, for example, the challenge is defined by the fact that many of their educational systems have only recently succeeded in achieving near-universal school enrollment. The problem they are currently managing is that the vast majority of those enrolled in the early grades are failing to reach minimum proficiency in literacy and numeracy – what the World Bank has termed “learning poverty”.
LtC: What most excites you about the direction of the field of educational change is going?
BF: I’m excited to see new scholars working in the field. Very powerful ideas are emerging out of the work of Santiago Rincon Gallardo (2016) and his research on bottom-up tutor networks in Mexico, Benjamin Piper and Stephanie Zuilkowski (2015) and their experimental research on structured pedagogic models in Kenya and other parts of sub-Saharan Africa, and Rakmini Banerjee et al. (2010) and their work on teaching at the right level in India.
LtC: What advice might you have for those interested in affecting change and improvement?
BF: For me, the most exciting frontier of research on educational change is in the so-called Global South, and particularly in resource-constrained systems. Not only are the change challenges huge and pressing, but I find many policymakers are eager to dialogue around research. It is also a space that allows us to really challenge many taken-for-granted assumptions about system-wide change. Building change knowledge anywhere is difficult and is made that much more challenging in settings with very little financial resources or established capacity to implement effectively.
The Global South is a space that allows us to really challenge many taken-for-granted assumptions about system-wide change
LtC:What are the future research directions that should be addressed in the field of educational change?
BF: Understanding the levers of change and how they work in resource constrained contexts, in places where government ministries and departments, district staff, school leaders and ordinary teachers lack essential education infrastructure and capacity, should be a future research thrust for scholars working in the field of educational change. It is critical that, as we move forward, we see this knowledge building as a cumulative process with scholars working together adding empirical findings, engaging with case study insights, and taking on substantive critiques. If we work in silos, if we neglect large-scale quantitative research on effects, if we fail to engage with internal and external critics, progress is likely to be slow.
References
Alsofrom, K (2019) How and why does coaching work to improve teaching practices in the EGRS2? An examination of causal mechanisms. Paper Presented at the UKFIET meeting, Oxford University.
Banerjee, A. V., Banerji, R., Duflo, E., Glennerster, R., & Khemani, S. (2010). Pitfalls of participatory programs: Evidence from a randomized evaluation in education in India. American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 2(1), 1-30.
Cilliers, J., Fleisch, B., Prinsloo, C., & Taylor, S. (2019). How to improve teaching practice? An experimental comparison of centralized training and in-classroom coaching. Journal of Human Resources, 0618-9538R1.
Fleisch, B. (2018). The education triple cocktail: System-wide instructional reform in South Africa. UCT Press/Juta and Company (Pty) Ltd.
Fleisch, B., & Dixon, K. (2019). Identifying mechanisms of change in the Early Grade Reading Study in South Africa. South African Journal of Education, 39(3).
Fleisch, B., & Schöer, V. (2014). Large-scale instructional reform in the Global South: insights from the mid-point evaluation of the Gauteng Primary Language and Mathematics Strategy. South African Journal of Education, 34(3).
Fleisch, B., Schöer, V., Roberts, G., & Thornton, A. (2016). System-wide improvement of early-grade mathematics: New evidence from the Gauteng Primary Language and Mathematics Strategy. International Journal of Educational Development, 49, 157-174.
Fleisch, B., Taylor, S., Schöer, V., & Mabogoane, T. (2017). Failing to catch up in reading in the middle years: The findings of the impact evaluation of the Reading Catch-Up Programme in South Africa. International Journal of Educational Development, 53, 36-47.
Kotze, J., Fleisch, B., & Taylor, S. (2019). Alternative forms of early grade instructional coaching: Emerging evidence from field experiments in South Africa. International Journal of Educational Development, 66, 203-213.
Piper, B., & Zuilkowski, S. S. (2015). Teacher coaching in Kenya: Examining instructional support in public and nonformal schools. Teaching and Teacher Education, 47, 173-183.
Rincón-Gallardo, S. (2016). Large scale pedagogical transformation as widespread cultural change in Mexican public schools. Journal of Educational Change, 17(4), 411-436.
This week’s post features a Lead the Change interview with Carol Campbell (@CarolCampbell4), Associate Professor of Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto. Campbell is a member of the International Council of Education Advisors for the First Minister and Deputy First Minister of the Scottish Government. She has held education, academic and government roles in Canada, the UK and the USA
Lead the Change: How, and in what ways, has your work evolved since the first publication of this piece? What ideas/points still hold true? Which might you revise?
Carol Campbell: Re-reading my 2014 Lead the Change Q & A, there are many points I still consider to be important and there is much that continues into my current work – the importance of educational system improvement for excellence and equity, the role of research and evidence-informed policy and practice, and the need to carefully attend to the processes of educational change balancing and valuing professional voice, agency, and judgement alongside the role of government directions, policies, and resources. In my 2014 comments, I said:
There remain perennial issues of how to truly achieve educational excellence and equity, and there will be new emerging issues associated with global and local changes.
Over the following six years, there have indeed been changes in the field of educational change. Below, I highlight some evolutions in my work since my 2014 Q &A.
First, evolutions in my work concerning the substance of educational change. In 2014, Ontario had just established a new vision for education – expanding the previous focus on raising achievement and closing gaps in performance to become a broader vision of excellence, equity, and well-being (Ontario Ministry of Education, 2014). It is clear that alongside the importance of academic achievement, persisting systemic and structural inequities in access, opportunities, and outcomes from schooling, and increased prevalence of mental and emotional health issues for students and staff require priority attention (Campbell, 2020a). These issues need new, and additional, educational priorities, strategies, and resources. The genuine quest to improve equity and well-being for students requires also fundamentally rethinking the core of schooling and classroom practices too. For example, in our review of Ontario’s assessment system (see Campbell, Clinton et al., 2018), our recommendations for changes to support teachers’ approaches to student assessments for their classes and to transform large-scale standardized testing have implications also for: student voice, agency, equity and diversity; professional judgement and pedagogy; curriculum; integration of technology; and communication and engagement with parents or guardians.
Second, shifts in my work about the processes by which educational changes are developed, implemented, and evaluated. In 2014, I wrote:
The next phase of Ontario’s change strategies will require further evolution… in valuing, developing and integrating educators’ leadership, voices, capacities and actions.
That idea turned out to be very important. By 2014, the limits of top down reform were increasingly apparent internationally and also in Ontario. In the Ontario collective bargaining negotiations between teachers’ federations, school boards, and the government in the 2014 period, priority issues included initiative overload, workload, and work intensification. Agreement was reached to establish a joint working group involving all education and related organizations and government to co-develop new ways of working between labor and management. The resulting Policy and Program Memorandum (PPM) formally enshrined Collaborative Professionalism:
In Ontario, collaborative professionalism is defined as professionals – at all levels of the education system – working together, sharing knowledge, skills and experience to improve student achievement and well-being of both students and staff. (Ontario Ministry of Education, 2016, p. 1)
In my recent research both in Canada and internationally, there is growing and substantial evidence indicating the importance of valuing, investing in, developing, and trusting the education profession to lead educational change. This approach benefits not only the people who work in education, but also, importantly, the students they serve and wider system improvement (Campbell, Osmond-Johnson et al., 2017; Campbell, Zeichner et al., 2017; Campbell, Lieberman et al., 2018; Cordingley et al., 2019; Darling-Hammond et al., 2017; Lieberman et al., 2017).
Such educational change processes have, however, been challenged by austerity and adversity towards the education profession in many contexts, including Ontario during 2018-20. As we look around the world at governments who have attempted to mandate austerity and created adversity for the education profession, we find these change efforts generally do not succeed in bringing about long-term successful and sustainable change. When professional judgement, agency and empowerment have been developed; governments cannot unilaterally revert to top-down mandates. Successful educational change is co-developed with the education profession and enables professionally-led improvements in educational practices. The need for professionalism and teacher leadership are especially important in the context of the global pandemic, as discussed further below. Therefore, my work has shifted in considering professionally-led educational change and collaborative professionalism in times of support for innovation and improvement, challenges of austerity and adversity, and now to prioritize professional judgement and professional capital in responding to the educational impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Successful educational change is co-developed with the education profession and enables professionally-led improvements in educational practices.”
LtC: What do these shifts suggest to you about the field of educational change more broadly?
CC: In terms of the substance of educational change, the field is becoming both broader and more diffuse in the range of policies and practice being researched; yet it is also becoming more precise and deeper in seeking to unpack the realities, implications, and possibilities of educational change. Increasingly, schools and educators are being asked to do more to meet the current and predicted future needs of students in a rapidly changing global and economic context, for example, by considering the competencies and skills to be incorporated into curricula, pedagogy, assessments and integration of technology. Teachers are also being asked to meet the increasing diversity of student populations and complexity of educational, mental, emotional, and physical needs present in classrooms. Already emerging in the light of COVID-19 is an expanding range of educational, health, and social needs for students and staff – from the logistics of physical distancing, hand washing, and hygiene in schools to how to address issues of trauma, anxiety and well-being for students and staff, and how to ensure adequate and equitable access to quality teaching and learning whether at home or in school (Campbell, 2020b).
Regarding the processes of educational change, the now long-standing tensions between bottom up and top down reform have not fully gone away but they have shifted somewhat in current evidence and debate. I have been a contributor to the ‘Flip The System’ movement – which prioritizes and values teacher-led educational change rather than top-down government directives – from the start (Elmers & Kneyber, 2015) and this is growing in momentum. For example, the findings from both TALIS and PISA emphasize the importance of professional ownership and leadership of educational change (Schleicher, 2019, 2020). There are examples of countries, including Scotland where I am a member of the International Council of Education Advisors, taking this shift to a professionally-led education system seriously. At the same time, there is still the tendency of many governments to mandate, micro-manage, and expand the scope and details of influence they seek over the day-to-day work of educators. In the emergency rapid response to COVID-19, it is understandable that governments made decisions quickly; however, this mode of governing needs to be re-balanced through partnership with the education profession whose leadership, knowledge and judgement are essential to protecting and educating all students (Education International, 2020).
LtC:What most excites you about the direction of the field of educational change is going?
CC: I am excited about the vibrancy and growth of the educational change community. As a field, educational change has become established over time while also evolving as a wider range of people becoming actively involved in investigating a diverse range of topics to grow the field further. My 2014 Q & A included discussion of research, policy and practice connections, I am excited to see the growth of ‘boundary spanners’ who work collaboratively within and across these communities and the increasing number of ‘pracademics’ – practitioners and policy-makers who are researching, writing, active on social media, and speaking out about educational change. Nevertheless, we have more work to do to further increase the diversity of people involved in the educational change field; including those of us who are already established scholars in the field introducing, encouraging, mentoring, sponsoring and collaborating with people who are currently under-represented in the field, for example Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) students and practitioners. These connections and intersections are vital.
“We have more work to do to further increase the diversity of people involved in the educational change field.”
“Excites” is not the appropriate verb, but if we go to the Latin origin of “call forth”, the implications and impact of COVID-19 for educational change cannot be understated. At the height of the pandemic, over 91% of students globally were not in school and 63 million teachers were affected (UNESCO, 2020a, 2020b). The human tragedy and trauma of COVID-19 are horrendous and our first duty is to protect people and save lives. As countries start to shift from emergency response remote learning to what the provision of education for school children will look like and require whether at home, in school, or blended learning; there are significant questions about all aspects of schooling, teaching, and learning (Campbell, 2020b; Osmond-Johnson et al., 2020). The immediate COVID-19 response suspended many of the traditional conventions, structures, and routines of schooling – these emergency responses should not necessarily become the ‘new normal’ but neither should there be a full return to the previous status quo.
Long-standing and new inequities for students and schools have been brought into very sharp attention currently. As I write this, anti-racism, particularly anti-Black racism, protests are happening in every state of the USA and around the world. In my home country of Canada, systemic and structural racism, including anti-Black racism, are long-standing issues too that have not been fully addressed by our governments and school systems (Campbell, 2020a). It is also one year since the publication of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, which concluded: “this violence amounts to a race-based genocide of Indigenous Peoples” (MMIWG, 2019, p. 1). This report further amplified the Calls to Action from the previous Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC, 2015) investigating the historical trauma and legacy of abuse and violence perpetrated by the Residential School system for Indigenous people.
With the new challenges of a global pandemic combined with the unacceptably long-standing history of inequities, injustices, and systemic and structural racism which are being brought to the fore right now; part of the solution must be in and from the education system. If ever there was a time for a serious rethinking of the purposes, structures, content, processes and outcomes of schooling and the need for evidence-informed educational change, it is now. I hope the educational change community will be ‘called forth’ to rise to this incredible and urgent challenge to collaborate to generate ideas, provide evidence, and to offer concrete suggestions to create new possibilities for genuinely equitable and excellent education systems which also embody a duty of care, protection and well-being for all people (students and staff) involved.
LtC:What advice might you have for those interested in affecting change and improvement?
CC: Educational change is essentially and ultimately about people and the relationships between people. Of course, when you work to bring about change there are a host of educational, political, and practical factors involved. Educational change should also be evidence-informed, drawing on research and data, professional expertise and judgement, and engagement of affected communities.
“Educational change is essentially and ultimately about people and the relationships between people.”
My advice is to always be very thoughtful about the human dimensions and implications of whatever change you are attempting. This includes:
working in partnership to identify needs and priorities for change;
engaging collaboratively in mutually respectful interactions to co-develop plans and details for change;
supporting and trusting the people who will be directly involved in the day-to-day development, adaptation and implementation of changes;
considering as many possible potential consequences (positive, negative, intended and unintended) before actually proceeding with change; and
having those continuing, trusting relationships to listen, learn, revise, or even abandon changes due to the emerging experiences and evidence.
The purpose of education is the betterment of humanity and that applies to both the substance and processes of educational change (Campbell, 2018).
LtC:What are the future research directions that should be addressed in the field of educational change?
CC: There are many potential and important future research directions. We have been living with many tensions in educational change – for example:
a rapidly changing world, yet the tendency for changes in curriculum and assessment systems to be slow, incremental, and often additive rather than transformative;
the commitment to be inclusive, culturally responsive, support diversity and advance equity, yet unacceptable continued evidence concerning systemic, structural and sustained inequities in and from schooling;
the rise of the importance of leadership and professional judgement throughout all levels of the education system, yet the complex and contested balance between the exercise of formal and informal power and authority;
the desire to learn how to appropriately integrate and manage technology and online media in teaching, learning and the work of the profession, yet ever increasing needs to mitigate the ethical, privacy, and safety risks involved;
the growing recognition of the importance of well-being for students and staff, yet changing pressures in students’ lives and work intensification for educators contributing to stress, anxiety, and related health issues, which are compounded by the profound impact of COVID-19.
It is even more urgent now to address these priorities specifically to understand the details of changes needed for each issue and holistically for interconnected, substantial changes in education systems.
We are witnessing educational change during a global pandemic combined with protests and social movements advocating for significant change to address long-standing discrimination and inequities. It is an extremely difficult time for many people. No one has all of the answers, so more than ever we need to come together as a global community to learn from each other. We know from history that from times of ruptures in society, social movements calling for action, and paradigm shifts in knowledge; change will evolve. I encourage the educational change community to be proactive in considering and supporting the possibilities for constructive, positive future changes.
References
Campbell, C.(2018). Developing teacher leadership and collaborative professionalism to flip the system: Reflections from Canada. In D.M.
Netolicky, J. Andres & C. Paterson. Flip the System Australia: What Matters in Education. London, UK: Routledge.
Campbell, C., Zeichner, K., Osmond-Johnson, P. & Lieberman, A. with Hollar, J., Pisani, S. & Sohn, J. (2017). Empowered educators in Canada: How high-performing systems shape teaching quality. San Francisco, CA: Jossey Bass.
Darling-Hammond, L., Burns, D., Campbell, C., Goodwin, A.L., Hammerness, K., Low, E.L., McIntyre, A., Sato, M. & Zeichner, K. (2017). Empowered educators: How high-performing systems shape teaching 1uality around the world. San Francisco, CA:Jossey Bass.
Elmers, J. & Kneyber, R. (Eds.) (2015). Flip the system: Changing education from the ground up. London, UK: Routledge.
Lieberman, A., Campbell, C. & Yashkina, A. (2017) Teacher learning and leadership: of, by and for teachers. London, UK: Routledge/Taylor & Francis.
National Inquiry into Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG) (2019). Reclaiming power and place: Executive summary of the national inquiry into murdered and missing Indigenous women and girls. Canada: MMIWG.
Ontario Ministry of Education (2014). Achieving excellence: A renewed vision for education in Ontario. Toronto, ON: Queen’s Printer for Ontario.
Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) (2015). Honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: Summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation Commission of Canada. Ottawa, Ontario: TRC.
ABOUT THE LTC SERIES: The Lead the Change series, featuring renowned educational change experts from around the globe, serves to highlight promising research and practice, to offer expert insight on small- and large-scale educational change, and to spark collaboration within the Educational Change SIG, Kristin Kew, Chair; Mireille Hubers; Program Chair; Na Mi Bang, Secretary/Treasurer; Min Jung Kim, Graduate Student Representative; Jennie Weiner, LtC Series Editor; Alexandra Lamb, Production Editor.
This post is the eighth in a series that includes views from Chile, Japan, the Netherlands, Scotland, Liberia, Pakistan, and Australia. The “A view from…” series editors are IEN’s Thomas Hatch and Karen Edge, Reader/Associate Professor in Educational Leadership at University College London’s Institute of Education.
IEN: What’s happening with you and your family?
Trista Hollweck: Where I live in Ottawa, Canada, the final week of June marked the ‘official’ last days of the 2019-2020 school year. And what a strange year it has been. Since the start of 2020, my three elementary-aged children have been out of school due to a number of unusual events: a province-wide labour dispute, which resulted in a number of rotating strike action days, inclement weather (this year it seemed we had an unusually high number of snow days) and a global coronavirus pandemic that catapulted 91% of students across the world into a full-time ‘learning at home’ context. As a result of COVID-19, my husband and I have also found ourselves working at home and sharing space, screens and bandwidth with our children. To say that I have found the experience challenging is likely an understatement, but I also recognize my extreme privilege. There have been no deaths due to the coronavirus in my immediate circle. I also continue to have paid work, have access to technology and outdoor green space and share virtual schooling responsibilities with my partner. I know it could be a lot worse and it certainly has been for many and these disparities will continue into the future.
Dr Trista Hollweck. Photo: annemariebouchard.com
IEN: What’s happening with education/learning in your community?
TH: As I reflect on the end of this academic year, I am definitely relieved to have the weight of ‘learning at home’ off my shoulders for the summer. However, the recently released provincial reopening plan gives me pause. The plan requires school boards to prepare for three different scenarios: a normal school day routine with enhanced public health protocols, a modified school day routine based on smaller class sizes, cohorting and alternative day or week delivery, and at-home learning with ongoing enhanced remote delivery. My children are part of the Ottawa Carleton District School Board (OCDSB) who released their plan for a fall school schedule which breaks students into cohorts of 15, with one cohort attending school on Monday and Tuesday, all cohorts home Wednesday while schools are deep cleaned and a second cohort attending Thursday and Friday. Apparently, cohorts at home will be learning alongside those in school. There are many remaining questions about this plan for students, families and educators. How will students and staff be protected? Why the deep cleaning on Wednesday? How will students at home be learning simultaneously with those at school or will teachers be responsible for both in class and online workloads? As expected, this plan has not been well-received by parents and health care providers who have raised serious concerns about the safety and mental health of children if they remain isolated and take issue with some of the quality of distance learning. In response, there is an active movement advocating for a full return to school in the fall. Educators and school staff remain concerned about the health and safety protocols in any school reopening plan. Personally, I struggle with the possibility of continuing to balance work and home beyond the summer, especially since all our children’s summer camps were cancelled. In fact, I think 15-year-old Ontarian, Liv McNeil, brilliantly captures what I and so many are feeling at this moment in her short film “Numb” submitted for a pandemic assignment at the Etobicoke School of the Arts.
Usually at this time of the year I am feeling more chipper and optimistic, but instead I am left with a sense of loss. As a part-time professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Ottawa, I am disappointed for the teacher candidates who were unable to complete their first practicum placements in schools and worried about what their second year might look like. As a mentor-coach and teacher leader, I am deeply worried for my colleagues and other teachers and school leaders who are very concerned about what the fall will look like, whether they will have the necessary time to plan and whether their health and safety will be considered. They are also exhausted from having to pivot rapidly from traditional bricks and mortar schooling to emergency remote learning, learn new instructional skills at breakneck speeds whilst simultaneously navigating often unclear and conflicting opinions and expectations from the Ministry, school district, union, parents, and education experts and public intellectuals. Many of them also remain very concerned about some of their students who they know have difficult home lives and feel quite helpless in being able to support and care for them. Finally, I feel sorry that so many students did not get to experience their proms and graduation events as they were intended. That said, a quick tour around my neighbourhood and across my social media feed shows just how creatively schools, families and communities have rallied to celebrate events, mark graduations and reimagine the traditional convocation ceremony. Lawns and windows are dotted with signs broadcasting that a “Graduate from the Class of 2020 lives here” and it is inspiring to see the sheer volume of innovative virtual proms, farewell tributes, and powerful commencement speeches. One of my friends who is a principal at a small school even told me that their individualized pandemic graduation approach was so well-received by students and families that it will likely become a school tradition. This idea of using the pandemic as an opportunity to rethink schooling- to build on what is working well and discard that which has long been broken, also leaves me feeling a sense of hope and inspiration for the future of public education. I do not yearn for a return to ‘normal’ schooling which has never served all children well or equitably. Rather, we have an important opportunity to learn from this unique pandemic experience and build our system back better.
This idea of using the pandemic as an opportunity to rethink schooling – to build on what is working well and discard that which has long been broken, also leaves me feeling a sense of hope and inspiration for the future of public education
IEN: What do you/your community need help with?
TH: In Ontario, it is safe to say that from a parental perspective the remote emergency teaching and learning has been a bit of a mixed bag. Whilst some educators have been incredible in their ability to offer innovative and impressive distance learning provisions, others seem to have struggled. Moving forward into a hybrid or blended learning situation, there will need to be opportunities for educators to learn from and support one another through mentoring and coaching, collaborate in professional networks, have clearer expectations for what is expected and access useful professional learning and development. During the pandemic, there have been incredible professional learning offerings. I have found curated resources on websites, webinars and online workshops focusing on trauma-informed approaches to teaching, culturally responsive approaches, restorative justice in education, repurposing our pedagogies, and building community in an online environment very useful. I think teachers and school leaders will need help navigating the sheer magnitude of available resources. Clear expectations and directives as to what effective distance learning and hybrid learning should look like would also help.
Systems will also need to find and fund supportive structures for the social and emotional wellbeing of students, teachers, school staff, school leaders and the wider school community. As an educational community, we will also need to take a moment to consider the purpose of schooling and reject practices that are not aligned with our aims. We must also listen to our students. Whereas some have thrived with self-directed learning, others as Liv McNeil captured in her video have found it a soul-destroying experience. In my own family, it has been hardest on my grade-five son, despite his teachers’ best efforts. With organization and self-direction already an issue, virtual schooling required constant supervision and prodding. He dreaded the twice weekly google meets (even though they were very well-structured), never remembered to submit assignments (even though they were complete and the platform was easy to use) and overall, missed learning by listening in class and the supportive feedback he received daily from his teachers. As he said to us, “I always liked doing my work at school so I never had homework and now all I have is homework.” Incredibly, his teachers noticed his struggles and set up individual weekly chats to keep him on track and check in. Going forward, we will need to continue to be creative in our instructional approaches, embed new pandemic pedagogies, prioritize wellbeing and relationships, collaborate and learn with and from other systems, work with stakeholders, and be innovative in finding ways to get all students learning in a safe and consistent manner.
“I always liked doing my work at school so I never had homework and now all I have is homework”
IEN: What resources/links/supports have you found most useful?
TH: In my work as the Project Director for the ARC education Project, I am fascinated by how our different member systems are managing the pandemic and education. I am also following what we can learn from other responses across the country and globe (see Educational International, the OECD, HundrEd, Unicef, People for Education, UNESCO). I believe Ontario can learn a lot from and with its global partners and that we need more ways to share our experiences and include key stakeholder voices at the decision-making table. Twitter has always been an excellent resource for me as an educator and it has been truly wonderful during the pandemic. I have an opportunity to learn from educators around the world and access content and practices I may not normally. I have been following People for Education, Carol Campbell and Caroline Alfonso among others to give me insight on what is happening in Ontario. I have also been actively engaged with my Facebook friends and gauging their responses to the numerous articles and opinion pieces that I am posting. This helps me get a sense of different perspectives and keeps me thinking critically. There are no easy solutions and no plan that will make everyone happy. Finally, as a mentor-coach and practitioner, I have appreciated Growth Coaching International’s #curiousconvos webinars (and even participated in my first one) as well as the resources made available by the Instructional Coaching Group and Cult of Pedagogy.
A typical day at home. Photo: Trista Hollweck
IEN: What are you reading, watching, listening to that you would recommend to others?
TH: I have found many moments of inspiration during the pandemic. It is amazing to see how quickly schools and districts have found innovative ways to deliver food, social services support, technology and mobile hotspot devices to students as well as how they’ve delivered curriculum using online, radio, television and printed methods. So many teachers have been incredibly innovative in their pandemic pedagogies and their use of online platforms and social media apps such as Tik Tok and Instagram to connect with their students. Colleagues at my previous school district, the Western Quebec School Board (WQSB), are also a constant source of inspiration. Since most elementary schools outside of the greater Montreal area in the province of Quebec reopened in May, I believe we can learn a lot from their experience and creativity (see the interviews with WQSB teacher Letha Henry and principal Sam Halpin). Ultimately, I tend to dwell in a place of hope and am inspired to believe that together we can use this terrible situation to catalyze transformational change and improve our public education system.
This week IEN features an email interview with Andy Hargreaves about his new book, Moving: A Memoir of Education and Social Mobility. Hargreaves is a Research Professor in the Lynch School of Education at Boston College and holds Visiting or Honorary Professorships at the University of Ottawa, Hong Kong University, Swansea University, and the University of Stavanger in Norway.
IEN: Why this book, why now?
Andy Hargreaves: Like one of Ernest Hemingway’s characters who went bankrupt, this book came upon me bit by bit, then all of a sudden. As you’ll understand if you read it, for decades, I intuitively felt that my life and lives like mine weren’t necessarily worth writing about. The children of famous families or who hold down big jobs often make a point of keeping a journal of their experiences, because they feel they are or will be notable and become someone whom people will want to read about in the future.
Like one of Ernest Hemingway’s characters who went bankrupt, this book came upon me bit by bit, then all of a sudden.
My life never had that kind of plan. In a working class mill town, keeping a journal was not a luxury we could afford or an affectation we could even countenance. But slowly and surely, while I have always cared about social justice, I began to sense that I was also a part of what I was writing about. So bit, by bit, here and there, I would insert short passages into my writing to explain how my research was in some ways connected to my own life. We would now call this positionality.
If there was a key moment, though, it was probably sitting with my Mum during her dying days, at the age of 93. My Mum had lived a working class life. She left school at 14, worked in factories, got married during World War II, lived in rented housing then public housing, raised her children through austerity, and then became widowed at the age of 43. Trying to raise three boys she was what we would now call an “essential worker”. She had three jobs cleaning people’s homes, working in local stores and looking after other people’s children. When I was in my early teens, she eventually collapsed with a nervous breakdown, and we moved onto welfare.
In the memoir, I describe this moment when I found her life to be an inspiration, like this:
After she lapsed into apparent unconsciousness, I sat with her for the best part of nine days until her final breath. I thought the time would pass slowly, but the hands raced around the clock at the end of her bed. Over many hours and days, I wrote a short piece about her life—the stories she told, the experiences she had, the things she did—at first, just for its own sake, and because, as a writer, I knew it was one of the few things I could usefully do.
The narrative took on a shape, and I sent it off to the Lancashire Telegraph that my mum used to have delivered every day—a widely read daily paper across one of the most populated counties in England. I submitted it not as an obituary but as a tribute to my mum and also to a way of life shared by women and families like her throughout the region.The editor wrote back, asked for some photographs (which we had luckily already collected for Mum’s ninetieth birthday, her last big bash), and announced they would publish it as a major feature. Just a couple of days before Mum died, when all the fluid had practically gone from her body, I leaned right over her with family members gathered around. I had no idea whether she could still hear.
“Mum,” I said, “I’ve something to tell you. I’ve written a piece about you for the Lancashire Telegraph. They say they are going to publish it as a double-page spread complete with pictures. It’s all about you and your life, Mum. A double-page spread. Here’s how it starts.” I turned to my text. “Here’s the headline”—the one the editors had assigned to it—“How a Loving Accrington Mum Scrimped and Worked for Her Family.” And then I began, “Doris was born in a commode at the back of a sweet shop in Accrington, two years after the end of the Great War . . .” Barely two sentences in, something happened that we thought was no longer physically possible. From the corner of my mum’s eye, out of a tiny frame that had received no fluid in over a week, a single tear fell slowly down her cheek. Then I stopped. She understood. She knew. And so did I. This life, these lives—lives like ours—are absolutely worth writing about, as many people appreciated when they wrote back to me about the piece in the weeks that followed.
This was really the impetus, the moment when I felt there was something worth saying not just about myself and my Mum, but about ordinary people like us everywhere, of all races and identities within the working classes, who struggle and sacrifice, and give things up so their children can have a better chance in life.
The challenge was now to find the time to write and perfect it, to develop it not as just a nostalgic memoir, but as a literary narrative about something in particular – the experience of working class upbringing and social mobility. This was an experience, I felt, with which many educators and other readers all across the world could identify. Some of this time I created myself, when I was in the midst of a very stressful and quite draining senior leadership responsibility. Taking an hour or two a day away from the escalating crisis I was trying to resolve, helped me create something that felt positive and renewed my energy in my daily work. Then, a perverse twist of fate came about when I broke my ankle hiking the Appalachian Trail, and could not travel for three months. This gave me the time and intense focus I needed to craft the memoir over countless drafts to the standard it really required.
IEN: What did you learn in working on this book that you didn’t know before?
AH: I learned a lot about social mobility. I discovered who invented the concept (the Russian-American immigrant Pitrim Sorokin, in 1927), and what baggage it brought with it. For Sorokin, social mobility – aka the American Dream – isn’t just about helping individuals move on and up through the various levels of social stratification. It’s also about greater equity – about moving those levels closer to each other. I consolidated my existing knowledge that the UK and US (unlike Canada), have two of the worst rates of social mobility in the world, and that these rates have been deteriorating from the golden age of social mobility during the 1960s and 1970s when I was growing up, right through to the present. I learned that there are many different subjective experiences of being socially mobile. There are:
Brilliantly irrepressible ones like the sheer achievement of working class figure-skater, Tonya Harding’s triple axel, which overcame the prejudices against her held by elite judges (as depicted in I, Tonya).
I also learned a lot about myself and about how to come to terms with who I once was and how this had profoundly influenced the way I go about my work today. For the first time, I addressed what it was about a selective education system that eventually sent me across the country to university, while my two brothers went to work in factories at the bottom of the street. For the first time, I thought, wrote, and spoke about the fact that I had been a child with ADHD (known as “highly strung”) at the time. I credited the one teacher who intuitively understood this about me for helping to shape the path of my entire life. And I learned that mental health issues I have faced as an adult from time to time – depression, feeling utterly overwhelmed, completely disorganized, taking too much on, and getting distraught about letting other people down, have their roots in these childhood years.
For the first time, I addressed what it was about a selective education system that eventually sent me across the country to university while my two brothers went to work in factories at the bottom of the street.
I have confronted issues that were difficult for me as an adolescent. I had to hide the fact that for many months after my Dad died, I had to raise my family instead of my family raising me. I felt ashamed about the trouble I had with the local gang when I was the only one left in the neighbourhood who was still going to high school on the other side of town. I had to endure homophobic insults (that I didn’t really understand at the time), and physical violence (I’m talking boots, studs and belts) that I had not only to survive, but find a way to surmount so I would be left alone. I have learned to look back on all this with acceptance, irony and even humor – not just to come to terms with who I was and who I am now, but also to find a way to connect these experiences to countless numbers of people like me. And that’s one more area of learning. For my quest as a writer has not been to compete with the upwardly mobile narratives of unbelievable survival by the likes of Westover and Vance. It has been to use and develop my skills in language and storytelling, to help others with their ordinary but very real struggles to see something of themselves and the children that they teach in the experiences I describe. As I write in the memoir:
this book could never have been written without the existence of the lives that it describes—the everyday and often invisible lives of ordinary citizens who drive our buses and taxis, make our clothes, fix our appliances, clean our homes, keep us safe, serve us in the local store, and look after our children. The book is meant to speak especially to all those who have made sacrifices, given things up, left behind homelands, or taken on extra jobs so that they or their children could have the best-possible chance in life.
IEN: What do you hope those working on education around the world will get out of this book?
AH: I hope readers will feel that this book will resonate with realizing that social mobility doesn’t just happen by developing grit and resilience in individuals to help them navigate unchanged systems. There also need to be systems of culturally responsive pedagogy, inclusive curriculum, wraparound schooling that supports the whole child, and an end to discriminatory high-stakes testing, so we can support children who grow up in challenging circumstances. I hope educators will come to see that their task is not just to help kids beat the odds in a rigged system, but also to change the odds so that the system’s no longer rigged.
I wrote much of this memoir in the years of Brexit and Trump, and during the rapid growth of racism, populism and xenophobia around the world. The people I come from are some of the hardest working, deeply loyal and most welcoming you could possibly meet. They are also suspicious of outsiders, and resentful towards condescending elites. We cannot and must not write off the white working class by renaming it euphemistically as middle class, by associating it only with pitiable poverty, by removing all its claims for sympathy or advocacy because it also possesses undeniable racial privilege, or by looking down on it as a “basket of deplorables” and tasteless white trash. (For more on this see my piece on Leadership Ethics, Inequality & Identity)
If it is regarded as invisible or deplorable, the white working class will and does react by stigmatizing others – being prejudiced toward immigrants and racial outsiders and displaying inverse snobbery towards liberal elites. My narrative, and the narrative I think we need now in America and across the world, is not to rank the various struggles of marginalized and oppressed groups and pit them against each other, but to develop empathy among the many among us who struggle. My purpose is to help us all to draw on and face our own suffering so we can understand the even greater suffering of others, so that we can all strive together for shared equity and common dignity. For as Adam Smith once wrote, “sympathy is the basic emotion of democracy”.
IEN: What’s happened with you since you wrote the book?
AH: The pandemic happened. We had to cancel multiple book tours and writers festivals for groups up to 5000. We delayed publication for two months so we could figure out how to bring the work to people’s attention in the new environment. I am now discussing this memoir in book clubs of up to 1000 in the US, Canada, the UK, Australia and elsewhere. Although I miss face to face teaching dreadfully, I am enjoying these more intense interactions around the book that are bringing other people’s lives and struggles to the fore, as well as my own. Even in a pandemic, we have to think about the opportunities as well as the problems before us. My mother, Doris, was named after the nurse who saved my grandfather’s life by caring for him in hospital during the 1918 flu pandemic. And now, all of a sudden, this book seems to speak to the lives of all the essential workers and their families on whom we have been relying so much. In the book, I wrote a passage that could well have been a tribute to all the essential workers and their lives today:
As you move up, on, and out, you hope you’ll continue to stand up for and stand with others against injustice and exclusion. Despite all your travels across different countries and cultures, you hope that when you open your mouth, people will still know where you come from. You hope you’ll retain some of your interests and TV-viewing habits, however unsophisticated and unfashionable they may be amongst the intellectual elite. You hope you’ll remember to treat all people with respect and dignity and acknowledge their humanity by thanking and conversing with them—the driver who lets you off the bus, the waiting staff at a conference dinner who never get noticed or receive any tips, and the people cleaning the toilets in the train station or the airport—because you remember how your mum used to clean people’s houses and how, when your own children were small and you were struggling financially, your wife was a waitress in the local pub and sold Avon cosmetics door-to-door in the evening. You also hope you do all this simply because it’s the decent thing to do.
It’s not enough just to clap for our essential workers now. It’s essential we rethink how as educators, we connect with and include their lives and cultures in the curriculum, and even in how they can have a space on their CVs to talk proudly about their family lives and responsibilities compared to the travel, hobbies and internships enjoyed by their more privileged peers.
IEN: What’s next — what are you all working on now?
AH: In terms of my research and writing, Dennis Shirley and I have just completed a book on Student Engagement: Beyond Relevance, Technology and Fun. It draws on our research work in the US Pacific Northwest, Canada, and the UK, to help educators rethink student engagement as being not just a psychological or individual challenge, but also as a social issue that requires changes in cultures, institutions, and policies too. This is especially true, we argue, during and after the pandemic. Organizationally, I am co-founder and president of ARC, a group of 6 nations (7 systems) and their Ministers and teacher union leaders who support and promote core values of broad excellence, equity, inclusion, wellbeing, democracy and human rights in professionally run systems. We have an annual summit and have found that peer interaction among the systems has provided invaluable learning and solidarity during the pandemic. We have produced several papers and op-eds coming from this work including one in the Washington Post and one for the Albert Shanker Institute (that originally appeared in The Conversation).
Finally
I hope readers enjoy the book and see something of themselves and the people they teach in it. Some of it is meant to be poignant and moving in places. But there are more joyous and funny parts as well. It only goes up to age 22, so perhaps one day there will be one or two sequels, if demand warrants it. If you read it, please write back and let me know what you think.
