Tag: status quo

Quiet is easier

Schools are rife with professional conversations, committees, and meetings. Each one of them is an invitation to contribute. Sometimes we’re compelled to contribute, sometimes obliged, and sometimes we can choose to contribute or not.

Some meetings, of course, are mundane, some are informative, and others are confronting and provocative. It’s in the latter kind that we matter most. If we don’t, we shouldn’t be there.

And it’s in those demanding engagements – at times when we feel elevated emotions and moved to comment – that we are forced to make a choice. Share our view and risk being shouted down, embarrassed, or challenged? Or keep our thoughts to ourselves?

After all, remaining quiet is easier – it helps keep the meeting moving along nicely ­– it helps maintain the status quo – it’s less complicated, trouble-free and painless.

And so we should keep quiet – if uncomplicated, trouble-free and painless is our aspiration.

Perms and parachute pants

Looking back, most things from the 80s seem pretty suboptimal by today’s standards. VHS video was terrible quality. People were smoking on airplanes and in teacher lounges. And mullets, perms, and animal print parachute pants…say no more.

It’s impossible to imagine how 2019 will look in 2049. But today’s status quo is guaranteed to look old, suboptimal and kind of ridiculous. What we are doing now, the way we are living our lives, the way we are delivering education is, possibly, the best we can do at the moment.

But it’s not ideal. There are better ways. The people of tomorrow will live this enhanced experience.

And if we genuinely open ourselves up to possibilities, there’s a chance for us to not only glimpse the future, but to help create it.