Thursday, December 15, 2016

The common good

Homemade coffeecake and juice were on the menu for this week's "Coffee with the Principal."  It was our first-ever Coffee without actual coffee - and without clear actionable steps forward - but what was abundantly clear is that the topic of school climate and culture is a critical one.

I defined the current status of St. Robert School's culture, or way of life, and our climate, or prevailing "feeling."  I shared my goals to maintain a faithful, rigorous program and a nurturing, safe, and comfortable learning environment, and then dissected the responsibilities of the principal, the teachers, and the parents in positively influencing these elements of the school experience.  It became clear that this is one area in which the school's reach is realistically limited by powerful influences beyond our walls.

We identified some challenges and suggestions that surfaced in last spring's survey on community and diversity.  Those comments centered largely around perceived social challenges - not only among students, but within the parent community as well.  After briefly considering some expert advice on how best to manage such challenges, our group engaged in some thoughtful conversation centered largely on the topic of bullying and exclusion.

We learned that programs and policies don't impact these social power structures.  The unsettling truth is that adults have no effective power to control bullying and exclusion. These forces can only be changed from within peer groups by empowering our kids with prosocial behaviors that have more clout than meanness. It's not enough to teach kids what not to do.  We also have to teach them precisely what to do to promote kindness and compassion among their peers.

Harvard School of Education's Making Caring Common project was launched in response to the concern that young people today are more concerned about their own personal success than the common good.  Student surveys conducted by the project reveal that students perceive that among the qualities of goodness, happiness, and achievement, their parents and teachers rank achievement first for them.  We know that bullying is a side-effect of achievement pressure, and that it is less likely to happen in caring, inclusive school environments.  We further know that promoting healthy social-emotional learning leads not only to improved relationships and health outcomes, but, ironically, to academic gains as well.  So it seems that we have to do some soul-searching about the messages we may be sending - in our words and in our behavior - and make sure that our kids understand that their goodness is more important to us than any other achievement.

In the end, we agreed that the way forward comes down to faith.  When our priority is to look outward and create a caring world, rather than to endorse a "me-centric" view of success, we have the potential to create a community of kids postured to make a positive influence on the world in ways that really matter.

This discussion needs to continue.  Watch for a follow-up Coffee on creating a culture of kindness.

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