Pointing the Way

Several weeks into our office renovation project, an ancient wooden pointer revealed itself from a long-hidden place at the back of a closet shelf.  At first glance, it seemed a quant reminder of a bygone era to be tossed in the trash.  But then...could it be a providentially-revealed artifact that could point the way forward in trying times?

In the many long decades that the pointer was a classroom staple, teachers were the receptacles of the knowledge to be passed to a new generation.  The pointer was the central tool that focused whole-class attention on the information to be learned; that signaled call-and-response recitation of memorized facts from a body of knowledge that changed only glacially through the decades.  

But what of today?  Knowledge changes at lightning speed.  Our children can access information at the touch of a keystroke.  We are preparing them for a world in which they will need portable, flexible skills and the dispositions to think and solve problems we can’t even yet imagine. Likely, one day, they will even be called upon to create new knowledge.  Our educational currency has evolved over the past twenty years from facility with a finite body of facts to the ability to think critically.  And we can only bring this capacity to life in a new generation by nurturing it and modeling it, which is exactly what we did at our School Advisory Commission (SAC) meeting on the issue of masking Wednesday night.

Some weeks earlier, I was asked how I feel about masking. I replied that my feelings should be irrelevant. I am called as a leader to be well-informed, to triangulate data, to filter, to think; and, ultimately, to base decisions on facts and needs relevant to our mission.

The ever-evolving facts about our ever-evolving pandemic are dizzying. I have listened to competing truths, fears and rights, and to mountains of uncertainties.  But school starts in a week and we need to move forward. Our Healthy School Plan was developed in thoughtful response to insights, concerns and passions that have been shared and heard.  The decision framework that informed the 2021 iteration of our Plan was: 

• Grounded in mission

• Committed to a holistic view of child wellness

• Aimed at a proper balance between the competing realities of mission effectiveness and disease mitigation 

• Informed by experts in medicine, mental health, and parenting, and

• Born of critical thought

For the first time in my fifteen years of leadership, our SAC was unable to reach consensus on a key issue. Our parent community-at-large holds vastly opposing views on the value of masking their children; and, after hours of discussion, our SAC reflected this same division. Nonetheless, it was not really difficult to see the way forward through the murky darkness of chaos because shared values also resonated loudly.  We want our children in school.  We care.  Deeply.  In the end, every member of the Commission, every guest commenter, and every expert panel member contributed some bit of wisdom that became part of the whole.  And the whole is, indeed, so much greater than the sum of its parts.

It is, in truth, a heavy burden to bear responsibility for the safety of other people’s children while trying to engender the confident trust of a diverse community. Though we will not all agree on a single way to educate and care for our children during this pandemic, we hold diversity as a core value; "welcoming, accepting, and respecting the unique gifts of every person."  I hope you will see the wisdom and good that will come from respecting diversity of thought and loving each other through challenging times.  Our shared humanity is worth the effort. Let’s point the way.