In today’s Meitler Minute, Tom Heding offers an encouraging reflection on looking forward, even as we are focusing on the six feet around us.
Schools
Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
Teachers belong to a funny profession. It is a profession because we have very specific training, are certified, hold a license and participate in professional development. Yet, we are also fiercely independent. Possibly as a result of so many years of one room schoolhouses, teachers are expected to know what is best for their students and the best way to educate them. No matter what the school, the diocese or the state says, teachers know that once they close their classroom door, that class period is theirs to design and implement. And that has caused problems as society and its workplaces have changed with the advent of technology.
As a teacher, an administrator and a consultant, I have experienced well over 100 schools and one thing they all have in common is a faculty that uses wildly different methodologies. Not that it is bad to have a variety of approaches to education. Kids learn in different ways and will benefit from experiencing a variety of teaching techniques. What is bad, however, is when teachers use a methodology because they always have, what is sarcastically referred to as when a teacher has laminated the lesson plans.
As professionals, we should be learning about new ideas and best practices, as doctors, lawyers and other professionals do. But in too many cases, teachers don’t believe best practices change and continue to hold on to disproven techniques such as 100% lecture, rote memorization and homework more accurately described as busywork. When challenged, these teachers maintain that it has always worked in the past.
I’m thinking the COVID-19 crisis might change that. While some traditional teachers have resisted including technology into their methodology and have dismissed on-line learning as ineffective, we are currently working in an educational environment that is anything but traditional. In many cases, education during this crisis is 100% online. What does this portend for the future?
Certainly, school buildings will not go away. Educating our children is more than simply mastering facts and learning skills. There are social aspects that are essential to growing up. Creativity flourishes in a communal environment. But will the teacher remain as the Sage on the Stage? Will parents, and their children, demand a more modern approach to education, one that prepares their child for a technological world? In a more aspirational hope, will many of the traditional teachers now see the advantages of combining 21st century techniques into their 20th century lesson plans? How can things not change? My only curiosity is, what will school look like tomorrow?
Meitler Minute
The Meitler team is continuing our work and we look forward to guiding you in envisioning how your school can continue using technology and remote learning tools effectively into the future.
Let Us Not Grow Weary
Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. (Galatians 6:9)
Paul’s letter to the Galatians contains, in part, guidelines for living a faith-filled life. One of those recommendations strikes me as particularly relevant to the situation we all find ourselves in with the COVID-19 outbreak.
If I may offer a very brief and high level summary of our recent experience, we first heard about this virus as a foreign malady that we hoped would stay away from our lives. Then it became an issue closer to home and we began to adjust some behaviors. Then it became a crisis and our lives changed: events were cancelled, schools were closed. As teachers and administrators we had to scramble to devise ways to keep our students engaged with their education while we all had to avoid being near each other. New issues continually emerged, and each was addressed and resolved as well as possible as we waited for the next issue.
All of this has taken an enormous amount of energy. Like any short term crisis, we were tired, but we were focused and driven to come through the crisis safe and whole. In a short term crisis, we know we could rest later. This, however, is not a short term crisis. This life altering germ will continue to challenge us for weeks and months and perhaps even years to come. Even when the rate of infection slows and the number of deaths is reduced, our society will have been changed which will require more adjustments, more energy.
Paul reminds us, however, that we can do this. We need to remind ourselves and focus on the idea that what we are doing is important, and “good.” Our children are our future. Our Catholic schools, with dedicated teachers and a moral compass infused throughout the curriculum, are essential to ensure that these children will grow up valuing faith, hope and charity.
We are, undoubtedly, weary. What Paul wants us to remember is that we cannot give up and that, in time, we will see the results of our labor and know that it was all worth the effort.
Meitler Minute
Whether you are facing a life interruption or a life disruption, Meitler is here and available to have a conversation about how to find hope and vision for your future.
