Parents ‘n Schools

(GLO — October 2009 — “Inspiring Education” is about jumping out ahead of the “blob” that is schooling today and talking about and thinking about what that blob might metamorphose into over the next two decades. The metamorphosis, of course, is already underway. If not in schooling itself, in life around it. If not as […]

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The lead speaker at the Alberta Government’s “Inspiring Education” conversation recently was author Dan Pink (www.danpink.com), and his talk drew largely from his book “A Whole New Mind”. His talk may be posted up on Inspiring Education’s site. I recommend it to you, and I recommend the book which fleshes out the concepts helpfully.
The conversation […]

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(GLO — October 2009 — Meaningful involvement of those paid to be at work in government schools is hard enough. Meaningfully involving the unpaid is an order of magnitude harder. But if you’re going to use the phrase “meaningful involvement”, you should actually make it meaningful. Otherwise, pick a different phrase. “Token involvement”? “Illusory involvement”? […]

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I have written elsewhere that public education is a veritable cesspool of self-interest… competing interests of the various “partners”, all churning around in the hope that most of the crap settles out. Parents are generally insulated against that dynamic (it is seldom mentioned in the communications home), but once they happen to “fall in” and […]

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Made my way back home to Edmonton for the first 1.5 days of the 2.5 day Inspiring Education provincial gathering organized by Alberta Education earlier this week.
600 people… about 6 of them “just parents”… talking about the future of schooling 20 years out.
I had a couple of the other 594 point out to me that […]

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(GLO — Oct 09 — Don’t know what made me think of this one from a year ago… but I’ve always liked the analogy.)
On the freeways and roads of major cities, where you find traffic lanes reserved for vehicles with 2 or more passengers, it is not entirely unheard of for commuters to put […]

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Toward better understanding the dynamics of the government school funding/finance game, within the context of other government departments and overall government needs in a tightening economy, and within the context of Alberta schoolers’ “www.stopthecuts.ca”, imagine schooling as a contestant in “Name That Tune”…
Health Care says “I can name that tune in 7 notes, if people […]

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(GLO — Oct 09 — This entry below was written almost exactly one year ago. We’ve seen what happened to the auto industry after that. Schoolers in Alberta got their pensions backfilled just in time, before the fiscal flood waters washed over our economy. In gratitude… as noted yesterday… Alberta schoolers are choosing to hold […]

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What goes up, may come down.
Particularly in the world of government funding, in the context of regional economies.
Not everyone accepts this. Particularly not government schoolers.
Those who have read the papers lately… oh, anytime in the last 15 months or so… will have picked up on the altered circumstances of North American and global economies. They’re […]

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Field trip coming up. Off to Edmonton this weekend to attend the provincial government’s “Inspiring Education” gathering. Guest speakers. Panel discussions. Lunch.
Should be good stuff. I am intrigued at the possibilities.
I am mostly intrigued because I have sampled some of the “What We Heard” summaries captured on the Inspiring Education website of the discussions held […]

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