An Overdose on Good Ideas: The Climb and Dissent

Good Intentions, Rising Altitude

Educators are consistently being bombarded with the next great strategy. About technology, behavior management, student-centered classrooms, just to name a few. Then just when they feel like they are well-read and up-to-date with the latest planning, procedures and policies, these implementations change. It is exhausting keeping up. They literally can overdose on good ideas. They are surrounded by 400 ways to improve education, long lists of tactics and approaches. They are given double the volume of content to teach, in the same amount of time. They are overwhelmed, out of balance and often frustrated and discouraged. Yet, they have very few options, in which to yell from the mountain top their disappointment.

If the powers that be, continue to raise the ceiling and the floor, all educators will have left is a diminished tolerance for error. No room for maneuvering to insure best practice for our students. Educators are devoted practitioners, dedicated mentors, whom every day, do not just reach the mountain top, to say they did, they arrive at its precipice, because they fought a storm of criticism and an avalanche of judgment. They enter the summit every morning: snow shoes buckled and nap sacks full of emergency rations. They never look down the slope in doubt, they hear the voices of their students and they step by step, climb against the gust. All the while keeping an eye on the peak, knowing unequivocally, that they reach it.

Suiting Up for the Climb

As adults, most of us try to avoid personal conflict with other adults. This doesn't ring more true than in the field of education. In our buildings the majority of us try to calm the waters, rather than raise sea level. We mingle out and talk to a few teachers, but for the most part our classroom is our Shangri-La and we like to immerse ourselves in its comfortable surroundings. 

Shangri-La has become synonymous with any earthly paradise, particularly a mythical Himalayan utopia – a permanently happy land, isolated from the world. This encapsulates our interpretation of our classrooms, we suit up every morning for the climb and when we reach our rooms, we pinch a tent and wait for the other climbers to make their way to camp. Our gear, we accumulate, through experience and a growth mindset. We listen and observe, learn from our mistakes and seek expansion and cultivation. But, we retreat from conflict, because this wreaks havoc on our Zen, our contentment. 

What we need to do as educators is to see past the personal aspect of teaching and welcome a bit of the business aspect. We need to be more tolerant of constructive criticism, be more candid with ours, and above all look for ways to better communicate, with those around us. The infamous saying “It’s not personal, its business,” may not be possible entirely, but if we recognize and accept the permanent vocational aspect of education, we will be able to find more of a balance. Prevent the avalanche.

Non-Discussable Issues

A strength of most educators is our capacity to disagree respectfully and professionally. Now, this is not to say every educator does this. But I feel the majority of us do. Even when we get really frustrated, we use restraint. However, this restraint in many cases, becomes talking about someone, rather than to someone, regarding a disagreement or conflict. This leads to naysaying and a vibe of gossip, rather than respect. This unfortunate toxic environment is like a million thought bubbles bursting to life, the pop, pop, pop, coating the conversations with dubiousness and suspicion.

Faculty and student relationships are structured around nurture, structure, foster and outreach. This facet is evident and plentiful in a positive and mindful school. These relationships parallel faculty to faculty interactions. When one is negative it definitely affects the other. But, we as educators, often treat our students with more respect than we do one another. Why do we forget to extend the same kindness and understanding to each other every day, as we do with our students? Do we feel like we are a cog at an institution, rather than a villager amongst the homestead? Every school is part industrial revolution and part agrarian, nomadic township. Each member specialized and contributing to the community.   

We like to be our Own Author

“Watch your air time.” Is a phrase I repeat to myself often, when I attend team and grade level meetings? I tend to not say anything at all, but when I do, I like to keep my ideas to nice crisp pocket sentences. Everyone wants to be the author of their personal narratives. So when you put a group of highly passionate, highly intelligent people together in a room, it is like an avalanche is rumbling. The conversation vibrates and before you know it, you are stuck under a pile of freshly, tumbled snow. The weight of it feels like a crushing force. So we often just start digging, oblivious to those around us that seem to be piling the snow back up on top of us. We simply shut down, out of exhaustion. So we sit, idle, distracted, waiting for our personal St. Bernard, to exhume us from our crevasse.

As authors, we need to experience, interact and at times lure in action that spawns creativity. If we assume good intentions are coming, ask questions if we disagree and be specific and direct, we may just be able to have open, meaningful discourse, even if the result is discordance. If we stay positive, not fudge what we want to say in response, but frame it in mindfulness and purpose, maybe we can lull any disunity or friction. There is a candor we are lacking as educators. We often stay positive without constructive change or we talk about one another, rather than to one another leading to rifts and rumbles and eventually avalanches.

A collaborative challenge, such as communication, makes us see our flaws, face our fears and it leads us past complacency. We are educators and we have a shared commitment, to better the lives of our students, we have a professional persona that keeps us on the path of service and growth. But what we need to improve upon is our candor, our honesty, our forgiveness and trust. If we as educators, professionals and human beings, understand that progress comes from collaboration, conversation and choice- we can choose to collaborate and converse more meaningfully. This in turn, will lower anxiety levels, make schools a more positive setting, and above all- it will allow educators to do their jobs without the weight of an avalanche upon their shoulders.