Excuse me…
Give me a place to stand, and a lever long enough, and I will move the world. — Archimedes
The world is flipping on a dime. What was impossible to change yesterday is now very possible today. We have much that needs change. Our apathy has rusted hinges, broken communication, and made us settle like an old armchair. But today, hope is in the air. It is in the force of unity that we see an open door. We must take it, before someone shuts and locks it. Everyone…young and old, white, brown, or black, male or female, and everything in between must cram through that single door. We must leave no one behind. That is the mission of our collective voices. We demand an inclusive country with a conscience steeped in equity.
Democracy does not just happen. It is taught. To assure our freedoms and the sacredness of our Constitution, we must make sure our children understand it. We must transform our public schools. We must create democratic villages of learning. Learning not just in the preconceived notion of school, but in arbitrary ways that translate how we live, how we communicate, and how we lead. Our society is broken. Focusing entirely on the rote-ness of learning begets children incapable of navigating our complex society. It is not in the realm of school to teach religious values, but it is a noteworthy education that reflects values of kindness, fairness, altruism, respect, and the ideal of agape in our communities that, in turn, becomes who we are as a nation. Children need meaning in their lives that outlive grades or test scores. We must gather ourselves and teach our children that they are not alone competing for space in this world, but rather that they are a piece to our national puzzle. We must assure them that they have a seat at the table, and upon graduation, they will understand that what they do will, indeed, bring to this table a concept we call collective humanity.
Love is our most unifying and empowering common spiritual denominator. The more we ignore its potential to bring greater balance and deeper meaning to human existence, the more likely we are to continue to define history as one long inglorious record of man’s inhumanity to man. -Aberjhani,
Quite some time ago, our classrooms became frozen spaces, emotionless on a journey towards desirable test scores. Educators were not involved in a job to teach grace and integrity. No, it was not their job to teach please and thank you. Not their job to teach opening doors. Not their job to love the best and worst of a classroom with faces full of hope and despair. But unapologetically and decidedly so, it IS. Teaching is emotional art. It is chocked to the brim with caring and compassion, worry and encouragement, love and desire. We must thaw the indifference that has chilled our educational system, and instead represent what it is to be a good human. We must convey to our children what it means to be gracious and empathetic. Teachers must be emotionally raw in their feelings towards all of our children. All students must feel love in American classrooms. It is in the receiving of love that eventually evolves into every being in their bones. In knowing that they matter, they grow in this space that they so deserve… We need our children to believe they matter, no matter where they come from or where they are going. Because many days of their lives, they come to the “here”, the concept we call school. As they unfold into who they are, they compartmentalize who we are, the adults in their day to day lives. In this process, how we act, how we talk, how we respond, what we believe, and how we make them feel influences who they become and what they deem to be worthy. We must, in this new day, rethink who we are and the legacy we leave to the souls we touch. Unsurprisingly, the roads they travel for the stories of their lives can quite often emerge at school. We cannot undervalue the importance of the school experience, the relationships, and the people our children become under the auspices of school.
For if you suffer your people to be ill-educated, and their manners to be corrupted from their infancy, and then punish them for those crimes to which their first education disposed them, what else is to be concluded from this, but that you first make thieves and then punish them. — Sir Thomas More
In a democratic village, students learn by experiencing what has been taught in the classroom. Empty words suddenly become verbs. Students’ participation in the ideal of democracy turns a flag into an idea that has earned our attention and dedication to a form of reverence for the freedoms it allows us. It is impossible to understand rights and freedoms if you have no idea what they are, or what they mean. The day to day school experience transforms with immersion into these principles. Students become empowered instruments in the security of our national values rather than ripe for the slow and diligent assaults to confuse who and what our country stands for. As our schools have slowly become mirrors of authoritarian ideals, our students emerge into society unsure of their power and their roles in a democratic country that relies on an educated and astute populace to survive. We must allow them to grow in democracy, so that they can carry its torch from generation to generation.
Respect for ourselves guides our morals; respect for others guides our manners — Laurence Sterne
In recent years, the worthiness of college acceptance and the litany of accomplishments and test scores needed for consideration seem unnecessary to the yearning of knowledge gained in pursuing a college degree. We must not be so tone deaf that we do not hear this plea. Sometimes, the best marker of a great society is not wealth and the selfishness of a nation consumed by insatiable greed, but the ideal of giving your seat to another, buying lunch for the hungry, or the realization that in giving, there are also returns. This mindset is not innate. We teach it, and we value what it speaks to our culture. We must create the society we want to live in. All of us must have skin in the game. A place for every student to stand should be our relentless pursuit.
Higher education must lead the march back to the fundamentals of human relationships, to the old discovery that is ever new, that man does not live by bread alone. — John Hannah
Today in America, we see enraged adults unable to control emotions. Parents have showcased a lack of restraint at sporting events. After watching recent protests, we are concerned as we watch police officers projecting violence and rage against Americans. Lack of self control in public spaces like Black Friday or sitting on a highway in stopped traffic always results in out of control emotions. Just watch a Trump rally to see the social decline in America. Our children are watching and processing an inability for adults to rein themselves in. Without realizing it, we are creating a society that has no invisible boundaries of acceptable behavior. Perhaps in our race for test scores, we forgot to nurture how to communicate and navigate the human experience.
True navigation begins in the human heart. It’s the most important map of all. — Elizabeth Kapu’uwailani Lindsey
Our daily experiences are affected by the attitudes and actions of the people around us. It is time to teach manners, social graces (as odd as that may sound), phone etiquette, how to compose a letter, common courtesies, and the idea that how we treat others is not only a reflection of self, but also a sincere respect of others. Kindness is nurtured by being treated kindly. We treat our children how we want them to treat us. Our students need to learn not only how to earn respect, but also how to give it to someone else.
Respect was invented to cover the empty place where love should be. — Leo Tolstoy,
America is out of control. We don’t need a military police, more prisons, or a war against Americans. We need the audacity to teach our students the give and take of the social experience. The genteel words lost in our common anger and despair. The moment we give up our seat, open a door, and extend a gracious thank you, we contribute to a better America. In this moment in history, with despair and rage boiling over in the streets, what we need is for Mr. Rogers to look us in the eyes and say,
In the external scheme of things, shining moments are as brief as the twinkling of an eye, yet such twinklings are what eternity is made of — moments when we human beings can say “I love you,” “I’m proud of you,” “I forgive you,” “I’m grateful for you.” That’s what eternity is made of: invisible imperishable good stuff. — Fred Rogers
Let us teach our students the good stuff, even if they lag in what we consider baseline. A person of kind composure, with an ease in the everyday lives of people, can create an atmosphere of good will that remains long after the moments are gone, and test scores are filed away.
