As educators, we tend to the entire person of the student. Thus, whether conscious or not, character education plays a critical role in much of what we do, and it’s character education that must necessarily lie at the heart of any anti-racist and DEIJ (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Justice) initiative worth its salt. Historically, schools have attempted to operationalize their DEIJ initiatives merely by “outsourcing” the associated instructional efforts exclusively to the humanities—disciplines such as English or History, where a great number of educators feel that moral categories like race, gender, and social justice are broached more organically given the broad nature of the course content.

Fully funding schools by providing guaranteed budgets does not absolve humans—the adults charged with disposing the budget—from the responsibility of effectively using that budget, the sole determinant of which remains the delivery of a quality product, i.e. the delivery of quality education. Resources, like any material asset, are only as effectual, are only as valuable—and, themselves, are only as useful—as the humans plying them.

It may very well be true that segregation is necessarily born out of diversity, can, in fact, occur only in environments that are, at their outset, diverse. And so it stands to reason that the more “diverse” a given population is, the greater chance for segregation to exist and in increasing degrees, no matter how segregation is measured—whether by the degree of homogeneity within groups, by the extent of separation among groups, or by the number of segregated groups within the sample. Where the segregation lies, however, is relative to the diversity from which it is born, and is so determined by scale of perception, as it is with any form—like, say, a viewed painting. Think a painting considered initially on the level of its constituent color elements all the way up to the ultimate level of the constituted image whole.

From these most trying times, we must glean at least a modicum of constructive meaning, else our sacrifices are for naught. That said, in light of classroom adjustments related to COVID safety restrictions, I now embrace a role for technology in my instruction, where I was reluctant to before.

In so many ways, teaching under current COVID conditions has made me a better teacher. For starters, plying my trade under the duress of an all-out pandemic and its safety restrictions requires that I marshal every skill I possess as an educator. Skills which I hardly knew I possessed, but which have been compelled to the fore in response to the current reality, have enabled me to prioritize in ways I was neither forced to nor knew were within my powers. The result has been a leaner curriculum more efficiently delivered on account of the increased intention, intention serving as one of the most critical factors regarding any craft.

Given the two-headed colossi currently impacting our nation (I’m speaking of the COVID-19 pandemic and the “reckoning” our country is experiencing around race), institutions and, to my point, schools, need to reconsider whatever their associated “brand” might be regarding their public leadership identity, which means pivoting away from long-held beliefs about themselves.

In response to COVID-19 restrictions, schools seem almost neurotic in how much they aspire to replicate pre-COVID conditions. Nevertheless, in times of uncertainty, it’s proven that hewing close to an established routine is known to provide a sense of much-needed security as means for coping. And yet, ironically enough, faithfulness to the previously known model may actually hinder a school’s ability to pivot and meet safety protocols. Meeting safety protocols may require schools to trade the typically sought-after means of security for a model that is radically different than anything previously experienced in spite of the uncertainty that such a shift may bring.

Regarding independent schools—particularly those of the New England prep school variety, which are world-renowned for their sense of “tradition”—I pose the following question. How do independent schools balance their sense of tradition with the supposed freedom they have to innovate as independent bodies? Both tradition and the freedom to innovate, while seemingly conflicting aims, nonetheless play equally important roles as parts of the overall identity associated with the independent school brand.

The irony of all ironies is education as a field and its failure to reform, it’s failure to otherwise innovate despite inquiry, creative and bold thinking, and intellectual risk-taking—that is to say, “innovation” itself—serving as its very charge, purpose, and mission, a mission that still remains one of overall enlightenment.

Institutions such as independent schools here in New England, pride themselves—matter of fact, bet their very reputations—on their ability to provide students and their families the highest quality service.  Not just the highest, but the highest of the highest—that is to say, an “elite” education.  Exceptionalism is what such “elite” schools market and sell, and they do so in nearly every facet of their programming, from the courses offered, to the strength of their athletics, extra-curriculars, and assumed social networks. 

As teachers in a school, and, so, presumably, as the adults in the room, we must always, to the extent that it is possible, adopt the moral and behavioral high road in relation to the young students we serve. This means aspiring to two objectives:

Rightfully so, intellectual life has always been central to the idea of education. However, there exists in our country a populist strain that equates intellectual matters with elitism, particularly given the perceived elitism associated with what might be stereotypically regarded as the nation’s “top tier” academic universities and colleges. In some respects, the association between elitism and higher education is warranted.

The vetting process for teachers in public schools is different from the vetting process for teachers in private schools. Those working in public schools are vetted via a series of state-mandated tests meant to certify qualifications. Beyond test vetting, the chance for any market to evaluate teacher services and to confer status is rendered false and void on account of teacher unions, the strength of which is capable of contriving the market as a means for protecting those teachers working in that market.

Prognosticators continue to forecast a U.S. population that will ultimately reach majority-minority levels within a generation. In spite of recent nationalist movements—both abroad and here at home—the path of our social evolution still points towards pluralism. Demography is still our destiny. Our civic identities must evolve accordingly. The most important thing our primary and secondary schools can do is prepare our children.

It seems that, currently, society is likely to measure evolutionary progress only as such progress occurs in the realm of the material—the realm of material technology more precisely. Yet there must be room for moral progress and innovation in our lives as well. That we exhibit an almost fetish-like thrill for all things material points to a potential source in the arrest of our human development.

The idea of arming teachers in schools begs the question, What, exactly, is it that is in such dire need of protection? While the answer might seem obvious—it’s the students!—what’s actually at stake is even greater.

As spring break approaches—my seventeenth now as a teacher—I can say with certainty that the academic calendar is like no other.  So swiftly it moves, rushing headlong like a wild child.  Knowing what lies ahead doesn’t assuage the nerves nor the anxious excitement associated with the rites of school, from morning assembly to greetings at the start of class.  Still, once class actually begins, the performance of it all takes hold, and the challenge of trying to connect is, indeed, a social and emotional test of utmost purpose, fulfillment, and joy.

There exists a natural tension between two of our most cherished American ideals—equality and freedom. Where the first speaks to the democratic principles that underscore our nation’s founding, the second speaks to free-market beliefs and principles of capitalism that similarly factor into society’s design. Where the ideals clash, however, is at the point where people are likely to conflate opportunity with results, confusing the two as one, when they are not.

Nothing engenders more potential resentment in young people than the fact that they must undergo some form of compulsory education. I’m talking school. And it’s not school on its face that stands as the potential source of a young person’s pique, but rather it’s the utter lack of control and autonomy regarding nearly every aspect of school reality that fuels their ire.

It pains my heart so, the schisms that exist between many a pair of educational belief systems, which, when seemingly pitted against each other, ultimately result in hurting the very individuals education is meant to serve—young people. Public school versus private schools, for instance. Each views the other askance. Charter schools and district schools spy on each other with similar distrust. This, despite ALL such systems—public, private, and charter—being likewise entrusted with the identical task of growing the nation’s next citizenry.