The Classroom Might Remain Relevant
While the institution of school incentivizes control and predictability, the irony is that relevant skills result from autonomy and self-direction.
As an early career teacher in a tight job market, I’ve struggled to find consistent job opportunities. I‘ve had to be enterprising in the five years since I received my teaching certificate, moving from a fringe private school to an outdoor leadership camp, from a foreign language school to daily substituting, and to my current role as a long term occasional. I’ve worked in three school districts, dozens of high schools, and shared face-time with thousands of teenagers.
Walk around any public high school. You’ll see kids in class, thumbs tapping out texts, heads down on desks, raising their hands when they have the answer right.
While every classroom is its own unique space, I’ve noticed three recurring trends:
- Kids are either bored or institutionalized
- Teachers are either tired or ambivalent
- Administrative incentives maintain the status quo
Meanwhile, there’s a lot of talk about engagement. Engaged students. Engaged teachers. Engaged classrooms. Daniel Pink does a terrific job explaining why top-down management systems are ineffective at fostering engagement. In short, it’s useful when there are clear destinations to target. People will chase the carrot and avoid the stick. Engagement, however, is most likely when efforts are autonomous, relevant, and allow for mastery. These are dynamic circumstances with unclear destinations. Public schools are entrenched in prescriptive models of success, offering little chance to embrace the process of discovery.
None of this is new. So why is this the time for innovation? I can think of two reasons:
- Future generations require different skills sets
- Barriers to entry are falling
School has maintained its authority because diplomas have remained a gateway to prosperous adulthood. That’s becoming less and less the case. Capacity to follow directions and maintain responsibility remains useful, but it’s a less likely path to success. Instead, the requisite capacity is being able to manage complexity and make decisions in the face of uncertainty. Thriving adulthood has more to do with soft skills and autonomous living than it does with getting the gold star.
Of course, parents look to school because they want to keep their kids safe, put them in position to succeed as adults, offer them a chance to socialize, and assure their personal development. And there are things that kids want from school, including to have fun with friends and to experience success.
The barriers to satisfy these interests are falling. Increases in online curriculum, pathways to diploma certification, legitimacy of distance education, and illegitimacy of institutional authority are resulting in innovations that threaten to disrupt the status quo.
Can you imagine earning your high school diploma from the local karate club? Or an urban explorers’ club? Or a flexible network of edupreneurs? It’s become less and less costly to develop alternatives that serve more localized needs. While the institution incentivizes control and predictability, the irony is that relevant skills result from autonomy and self-direction.
School has maintained its authority because diplomas have remained a gateway to prosperous adulthood. That’s becoming less and less the case. Capacity to follow directions and maintain responsibility remains useful, but it’s a less likely path to success. Instead, the requisite capacity is being able to manage complexity and make decisions in the face of uncertainty. Thriving adulthood has more to do with soft skills and autonomous living than it does with getting the gold star.
My view is that the classroom can remain relevant. Many organizations have already transitioned away from prescriptive success towards intrinsic success because those are the qualities that the future requires. For me, that means supporting students to commit to goals of their own choosing, document their efforts as they go, and make connections between what they’re doing and the requirements of their course credits. As their teacher, I thrive in transitioning away from the role of director and administrator towards that of auditor and mentor.
The question to be asked is not ‘is innovation is required’, but ‘to what extent are you participating’?
Meet the Expert(s)
Eric Rosenberg
Teacher, facilitator, and curriculum designer
Eric Rosenberg is a teacher, facilitator, and curriculum designer. With training in finance, fine art, and education – Eric’s work brings learning from each of these disciplines to his life coac...
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