The Air Between Two Hands: Parts, Wholes, and Holistic Wellbeing
A reflective essay written as part of the WISE Emerging Leaders program. The concept of holistic wellbeing, for me, is intrinsically linked with the concept of wholeness: bringing awareness to, and caring for the entirety of our being. The word holistic is derived from the Greek word holos, meaning all, whole, or entire, and is associated […]
What Does COVID-19 Mean for SDG 4’s Future?
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a collection of goals set by the United Nations to achieve better lives and future for all. There are 17 goals that are interconnected and address multiple challenges facing humanity ranging from poverty, inequality, quality education to gender and environmental issues. It is extremely important that these goals are […]
Measuring Success of Systemic Impact: Be Fine with Letting Go
A reflective essay written as part of the WISE Emerging Leaders program. My last memory as a teacher is of being in front of a school, surrounded by students, who were either disappointed or relieved, some crying. It was their last year in secondary school, brought to an end by the baccalauréat, the french national exam allowing […]
Introduction: Reimagining Education
There is a fantastic quote from the German philosopher Hannah Arendt “Education is the point at which we decide whether we love the world enough to assume responsibility for it, and by the same token save it from that ruin which except for renewal, except for the coming of the new and the young, would […]
Do Children need to go ‘Back to School’?
Wherever we look for the origin of schools, it is usually defined by ‘studying’ subjects and being separate from the everyday reality of work and personal life. Nothing could be more wrong. Right now, we are falling short of providing education for all, including seeing some of the biggest decline in well-being, and the current rapid changes […]
Developing Student Agency in South Australia Seeing Our Learners Anew—’Don’t Waste A Crisis’
“Don’t waste a crisis”. I’ve heard this statement many times during the COVID-19 months. To me, this means thinking about how we work with new worldviews about teaching and learning, having had the rug pulled out from under us. If deep learning requires an emotional shock/trigger, then having our daily behavioral patterns, habits and routines […]
The New Success for our Learning Future
Crises both disrupt and reveal. Every single human being across our globalized world has been impacted by COVID-19, and this moment has revealed deep structural inequities and outdated principles and priorities across societies. This is particularly true for our understanding of schooling, and how it reflects our emerging learning economies. If this moment offers us […]
Using the Crisis to Reimagine Educational Systems and Practices
The Nobel Prize winning economist Milton Friedman once wrote: “Only a crisis—actual or perceived—produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically […]
Accelerating Action for System-Change in Education
The apparent pause in the earth’s spinning brought about by the global Coronavirus pandemic, is a time for profound reflection and reappraisal of the most fundamental things we used to take for granted. It is a time to recalibrate our values and the entrenched socio-cultural norms and misguided priorities according to which we have been […]
Creating a Better Future Through Equality in Education
‘Civilization is a race between education and catastrophe.’ – H.G. Wells Over 1 billion children are out of school in over 140 countries around the world due to COVID-19. Schools, teachers and governments have responded in creative ways to ensure students continue their education during this difficult time. EdTech companies are offering their products for free to […]