Tag: sacred cows

To Redesign Our Schools, Post-Pandemic, We Need to Remove Some Sacred Cows

Posted on | by Sam

Watch this video. What do you see?

Literally, of course, it’s a sacred cow. And what strikes me is how everyone around it unconsciously adjusts what they do, to the point that the cow has become all but invisible to the chaos of a morning commute.

We have sacred cows here, too — but whereas in Nepal they literally block traffic, in America they block our ability to think in new ways. And I can think of no aspect of our shared public life with more sacred cows than America’s schools:

Grades. Bells. Schedules. Credit Hours. Classrooms. Tests. Transcripts. Homework. 180 days. Age-based cohorts.

And the list could go on.

For this reason, we produced a short film series that looks at a few of these structures, and how and why they need to change. Here’s one of them:

But more importantly, what can each school do to better understand which sacred cows are blocking traffic, and which, if removed, would best improve the quality of learning flow for kids?

Try doing this exercise with your entire school community:

  1. Name as many “sacred cows of schooling” that exist in your school and/or district as you can
  2. Number these along a continuum of least imposing (1) to most imposing (10), in terms of which prevent you from doing your best work for kids.
  3. Now, rate the same list according to which would be easiest to remove, (10) and which would be hardest (1).
  4. Add the two numbers together.
  5. Take note of the sacred cows with the highest total. These are the habits and structures that are the biggest obstacles, and the easiest to remove.
  6. Start with those, by thinking about the ways in which you could either replace, revise, or remove them from your school’s overall learning culture.
  7. Rinse. Repeat.

WHY DO WE STILL TREAT EDUCATION LIKE IT’S 1906?

Posted on | by Sam

Why do we still use a 19th-century invention— The Carnegie Unit—to determine if our kids are ready to graduate in 2019?

Also, what the heck is a Carnegie Unit?

Watch the latest video in our #AskWhy series  — a series that has now been viewed by more than ten million of you — to find out.

The same way may not be the best way.

What are the sacred cows of American schooling?

Posted on | by Sam | 13 Comments on What are the sacred cows of American schooling?

This year, 180 Studio joined forces with ATTN and Education Reimagined to produce a four-part video series challenging mainstream thinking about some of the “sacred cows” of American schooling.

Our goal was to spark reflection on two fundamental questions: How should we continue to think about the structure and purpose of public education? And which rituals and habits from our collective past should we hold onto — and which should we let go of, in order to reimagine teaching and learning for a rapidly changing world? 

As of today, I’m pleased to say that more than five million of you have watched, shared, and/or commented on our examinations of 1) our love of letter grades, 2) our overreliance on rote memorization, 3) our dependence on classrooms, and 4) our habit of grouping kids based solely on their age.

If you missed an episode, here’s how to watch and learn more.

Episode 1: Memorization

Episode 2: Classrooms

Episode 3: Ages

Episode 4: Grades

And if we do additional episodes, and tackle additional sacred cows, which ones would you most want us to explore?

To Remodel American Education, We May Need to Slaughter Some Sacred Cows

Posted on | by Sam

Watch this video. What do you see?

 

Literally, of course, it’s a sacred cow. And what strikes me is how everyone around it unconsciously adjusts what they do, to the point that the cow has become all but invisible to the chaos of a morning commute — and how ridiculous that is.

We have sacred cows here, too — but whereas in Nepal they literally block traffic, in America they block our ability to think in new ways. And I can think of no aspect of our shared public life with more sacred cows than America’s schools:

Grades. Bells. Schedules. Credit Hours. Classrooms. Tests. Transcripts. Homework. 180 days. Age-based cohorts.

And the list could go on.

For that reason, 180 Studio and ATTN are partnering on a new series, Ask Why, that is designed to help us reflect on a fundamental question:

How should we continue to think about the structure and purpose of public education? Which rituals and habits from our collective past should we hold onto — and which should we let go of in order to reimagine teaching and learning for a rapidly changing world?

So stay tuned for the first few episodes in the series — and keep your eyes open for sacred cows. They’re everywhere.

Why We Need To Kill Our Darlings

Posted on | by Sam

Every writer knows what it means to “kill your darlings.”

It’s a reminder that there will be times when you’ve written a beautiful sentence, or a paragraph — perhaps even a whole character or scene — and yet you may need to leave them on the cutting room floor, if it turns out they no longer fit into the larger picture of what you’re working on.

That’s what editing does — it forces you to make tough decisions in service of crafting a final piece in which everything finds its rightful place.

I see this same problem everywhere in modern school reform. Ours is a crowded landscape of sacred cows — filled with competing beliefs, priorities, and acronyms. But here’s the thing: if we’re serious about collaboration — and the good news is I see a greater willingness to think collaboratively right now than any other time in my career — then all of us, to some degree, are going to have to kill our darlings.

That doesn’t mean we sacrifice what defines us, it doesn’t mean we compromise on our values, and it doesn’t mean we keep nothing of what we’ve built up to this point. But it does mean that if you’re serious about building a diverse coalition, and you’ve reached a point of having a pretty fabulous five- (or four- or six-) point vision of the future, then you need to be willing to break down — and then rebuild — your core vision and strategy with others.

That won’t work if the people you want to collaborate with aren’t fundamentally interested in the same set of core questions to drive their work. And it won’t work if anyone falls too deeply in love with their own ideas or language.

It will work, however, if we believe strongly enough in the processes we went through to make those darlings in the first place. It will work if we are willing to answer anew the questions we feel are most important to reimagining education for a changing world. And it will work if we realize that what matters most is not our list or our language or our framing — but our willingness to re-engage in the work with a wider net of partners.

That’s how movements are born. The goal is not to show people your own most beautiful pictures; it’s to hold up a mirror together and each be prepared to describe what we see.