I was very pleased when I saw on twitter this spring that Stephen Hurley proposed bringing edcamp to Toronto. Today we had our first planning session at the Canadian Education Association offices (CEA) on Spadina in Toronto. Eighteen people were present from very diverse backgrounds, all with an interest in education. We spent time discussing our understanding of edcamps and how they are very different from traditional PD. (more about this will follow at a later date). We tossed out dates and possible venues. (Again, more to follow, later). We also met f2f, people we've been in discussions with on twitter. That was fun!
Some key phrases stayed with me from the discussion. The first came from Sean who works for the Section 23 schools in the TDSB. What we are doing is education on the fringe. We are the innovators who are driving education in a new direction, now how do we bring people in?
The next came from Stephen Hurley: the idea of this place called "school" is about to be shattered. Things are changing so rapidly that those educators, administrators and stakeholders who do not begin adapting their practice are going find themselves steamrolled into irrelevancy.
The third came from Jennifer Chan, founder of Exhibit Change. Her words were profound and caused an immediate shift in my understanding of "school improvement plans". We don't work for the Ministry of Education, we don't work for the Superintendents, Directors and Boards of Education - they work for us: the communities, students and educators in which schools exist. If the "school improvement plan" is only talking about what happens within the bricks and mortar, it is failing by limiting growth and possibility. It ignores a key factor: students and teachers do not exist just within a school, they exist within dynamic communities - we need to have community improvement plans of which schools are a part. Teachers don't own the schools. Principals don't own the schools. The Ministry does not own the schools. They belong to all of us. We need to open our doors and let others in.
Some key phrases stayed with me from the discussion. The first came from Sean who works for the Section 23 schools in the TDSB. What we are doing is education on the fringe. We are the innovators who are driving education in a new direction, now how do we bring people in?
The next came from Stephen Hurley: the idea of this place called "school" is about to be shattered. Things are changing so rapidly that those educators, administrators and stakeholders who do not begin adapting their practice are going find themselves steamrolled into irrelevancy.
The third came from Jennifer Chan, founder of Exhibit Change. Her words were profound and caused an immediate shift in my understanding of "school improvement plans". We don't work for the Ministry of Education, we don't work for the Superintendents, Directors and Boards of Education - they work for us: the communities, students and educators in which schools exist. If the "school improvement plan" is only talking about what happens within the bricks and mortar, it is failing by limiting growth and possibility. It ignores a key factor: students and teachers do not exist just within a school, they exist within dynamic communities - we need to have community improvement plans of which schools are a part. Teachers don't own the schools. Principals don't own the schools. The Ministry does not own the schools. They belong to all of us. We need to open our doors and let others in.
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