Until you take responsibility for all of it

…you can change none of it.

A crisis of leadership

Our world is run by suited men in perpetual fight or flight mode. It’s no state to be making decisions in. Reactionary behaviour from our primitive lizard brains. Playing the blame game. Believing our own lies because the alternative is keeping track of them and there are so many it’s impossible.

This is no way to lead.

True leaders are masters of positive change. Their decisions come from passionately held values. Their strength comes from standing for what they know to be right and always acting in accordance with it. They are creative because they act on their learning, never afraid to take responsibility. Their head is in sync with their heart.

The world is in crisis. We have too few true leaders, too many pretenders.

Education is partly to blame. Children are raised systemically to follow orders. To follow instructions. Not to be too passionate. To conform.

All in unison, “Good morning, Mr McTaggart”.

Children never have to lead. Their work has no audience. Assessment tasks are inauthentic. Projects are never deployed so feedback comes in the form of arbitrary marks and subjective comments from overwhelmed teachers.

Little wonder young adults don’t know what to do with their lives. They’ve never done anything of real value. They’ve never been asked to provide for their community. They’ve never created anything for a true purpose. Schools don’t offer that.

We segregate our children to their own age group. We restrict their opportunities to impact younger children or to work with older mentors. A child gets one or two minutes of their teacher’s attention each day. Maybe a few more from their parents when they get home.

Great leaders may be forged in fire but they’re impaired by our schools and limp communities. It takes a village to raise a child but all they get is a wave and an iPad.

Once, children had a role to play. Rites of passage formalised their responsibilities and status in the community. Now, children float from ad to fad without a cause. Many struggle to take responsibility for their own behaviour. It rarely improves with adulthood. With no power comes no responsibility. No chance or reason to lead. Too few true leaders to model. Obviously, this goes beyond schooling to how we structure our communities but schools are often the hub of otherwise disparate collections of people.

It could be different. Higher expectations for young people. Authentic work. Children could hold visible and vital roles in society. Maybe we could stop tucking them out of the way all day. Get schools into the world. Get the world into schools. You have to be part of the world to be part of the change. Forget mere engagement, young people might even be enrolled in their learning. Many more young people could find their calling and lead the way; true leaders with a purpose beyond empty power. Young people are so much more capable than what we give them credit for!

We have a crisis of leadership in all parts of society. Our education system is partially to blame. It could become a large part of the answer. Let us help students to follow their passions down the rabbit hole. Let us encourage them to wrestle head-on with the world’s problems. Let us allow children to take responsibility for change in the world, however small. Young people will stand up and be counted if we the educators will stop pushing them back down again and instead encourage them to lead the change.