Great Expectations in Education
We achieve greatness when we hold high expectations for learning communities, not just students.
Once upon a time, I lived the educator’s dream. Together with a team of passionate teachers and incredible students, I helped create a learning community that was truly transformational. As students and educators, we took a deep dive into our values and found purpose. We each came to own the learning process and give it meaning. The educators reflected deeply on their practice and wielded their pedagogy intentionally. We all grew as people, coming to better understand ourselves, the world, and our place within it. We achieved greatness.
This greatness was the result of high expectations. Every stakeholder involved held high expectations for the others. Then, we supported one another and collaborated toward creating our learning space and culture. Informed by research about learning, we collaboratively built a framework for the pedagogy, program, and curriculum. We regularly sought and responded to student and educator feedback and needs. The educators didn’t award grades or assess performance. They supported the students in giving the learning meaning and shaping accountability. And, it was powerfully rigorous. We achieved greatness because we leaned into the notion that individual growth was dependent upon having a supportive and challenging community of learning.
Principle of Learning and Teaching #9:
Aim for greatness and believe in everyone’s capacity to achieve it.
Holding high expectations has long been a refrain among educators who want to serve every student, not just those who arrive in class ready to perform. In traditional pedagogy, high expectations are about grades, test scores, and behavior. They are about success in performing the role of student — receive the content and prove “mastery” by regurgitating it. The role of the educator is to offer content in a compelling way and hold students accountable for meeting standards.
You don’t have to look far to find evidence of the failure of this approach. Teachers’ unions, administrators, and policy makers battle over who is responsible for the lack of greatness in our system. In my work with students in the college transition, even those who achieved “greatness” through exceptional grades and test scores had no sense of purpose or meaning beyond college admissions. As competitive as college admissions can be, this is a painfully low bar for achievement. It’s rooted in meritocratic assumptions that only some can be great.
Achieving great outcomes in education requires high expectations for learners and educators. But, it requires more than that. It also requires collaboration among the entire learning community toward a common goal. It requires critically examined and clearly articulated values. Achieving greatness isn’t about putting all of the right inputs into students so they spit out the right outputs. It is about creating a focused community rooted in personal responsibility and reciprocal support. Everyone is responsible for great learning and great teaching.
Defining “Greatness”
I assume great achievement in education to be a constant pursuit of understanding the world and ourselves so that we can live our lives in alignment with our values. Greatness can be seen in the quality of questions learners ask, the humility with which they pursue understanding, and their ability to effectively bring others into the learning process. Greatness is assessed by the learner’s capacity to contribute meaningfully and positively to society.
This framing of greatness assumes every individual has sufficient potential. It does not limit greatness based on learning abilities or challenges. It does not assume race, religion, class, or gender affect potential for greatness. It stands apart from a “greatness” that aligns with meritocracy, where those who “win” in our society deserve it, and everyone else either couldn’t or wouldn’t do the work.
What does this kind of greatness look like in the real world? It’s individuals who embrace the fact that the world is too complex and dynamic for anyone to claim “mastery” of anything. They acknowledge what they don’t know, focus on asking good questions, and seek others to share in their curiosity. They contribute to communities not by competing to be seen as the person with the answers, but by bringing people together to collaboratively build understanding, take calculated risks, and constantly improve outcomes. They serve by observing the realities of others, critically reflecting upon their values, and leveraging their voices to serve the entire community.
Pursuing Greatness as a Teacher
This principle assumes that everyone has the capacity for greatness, including educators. No teacher steps into a learning space ready to deliver humanizing, transformational education. Education is a profession where 44% of new teachers will leave the classroom within five years. And, great teaching requires years of experience and intentional support. It’s crucial that we create learning communities that support educators in their pursuit of greatness. This requires reflective practice, shared ownership of the learning space with students, and an ability to hear and receive feedback.
During my first year in the classroom, a veteran teacher invited four younger teachers to form a team for reflective practice. Each week, we identified a teacher to observe. After asking their permission, we’d each observe for fifteen minutes. Our leader set a strict rule: only observe for and take notes on the things that we liked. On Tuesday afternoons, we’d gather after school to share our observations and discuss how the teacher’s pedagogy and practice challenged our thinking about our own work. We’d then compile the notes and share them with the observed teacher.
Nothing I have done as an educator before or since has had such a dramatic impact on my teaching. I observed effective content engagement and classroom management strategies. I found emotional support in my peers and the fundamentally positive culture of our team. Though the observations reminded me that I was a long way from the greatness I aspired to, they also gave me a sense of hope that I could get there. I learned there is no magic to great teaching. It is about intentionally leaning into my individual strengths and addressing areas for improvement. I needed support as a learner in my school. Unfortunately, many schools fail to create this space and culture for educators. After six weeks of our reflective practice work, the administration forced us to stop out of concern that we might make some colleagues uncomfortable. That argument made no sense to me then, and it still doesn’t now.
When I later led a team of middle school educators, I incorporated observation and reflection into our team’s reflective practice. We then married it with regular inquiry with students and parents. Community meetings, email communications, and phone calls provided deep insight into how our work as educators was succeeding and, at times, failing to support our students. In these communications, we often posed questions related to our mission and vision as a school community. Students and parents shared their perspectives, desires, and fears, helping the faculty shape our understanding of what great achievement looks like. While it was difficult to remain open to feedback and engage in collaborative shaping of the learning community, it had a powerful and humanizing impact on both the students’ and teachers’ experiences.
A Pedagogy of High Expectations
Achieving greatness is no small feat. In a sector heavily shaped by standards, funding formulas, and political agendas far from the classroom, creating or evolving learning communities to support such achievement is incredibly challenging. But, in my experience, small changes can have substantial impacts. As a starting place, consider how your learning space can include:
- Learning that is meaningful to the learner, the educator, and the world;
- A cycle of inquiry driven by curiosity and humility;
- Incorporating academic resources with experiential learning and diverse perspectives to generate understanding of the core subject and how others experience it;
- Learning that seeks to understand how context and core assumptions shape perceptions.
Great educational achievement doesn’t result from individuals effectively playing their respective roles as learners and educators. It’s the result of a cohesive learning community where each stakeholder holds high expectations and has the responsibility to meet high expectations. It’s the result of a culture that recognizes and celebrates that learners and educators are in it together, that no one can succeed without the success of the others. If we want to move past the performative approach toward transformational and humanizing education, this cultural and structural shift in our learning spaces is essential.
This post is part of a series supporting educators in reflecting on their pedagogy and practice. Read the intro to this series If We Don’t Work on Pedagogy, Nothing Else Matters or explore the most recent posts below.
Owning the Responsibility for Learning ← P R E V I O U S
N E X T → Celebrate Learning Over Achievement
