I have hopes and dreams for my grandchildren’s education. I have hopes that the next Secretary of Education will help make them possible. I’m not counting on it.
Like other educators, I’ve been intensely focused on Joe Biden’s selection of the next Secretary of Education. The rest of the country may not be, but not for lack of concern about the needs of America’s children. And not for a dearth of thwarted yearnings. However, leadership selection is a trailing indicator of our collective success in coming together to organize and to fight for our hopes.
Persistent inequity and underfunding, especially after decades of emphasis on test-based accountability and privatization, largely unopposed increases in racial and socioeconomic segregation, and four years of leadership by an active opponent of public education bring us to a moment of choice for K-12 public education in the United States: Change or give up on the needs of most of America’s children.
I usually write what I hope are persuasive essays about education policy and other social justice issues. However, the divisiveness of the last election demonstrates that we can’t argue or campaign our way to lasting fundamental change through presidential elections. The change we need begins with building relationships through shared multiracial conversation and struggle.
Today, I offer my hopes for my two grandchildren and the rest of the children with whom they will grow up and live as adults. Maybe these can be conversation starters with others about their own hopes. That is what I think we need to do so that we can work together to push for our hopes for America’s children in the coming years no matter who serves as America’s chief education officer.
I hope they will go to schools where they and their classmates are cared for, known, valued, and respected.
I hope they will experience and learn empathy and respect and that their circle extends across our great diversity to encompass all people.
We all remember how we were treated. How we treat one another is what matters most for how we live together.
I hope they will learn the thinking abilities, concepts, practices, skills, and dispositions required for active participation in a diverse, equitable, democratic society for all students.
I hope they will develop a sense of responsibility and the confidence to struggle with others for that way of living together.
I hope they will learn to make decisions based on evidence, to admit when they are unsure, and change what they think when evidence suggests they are wrong.
Our collective ability to decipher the truth and assume responsibility for one another will determine whether or not we fall further into a destructive out-for-yourselfism pandemic and divisiveness.
If we articulate and coalesce around needs and hopes, the rest will fall into place. That will guide who is chosen for leadership positions from schools to school districts, from state to federal education departments. It will frame what we should stop and start doing to ensure a successful, equitable education for all students.
Arthur H. Camins is a lifelong educator. He writes about education and social justice. He works part-time with curriculum developers at UC Berkeley as an assessment specialist. He retired recently as Director of the Center for Innovation in Engineering and Science Education at Stevens Institute of Technology. He has taught and been an administrator in New York City, Massachusetts, and Louisville, Kentucky. The ideas expressed in this article are his alone.
Follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/arthurcamins