My Vision and Mission Deconstructed
by Richard Beatty
Richard Beatty
Rethink Education
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Personal Vision
To make the world a
better place around me.
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I acquired my Personal Mission before I had a Personal Vision. The Mission should proceed from the vision, but it didn't work out that way for me. This Vision Statement came after I heard these words in a podcast where principals were interviewing one another and one of them said something like “I just try to make the world and better place around me”. These words stuck in my head, especially since they were right in line with what I considered my foundational default positions which I have now labeled my “Personal Mission”. I liked the way the words sounded and used them when I was thinking about and writing my Personal Vision Statement.
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Personal Mission
To cause the least amount of harm as possible while contributing to human flourishing as much as possible.
To believe as many true things as possible while disbelieving as many false things as possible.
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My Personal Mission is really just my relabeling what has become my foundational default positions. These words describe what I have always strove for, and what continues to drive me. Even though I just adopted them a few years ago, they seem to have been with me since I was a child. The harm part was adopted from Sam Harris’s Moral Landscape. The true things part is from Matt Dillahunty who chants it like a mantra. It is my sincere believe that these are some of the wisest words ever assembled.
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Educational Vision
To prepare students
for an unpredictable future.
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The ultimate goal of any educational system is to prepare students for a future that no one can predict. This seems like an impossible task, but there are means of achieving this ambitious Vision. The inspiration and plan of action came from reading three Foundational Texts (Link coming soon!).
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Educational Mission
To create leaders, equipped with
21st Century Skills,
who are capable of creating a future where humans flourish.
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Leading is a critical component of learning.
To prepare students for an unpredictable future, we must create leaders, equipped with 21st Century Skills, who can create a future of their own making. One way of dealing with uncertainty is to intentionally change things to make them more certain.
The 21st Century Skills are the skills identified as necessary for a quality life and career in the 21st Century, the century we are living in now. This is important since many of the skills emphasized in education today were important in the 19th and 20th centuries, but may not be as important today. Many 21st century experiences did not exist 10 to 20 years ago. Preparing for these new experiences requires a shift in emphasis in necessary skills.
The leaders referred to here are students and educators (teachers, coaches, administrators, and curriculum developers).
Students must become leaders, as opposed to passive followers, passive listeners who regurgitate information. They must become leaders to lead partners, groups, and activities as they develop their learning skills. Students must become leaders of their own learning.
Educators must foster their own skills as leaders since they are leaders in the own classrooms, of professional groups, committees, and communities. They must also become leaders of their own learning and development.
The future of the human animal. Humans have created a world that may shortly become inhospitable to human life. A major shift in human activity is necessary for continued human survival. But, survival should not be the end goal. Humans have the capacity to create a world where humans can flourish. We know enough right now to understand basic, and extended, and what we don’t know we have the capacity to learn. We have the skills to create conditions where our needs are met, and where we don’t we can create. This is the drive to learning. This is essence of education, to make the world a better place.
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