“Are you with me now” A J Ryder
My Uncle – Graham Parsons
“I’m headed for the nearest foreign border
Vancouver maybe just my kind of town
Cause they don’t keep the kind of law and order
That tends to keep a good man underground.”
Catch You on the Rebound – Brenton Wood passed away January 3, 2025, Oogum Boogum – Enrique – Much thanks for the reminder
Well this time I rebounded and made it into Canada and I can tell you things are humming there. It is like walking into a different world. Everyone was moving on up. I visited six schools, met with the Commissioner of Education Brian O’Leary, the Superintendent of the Winnipeg Division Matt Henderson and loads of students, advisors, principals and community members. Yes, it was freezing. As a matter of fact, it was way below freezing. Minus 20 was the norm but hearts and hands were warm. What is going on between the US and Canada only brought about a grander unity there. And according to many that sense of ‘one from many’ was on the wane.
On my last day in Winnipeg, I attended a half-day meeting of all principals and admins in the district. They worked on their strategic plan which was my kind of strategic plan. For 33,000 students and 78 schools, it was only one page. I’m attaching it because it is so well done. For starters there are no straight lines here and no school buildings. It is an en plen air – an outdoors plan – a GTFO plan, A plan where the learning is outside, not in. That’s a powerful statement made through an image. Their superintendent Matt Henderson opened up the meeting emphatically stating this is where we are and where we are going and framing the budget ideologically rather than driven by bean counting. Then everyone got to work. Big Picture design and Indigenous Education were melded together and front and center. It felt like Namahana. Just larger.
In schools I visited both big and small, I saw the beginnings of advisory and project-based learning becoming interest-based learning where the work of students was their work and not schoolwork. It is so nice to be part of this change. One student invented a mosquito zapper. It is something that is sorely needed when it is not freezing. Come to Winnipeg in the summer and find out for yourself.
On my Zoom this week with Civics Unplugged and they do mean unplugged, we had another deep and focused conversation about their long-haul plan. And then… kismet struck again. The whole conversation was about scarcity and abundance when just two weeks ago Pam Roy recommended a book I'm halfway through called The End of Scarcity: The Dawn of the New Abundant World by Kristen Ragusin. When I told Josh and Nick about the book, they had never heard of it but lo and behold, they came up with the same theme. How the hell does that keep on happening? Synchronicity? Their way forward is very similar to what the book is about. Both are important for our work with youth. Way more to come on this one.
My AI foible of the week
Darlene’s 90-year-old cousin Padraic Horkan still runs a pub in her hometown of Swinford, Ireland.
Not long ago, a couple came into the pub and asked Padraic,
“Do you have internet?” Padraic said, “No, I want you to talk to each other.”
Well today, I had my first argument with an AI bot. I was calling for a room at a hotel and this bot thing got on and refused to let me talk to a real person and then honestly, it got uppity with me. It was my first encounter with a bot losing its cool with me and not the other way around. Scary! Shades of Padraic! Shades of HAL! Padraic, I really do want to talk to someone but now it seems like I can’t get through. In the proposal last Sunday that Andrea, Scott, Andrew and I wrote to Google we made it clear we want a person who works with a ‘personal’ bot in our design for working with students.
Next week, I will take a quick trip to Nashville to join Sonn on a BPL Guided Experience for the Deeper Learning Group.
On the first day I woke up in Canada I turned on the news and for Black History Month, Hall of Fame pitcher Ferguson Jenkins, a Canadian was honored. I had no idea he was Canadian and was the first Canadian inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Be well
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