Relationships in schools

Schools as purposeful communities

To a large extent schools have been modelled as "factories" for "educating" (processing) children . In factories people have largely fixed roles and undertake predetermined activities. To a large extent relationships are incidental and good relationships are optional.

But at their best, schools have been also been purposeful communities in their own rights. While many universities have moved towards being online certification factories, many schools have worked hard to become genuine communities in which people work together on the basis of their relationships, and their respective roles are dynamic, rather than fixed.

3Rs: Rules, Roles and Relationships

Roles are often defined in largely fixed and imposed rules about authority and responsibility. On the other hand, relationships have to be continually constructed and reconstructed by those involved. They are constructed around shared purposes and values and the mutually acceptable ways and means of achieving them.

Over time, relationships are built around agreements that may sound like rules, but are fundamentally dynamic, negotiable and situational rather than fixed. And all parties are mutually responsible for their contributions to the effectiveness of the working relationship.

There are numerous such "rules" relating to relationships in schools, for example,

• Wherever possible, work with others on the basis of relationships, rather than roles 
• Good working relationships are not optional
• When relationships fail revert to roles and keep working together
• No mind reading, rescuing - talk through any relationship issues
• Share what you know about what is happening
• Work together to improve what is happening
• Make it easier for the next person to do well
• We don't have to like each other - but it helps by making things easier
• Strive for agreement and consensus as much as possible
• Don't stress:  all decisions are interim decisions: what has been decided for now
• ...

Suggestion:

• Consider using this (and other posts) as a discussion starter for your staff team
• How do rules, roles and relationships operate in our school?

Self Organisation is new the purpose of Education

Compliance or self organisation?

Someone once said: "The future isn't what it used to be". This is certainly true for education where the timeline for a basic education (20 years) is much longer than the foreseeable future. This has big implications for the planning and organisation of schooling. 

The industrial age arose from the use of new technology in highly organised ways. The result was factories supported by schooling that prepared people to be compliant and organised by managers. In many ways, schools were education "factories", teachers were "managers", and "production" was determined by the "owners of the factories". Learning was treated as "work" and students as "workers".

Now there are many fewer factories, new technology continue to disrupt work and, as a result, work is increasingly difficult to organise in systemic ways, and there is growing uncertainty about the future of work itself.

To the extent that they remain "factories" and promote compliance over self organisation, schools are less and less relevant to the present and future of today's students.

Schooling for self organisation

Designing education faces an enormous challenge. A basic education takes the first 20 years of a person's life and we can't envisage what the future world in general, and work in particular, will be like in a fraction of that time.

Self organisation occurs in personal and social contexts

• Learning for self organisation requires high levels of social and emotional learning

Perhaps the only things that are certain about the future are that the

• The current rate of change will continue and increase
• Uncertainly about the future of education and work will increase accordingly
• Planning education will be increasingly difficult 
• Preparing people for new forms of compliance will be counter productive
• Individual and shared success will depend on innovation and agility as all levels
• Education will need to utilise and promote self organisation 
• Educators should revisit constructivism 
• The "factory owners" may be in charge, but they are no longer in control
• Planning and policy making need to reflect the emerging reality

There are systems of education that are already addressing these issues

• Finland
• Big Picture
• Negotiated studies
• Real-time project learning
• ...

Managing for self organisation

People are self organising around ideas, things, situations...

Principals and schools systems need to develop management systems that support and support self organisation. Schools with mature self organisation are focused, resilient and continually improving what they do.

The challenge for Principals and system administrators is to acknowledge that while they may be in charge, they are not really in control. But that is OK - people want to do the best for those they work with. 

Collaborative self-organisation emerges* in everyday conversations. Principals, and system administrators need to lead and focus these conversation on success and well-being for all

•  There are only two outcomes:  Success and Well-being

The meaning of "success and well-being" needs to be continually constructed (and re-constructed) by those involved. For one student it might be getting through a whole day at school. For another it could mean engaging in a national science competition or undertaking a pre-tertiary course while in Year 10.

[*More on Nurturing Emergence]

Core rules for Staff - Working with Students

What is expected of the school and its staff?

There is an almost universal madness about schools at the moment:  "Mass standardised testing of students can measure how well a school is doing its job". 

Really? I don't think so!! That is like using the speed of motor vehicles to measure the quality of roads or the vehicles or the drivers. It just isn't that simple.

• "Not everything that counts can be measured" (Einstein) 

Students, families, communities... expect that (for each student), schools and their staff members will

1. Know what matters
2. Do what works
3. Be accountable

These rules have implications for the operation of the school and schools system. 

Partial knowledge of "what matters" and "what works" for each student exists in the student and each person who has engaged with the student including current and previous teachers, other staff, family members, friends... 

Schools and their staff members need to have the ways and means (processes, tools, relationships, culture...) to

• bring this knowledge together and 
• make it available to staff and other stakeholders in a timely manner
• give an account of their actions

The Ultimate Rule - "TANOBWAY"

The law of TANOBWAY

• "There Ain't No One Best Way"

This does not mean that we shouldn't bother with rules, or try to find a better way to do things. Every challenge is an opportunity to achieve improvements

This rule means that we have to continually construct and re-construct our responses to each situation we meet. We have to be mindful (not mindless) and be in the present.

Experience and well articulated  agreed "rules" provide useful starting points from which we can collectively and quickly construct our responses.

Example: When Things Go Wrong

When things go wrong

We tend to think of rules when things go wrong. In particular, we are likely to ask"

• "Who has broken what rules?"

In serious situations this can be important but it rarely improves things in the short term. Often it is difficult, and takes time, to establish responsibility.

In most everyday situations there is a need to take prompt and effective action. So the following "rules" can be helpful in choosing or constructing a response.

When things go wrong

1. Contain situation that has gone wrong
2. Repair any harm done (if possible)
3. Reduce the likelihood of the situation recurring

One "Job Description" for everyone

Rules for Schools (@rules4schools) are not just for students.  At their best they are for everyone:

• staff 
• students
• family members 
• visitors....

One of the ways we make sense of the world is to  simplify it with "rules".

The following "rules" applied to everyone at Riverside Primary School (Launceston, Tasmania Australia)

Job Description

1. Know what is happening
2. Work with others to improve what is happening
3. Make it easier for the next person to do well

The results were amazing - we used 97% of the available teacher time (including senior staff as teachers) for working directly with students.  In a school of 670 students there were times when no-one was "off-class".