October 4, 2023
Shortly after announcing a new OESIS event, I couldn’t help but notice Debra Wilson’s inaugural Independent School Magazine article as the new NAIS President. Sanje’s initial announcement said, “The conference will go beyond curriculum and pedagogy, the central themes of OESIS conferences, and focus on culture and school purpose.” Debra writes, “Over the past three years I have noticed a remarkable shift in interest around purpose in our community.” After years of calling out NAIS for a lack of willingness to address the limitations of the current governance structure to effectuate strategic change, is it possible that OESIS is now more in alignment with NAIS goals? Is Debra Wilson a “person of courage,” somebody who is brave and tells the truth, suggesting that the school purpose conversation “will lead us to an independent school renaissance…?” What I know of Debra tells me that she will potentially be successful, even though she faces some difficult challenges. Let’s look more closely at the three key themes Debra identifies as being a part of the purpose conversation. I would describe them as opportunities, and as such, they could be very exciting. But as any leadership organization will tell you, with opportunities come threats or challenges, and the most successful leaders and organizations assign equal weight to both.
Debra’s key themes are student success, student preparedness, and public purpose. As she points out, the criteria for student success is a moving target right now. Several trends are threatening our traditional ideas of success, not the least of which is the decline of the higher education model as it is currently structured. The strength of the second meritocratic era will likely sustain the cadre of hard-working affluent talent flowing from our most elite schools to the most elite colleges and universities. But outside that cadre, student success will be defined in broader terms and require schools to rethink purpose and culture through programs and curriculum.
Student preparedness is even more challenging and potentially more rewarding. Amidst the cultural pressures associated with student success, “lawn-mower” or “helicopter” parents and other well-meaning adults have reduced children’s autonomy, making the discovery of purpose more difficult. Combine minimal autonomy with a global pandemic, and you have the perception of a lack of control and resulting mental health challenges. If we’re honest with ourselves, we can admit that we have no idea what the future holds. Just as Navy SEALS are trained to respond to almost anything, our students must also learn the flexibility and earned confidence to face problems we cannot even imagine. In doing so, we’ll have to ask ourselves the hard questions about the size and emphasis of our current curriculum and whether it serves our kids’ best interests.
NAIS has touted the theme of public purpose for several years, and with good reason. Not only do our students and schools learn that they are part of something that is larger than themselves, but we also fulfill our public obligations as not-for-profit organizations. I will not pursue the slippery slope that emerges from equating public purpose with financial accessibility. The reality is that some schools have embraced public purpose as a mindset and a philosophy, realizing that required community service, while it may serve a purpose, is not a public purpose. I am reminded of true public purpose by a school in Texas that converted their maker space into a mask manufacturing operation during COVID. The efforts of their students resulted in a significant contribution to their local community.
Despite the cautions, an inaugural address is usually upbeat and filled with hope. I spent too long in an independent school to believe in anything other than the need for hope. But we are all familiar with the best ideas at our schools crashing down because we lacked the capacity for change or did not anticipate the response from one or more of the many constituencies that have an interest in our schools. So, while we sort out the intricacies of the three themes Debra writes about, we must also be mindful of other threats awaiting us. Our schools are operating with a financial model that resembles a house of cards. We face the dual existential challenge of enrolling the students we most want and affordability. Accreditation has been affectionately called an “old boys club” with a “you scratch my back…” philosophy rather than a serious, objective, and measurable process for school improvement. Politics has infused our schools in the form of misguided agendas to the point that all of our inclusion, equity, and social justice initiatives are dividing our communities rather than bringing them together. And into this maelstrom comes a seemingly new imperative to define school purpose.
It is a tall order for any organization to tackle, and the jury is out regarding whether it will be addressed successfully with new leadership at NAIS. I have every confidence in Debra Wilson, whom I have known for a number of years, but she can’t do this alone. She needs the support of her Board and every member school out there.
Thank you for this, Joel. For whatever reasons, independent educators appear to be asking the right questions nowadays. I hope that these questions are welling up from deep within rather than from the noted financial challenges or existential fears.
“What are schools ultimately FOR?” is the right question to be asking. I think you’ll find that Debra Wilson is aiming high with a bow and arrows made of the finest materials. Let us hope that she will have the courage of her convictions and BE encouraged by those around her. What might be called the perennial philosophy of education–the modus vivendi of the best educators and finest schools of the last 2,500 years at least–is that the End or first purpose of education is Virtue. If a school establishes this as the Goal, and if the school is tooled up for it, then all the other goals (what I believe Aristotle called the “natural goods”), of which we have a longish list (and which most parents unfortunately value the most), will come to students as a matter of course. The High-Aim Philosophy of education ensures many goods. But it does not work the other way round (as we have seen over the last decades): If lesser ends are pursued as the Main Thing, then not only does Virtue not happen but the other valued goods happen only for the Few (those born with exceptional intellectual power — 10% to 15% of the population?) and the Few too often turn out intellectual barbarians. Even skills development is not the end but the “byproduct” of the premier scholastic experience. We have been stuck with the Sophists in the belief that Virtue is a matter of developing skill in particular arts. Socrates excoriated the Sophists by declaring, “We asked for VIRTUE and you give us a swarm of virtues.” Thence he defined Virtue as the overarching skill in being human as such. This is what the Navy SEAL possesses: He or she has developed Character while learning many particular skills. And making Virtue the end of education is a Goal about which both good pagans and religious people can agree!