Edu Change & Student Advocacy

     Education, among many things, is about opportunities. Right? If Education is about creating, utilizing and benefiting from opportunities, then consider how often we say ‘yes.’ Or rather, consider how often we say and hear the word ‘no.’ Saying the word ‘yes’ is often harder that it seems and quite often the opposite of what we naturally do. Yes, we say ‘no’ more often and much easier. Indeed, a survey conducted a few years ago at UCLA reported that the average one-year-old child hears the word ‘No!’ more than 400 times per day. Might seem crazy, but think about how often we tell a child ‘no’…sometimes repeatedly in several seconds. You could argue that more active, or even creative children, might even hear the word ‘no’ even more often.       Simply, we all grow up hearing all of the things we can’t or shouldn’t do. When we get to school, and advance through educational systems, we tend to hear ‘no’ far more often than we hear ‘yes.’ Walk o...

     FEAR . It’s a crippling and stifling condition that is not conducive to many positive things - including learning. But that is exactly the overwhelming conditional plight in education. Everyone is scared. That’s right scared. We are scared to ask questions, deviate, experiment and especially FAIL.      Fear of Failure is a well-known challenge or hurdle that prevents anything truly great from happening. All major progress and successes throughout time were made possible by experiencing and navigating failure. It is well documented that trying new things, then re-designing them after documenting how they failed, ultimately leads to greater success. So, if we are afraid to fail, then we are essentially afraid of getting to a higher level of success. We are essentially afraid to learn and adjust from our mistakes – also simply called real learning. (courtesy of Emily'sQuotes.com)      In schools, teachers are afraid to d...