Why am I writing this personal entry? Well, it is not an attempt to gain any sympathy. It attempts to show what is possible if a clear intention and goal serve the learner's needs. In May of 2022 just near the end of another fantastic school year, I do not remember what happened. But, I was unable to finish the school year and was unable to teach the following year. Why? On May 21st, 2022, I fell down a flight of 16 stairs (luckily carpeted) from the 2nd to 1st story of our home. I was found at the bottom of the stairs. I was found foaming at the mouth. This would lead to a 2-month hospital stay which included an induced coma because my seizures would not stop, several rounds of lumbar punctures, and relearning basic physical movements like something as simple as being able to roll in the hospital bed. Simply put, when I was admitted to the hospital, I was diagnosed as being “critically ill.” Please take a moment and read those words: critically ill. They are not terms that are
One of the great stories of Innovation shared in Innovator's Mindset is that of Blockbuster and Netflix. A part of the story that I’d like to reflect on is the failure of Netflix. Most of us didn’t know about it because we didn’t have a personal interest in Netflix, yet. The graph below is taken from a series that Derek Bennington did at Chief Innovator. As you can see Netflix was not an instant success. They lost money for years before they began to grow.
In a meeting four years ago, our assistant superintendent for teaching and learning Dr. Dana Monogue began by drawing a curve on the board similar to this:
She noted that the gains in our district had flatlined. Yes we were one of the highest performing district in the state now, but we weren’t preparing learners for tomorrow. She put forth the challenge that we needed to change our model before we lost touch with the workplace of tomorrow and saw negative gains.
She next drew a second curve that represented a shift in practice, an attempt to innovate.
As you can see by this graph and the Netflix graph, they begin with loses. That day Dr. Monogue told us something I had never heard an administrator say before. She communicated that our test scores might go down at first, but that’s ok. She let us know that she believed that short term losses are what long term success is built upon. Innovation requires a commitment to your goal and sticking to it.
It is one of those moments that I cling to as an educator. It told me that my administration trusted me to be an agent of change, my failures didn’t define me, and they knew learning was more than just a score. They understood that to innovate one must lose before growing.
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