Reading is Fundamental to So Much - Yet Cut

Deficit reduction talks permeate the headlines like an ongoing sport saga. Republicans gain an inch after hours and hours of costly talks. Democrats take back the inch and move the ball a few yards further only to be outmaneuvered with crazy plays that involve billion dollar hail Mary passes and billion dollar blitzes. In this may-lay of budgetary posturing, someone on the sidelines got hurt. And millions will be effected for years to come.

RIF (Reading is Fundamental) ,a small in the scheme of things federal program of $25 million dollars, was cut from the federal budget. While deficit hawks squawk of victory when any money is taken from the government beast, the loss of RIF funding is shortsighted and costly. History is permeated with examples of significant contributions made by Americans who discovered their passion for learning in the sequestered nooks of a library and between the pages of a book.

I love music and the great lineage of learning passed from generation to generation through song. Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Jeff Tweedy, Pete Seeger, and countless other artists who've shaped our American soul with songs of freedom and love were inspired by a man who as a boy found his salvation in books.

Joe Klein's stirring biography of Woody Guthrie details how a next door neighbor and a library card propelled young Woody's lust for learning. Guthrie spent hours in the sanctuary of  a local library immersed in books. Resulting in a hard scrabble but highly literate man whose poetic songs sustained our nation's conscience for social justice during the Great Depression and WW II. RIF took the simple inspirational concept - get kids books -that Woody had to actually strive for as a young boy and made it part of the public school culture.

Reading opens the world. Reading opens the mind. It is the purest form of quality communication available to many disadvantaged students. Text delivery methods have changed. But to assume we all have equal access to the internet and books is a failed assumption similar to thinking everyone had access to books in the 1920's and 1930's. Such a simple and powerful program, with years of effectiveness, being cut is indicative of the tragic loss of long term remedies to short sided posturing.

With 400,000 volunteers RIF's reach was wide, from the red wood forests to the Gulf Stream waters. How many potential passions will go unlit without consistent access to books? If this land is truly made for you and me, why does it seem lately to be made for only a few at the top with money and power to make the world seem like sport. A sport where spectators get hurt, ignored, and shut out.

Woody Guthrie; A Life (http://astore.amazon.com/bew-byrneeducationalworks-20/detail/0385333854)

New York Choices - Elusive but at least Available

It's hard to read Liz Robbins article about New City eighth graders getting into their schools of interest without a sense of longing for Central Pennsylvania.

(http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/29/nyregion/belated-good-news-on-high-school-admissions-for-some-in-ny.html?src=recg)

Last night I sat with parents who bemoaned how their children are undeserved by the standard offerings of their local schools. A one size fits all mentality is so pervasive parents can only hope for teachers giving their students some precious one on one attention, let alone having their child's interest in engineering, art, or music truly inspired by a quality school or program. A school or program precisely dedicated to nurturing each student's individual passions. Instead we are mired in a monopolistic system where incremental change silently stifles student interests year after year.


Imagine instead a true variety of schools in the Central PA region where families choose to go. Rather than a forced choice based on geography, families could explore school offerings aligned to their child's burgeoning interests and strengths at a formative age. Instead of waiting until eighteen or nineteen to make a similar choice for post high school college or training, families could chose a school or program engaging to their child earlier so future opportunities become more realistic and happiness with school prevails.

Some students are so disinterested by the stifling of their passions that school becomes associated only with tedium and boredom. A study of high school students produced a frightening testament to the pervasiveness of boredom.

Students were given pagers and at random points throughout the day beeped. Once alerted students wrote in a journal what they were doing and how they felt. Like the Eskimos who have over a hundred words for snow, the researchers had to develop over a dozen different definitions for boredom. Tedium was so pervasive the researchers were able to distinguish the type of boredom where the clock seems to go backwards from doodling inspired boredom.

Losing one student to this lack of choice and boredom is bad - we lose many more.  Dropout rates are one measure, but consider only the apathy too many students have towards learning. Through the latest internet devices, students experience a specialized globally connected world where relevance is prevalent. When placed in schools and exposed to disengaging and irrelevant curriculum and instruction, many more students drop out mentally from school. This disinterest effects the growth of the individual student, our local community, and our society as a whole.

The majority of schools may still offer the scholarly foundations of producing quality readers, writers, and mathematicians - but if we could increase the offerings our schools may quickly shift from tedium to terrific from compliance to courageous from irrelevant to inspiring.

Robbins article shows customized choice can happen in the complex New York City school system. If choice can happen there, why not in Central PA? Choice spurs satisfaction. So a change in funding where parents have the choice to support their child with a program best suited to support their strengths may change pervasive school bemoaning to inspired satisfaction.

Vouching for School Improvement

Pennsylvania, like so many other states, is struggling with significant revenue shortfalls and rising expenditures for entitlement programs such as government worker pensions and health care. An area of considerable debate during current budgetary negotiations is how to proceed with educational funding. In the past, blocks of money were funneled to local school systems based on formulas that had little or no connection to school performance or school improvement results. A seemingly radical new plan is being proposed to tie funding to school choice. Unfortunately the change with school funding is being associated with an offensive term – vouchers.

Vouchers have come to mean stripping money away from public schools. But vouchers are simply having funding follow the student and their family’s choice of school. So students who are better served by an art curriculum could choose to go to a school with a specialty in art. Or a student who thrives in a mix of on-line and face to face instruction could choose a customized school to best meet their need.

Expecting every student to thrive in schools that hardly vary from system to system takes away opportunities for students to identify and nurture their strengths. So many students get stifled by this lack of choice. In our dynamic economy where so many new opportunities are being developed at a fast pace, stifling students’ strengths stifles our ability as a state and a country to compete globally.

But republicans proudly use the word vouchers to draw a politically charged line in the sand. Democrats embrace the same contentious word. The results are a polarized debate with little connection to the real need for school systems which is measurable and continuous improvement; improvement with measurable results as compared to not just local or state standards but national and even international standards.  Rather than relegating the debate to a simplistic battle over the limited scope offered by the concept of vouchers, let’s examine how the scope of the debate could be expanded to include the very important concept of school improvement.

While the idea of implementing vouchers stirs a hornet’s nest of debate, the idea of creating schools that truly engage learners and fully prepares them for a competitive, global economy stirs an emotive connection in anyone who has, had, or will have a student involved in the K-12 educational system. The drive for global preparedness has led to some admirable achievements and cooperation among divergent groups.

·         The National Common Core Standards were developed by the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, the Council of Chief State School Officers, teachers, post-secondary educators, and civil rights groups. These national standards were formally adopted by forty seven states and US territories.  Efforts are underway to develop a rigorous national assessment based on the Common Core Standards. This collaborative effort sharply hones the idea of making educational standards and accountability efforts universal so educational improvement can be a shared goal among states rather than a disjointed effort between them.

·         The federal government’s Race to the Top initiative has led to unprecedented cooperation among teacher unions, school administrators,  and state legislatures because school systems must earn funding by developing innovative plans with measurable improvement outcomes.  Clearly this level of collaboration among divergent groups with varying interests indicates how emotionally connected we are as a country to the idea of school improvement.

Why in an era where so many groups and leaders are focused on collaborative school improvement efforts are Pennsylvanians getting mired in a contentious debate about vouchers? Perhaps the contention relates to misunderstandings about how vouchers and its ancillary effect of school choice would shift the paradigm in the state and actually lead to a statewide cascade of school improvement.  By suspending the contention of vouchers and shifting the paradigm, we can discuss to how a funding change can effect school improvement.

There are at least three effects that have been proven to improve schools and school systems that would be spurred by a funding change that leads to school choice:

·         Choice leverages change – I recently saw a bumper sticker that said “If nothing changes, nothing changes.”  Our educational system has not significantly changed since the wide spread adoption of the Germanic factory school model over a century ago. Even charter schools that have deemed themselves innovative have made little real progress in improvement outcomes or influencing neighboring schools. However, in many systems with choice, where funding money follows the student, choice has leveraged school improvement.

A local example is the Carlisle Area School District (CASD). Parents in CASD can send their students to any of the seven elementary schools and have a choice between two middle schools. While many parents stay with their assigned schools, the element of choice among the elementary schools in particular leads to a healthy dose of competition. While certainly not cut throat in nature, the pressure of choice leads to a sense of ownership among school leadership teams to have innovative and effective programs that met the needs of all students.

An even more prominent example is the Hawaii school system. Throughout Hawaii parents have the choice of any public school for their child. Since Hawaii is a state wide system, a parent who works thirty miles from home could enroll their child in a better performing school close to their work. If a school’s enrollment increases based on reputation and achievement results the school has more funding to develop innovative programs, hire staff, and provide top quality professional development. Strong leadership teams in Hawaii schools that understand and embrace this dynamic see themselves as not only competing with other public schools but also nationally ranked private schools in Hawaii and even international schools.

A prime example is James Campbell High School (http://campbellhigh.org). In one of the poorest areas of Oahu, Campbell High recognized the importance of going beyond standards and accountability and became competitive at an international level. They were the first public school in Hawaii and one of the first in the whole western US region to gain International Baccalaureate (IB) Accreditation. Students with an IB high school diploma are heavily recruited by colleges and universities because the IB curriculum is steeped in the examination of big questions, quality writing ability, an interconnected curriculum, and a deep understanding of how to best learn.

A category of schools which have chosen to change are frequently termed 90/90/90 schools. These are mostly urban schools whose history of failure was exposed with the institution of state assessments. Their choice after No Child Left Behind (NCLB) was similar to a patient visiting a doctor to deal with a significant weight problem. Their level of failure was so pervasive it was like going to a doctor and having the doctor say, “if you don’t lose 150 pounds you will die soon”.

Faced with the ominous choice of closure or significant funding cuts, these schools embraced change efforts which focused on school level autonomous decision making, rigorous learning expectations, consistent school wide implementation of best instructional practices, and customized learning opportunities for students. These schools are called 90/90/90 schools because their populations are 90% socioeconomically disadvantaged, 90% minority, and have achievement rates 90% or higher. Among educational leaders, the question frequently asked in relation to these shining examples of change through choice is “If this high level of improvement can happen in five schools, why not 5,000?”.

The 90/90/90 schools were at distinct advantage because of the early urgency of their diagnosis. Schools with historic levels of achievement around 60% to 70% received a dissimilar diagnosis from NCLB accountability. Their diagnosis was akin to the metaphorical doctor saying, “You should lose 15 to 20 pounds so you look and feel a bit better”. Fortunately, with the rising accountability expectations coming in 2012, 2013, and 2014 all schools will need to take a hard look at their past and embrace changes to improve outcomes.

By instituting choice statewide, Pennsylvania could promote the same type of urgency towards action found in school systems and organizations with a history of being subject to the influence of choice.  Even industry darlings like Microsoft and Google become complacent when a lack of choice fails to spur improvements. Microsoft’s monopoly with Windows led to a laggard entry into both search and social media technologies. Now with the recent purchase of Skype and the introduction of Bing, Microsoft’s level of innovativeness in the marketplace is gaining respect. Even Google has had to increase its innovative efforts because of the infusion of choice brought on by Facebook.

For so long, schools have been mired in a comfortable monopoly with the effect of stifled improvement. Infusing of the power of choice would jump start improvement efforts statewide.

·         Improved efficiencies – During a recent conversation with a state legislator I was corrected for saying Pennsylvania had 501 school districts. Over the last year two small rural districts consolidated and now, after decades, Pennsylvania has shrunk its number of districts by one. Five hundred school districts now populate the state. With 500 superintendents, 500 business managers, 500 human resource departments, 500 school boards, and many other examples of inefficient duplication.

The effect of this duplication is wide spread inefficiencies which disproportionately take from what affects student learning the most- the interactions and relationships among a teacher and their students. Research from many states shows the percentage of school funding actually tangibly tied to classrooms is often 50% or less. Schools systems are masterful at creating overhead costs not remotely associated with student learning. 

Budgetary efficiencies could be realized by infusing money at the level where it most affects student learning. Stripping away duplicated overhead costs and moving budgetary power to each individual school would lead to more money being infused into the classroom. Empowering principals, school leadership teams, and teachers with more budgetary power would promote intrinsic improvements and lessen the onerous burden of extrinsic mandates from bloated bureaucratic structures.

Since the start of the technological revolution organizations have shifted from hierarchical structures where individual workers have little input to more streamlined flat structures which more effectively engage workers in improvement efforts. Students and families would be well served if schools did the same.

There are too many examples of expensive school district employees doing menial tasks to fill their time. Six figure salaried employees rearranging curricular materials in a closet, organizing testing materials, or drafting lengthy memos which go unread are not uncommon. If those costly hours could be spent directly supporting classroom instruction or school level improvement efforts, efficiencies and student learning gains would increase exponentially.

England adopted a standards and accountability movement similar to No Child Left Behind called Every Child Matters in 2003. Like many US states, England noticed achievement levels flattened after some initial improvement. Taking a cue from 90/90/90 and international schools, England revamped its principal training program to include a heavy emphasis on autonomous and transformational leadership.

No longer were principals expected to be middle managers following a list of directives from above. They were empowered to develop leadership teams so decision making could occur closer to the classroom level. Teams of teacher leaders were charged with ensuring improvements at the school. What resulted were achievement gains and the unforeseen dynamic of principals being recruited by corporations outside of the school system, a true testament to their valued leadership skills.

Similar dynamics are being documented in developing countries. Failed state school systems in Indian, parts of China, and West Africa are being outperformed by small autonomous private schools where budgetary power and decision making is set firmly at the individual school level. James Tooley has documented numerous cases where the poorest students are making significant gains because of dynamic private schools that can operate efficiently, provide reduced tuition, and respond quickly to the needs of the surrounding community.

In New York City, a school of choice called The Equity Project or TEP opened last year. Teachers were paid $125,000. The flood of highly qualified applicants was so overwhelming that a high G.R.E. score was required to even be considered. TEP paid the principal like a professional sports coach – less than the players. And the school had a streamlined structure with very little overhead. The rationale being getting resources to the heart of where student learning is affected most, the classroom. While first year state assessment results where marginal at TEP, most students showed years of growth from where they started the school year. Efficiencies were achieved even though the school’s operations were funding solely from the per pupil rate set for New York City students.   

The common denominator in all of the cases of improved efficiency is choice driving funding closer and closer to the classroom.  If Pennsylvania adopts a funding system where the money follows the students, school systems may not quickly consolidate because of the inherent pride of a local school. But they may realize the value of empowering schools to be more innovative, dynamic, and focused on improvement as a way to attract not only students but as a way to build revenue to attract the best school leaders and classroom teachers.  

In the long term, school systems could further their efficiencies through consolidation of operational costs especially once individual schools become more precisely empowered to concentrate on student learning. Operational costs like human resource management and purchasing could be combined to better spend per pupil funding tied to school choice. Regional collectives and cooperatives could bring economies of scale found in states with larger county wide school systems. Imagine the savings in health care costs when a school system with 400 employees (about the size of York City) is combined with other areas districts to triple or quadruple the size of their purchasing power.

·         Multiplier effect – An argument against choice relies on the age old notion of geography determining school engagement and learning. While overwhelming evidence ties student achievement levels to the socioeconomic level of the family and some recent studies have even hinted at a “motivational gap” in certain geographical areas, one study even suggesting the whole of the United States suffering from a motivational gap, it is impossible to ignore the multiplier effect several positive and influential leaders can have on a community.

While a significant amount of students from low performing schools may not choose to attend schools outside of their locale, it may only take a handful of determined students and families to make a significant difference in their community. The movie “Waiting for Superman” chronicles the efforts of several families in large urban areas to get their children into innovative charter schools. Tragically only a few of the students are lucky enough to be selected in lotteries to attend the alternative schools. Imagine the multiplier effect of those few students getting a quality education and becoming leaders in the same communities where they were raised.

Paul Tough writes about the effect of just one such student in his book Whatever it Takes. Geoffrey Canada grew up in a dilapidated community in Harlem but through a persistent push from his family, he earned a college degree and dedicated himself to improving his community. He now leads the Harlem Children’s Zone, a ninety-seven-block laboratory in central Harlem where he is testing new ideas about poverty in America. His conclusion: if you want poor kids to be able to compete with their middle-class peers, you need to change everything in their lives, their schools, their neighborhoods, even the child-rearing practices of their parents.

Geoffrey Canada was changed because he chose to get a quality education and now he is influencing thousands. Similar zones are being developed in other urban areas. Hawaii’s winning Race to the Top application included developing similar zones in the poorest regions of Oahu.

Geoffrey Canada is just one example of the multiplier effect. Consider your own community and identify those influential individuals. Recent research has suggested that in small to medium size cities ten such individuals can make a considerable difference. Conversely, influential individuals who don’t have the choice of a quality education can still be influential but in a negative way – crime, graft, and corruption may be their only understanding if not given the opportunity to choose a different path through educational opportunity.

Pennsylvania has an opportunity to apply the multiplier effect through school choice and influence improvement efforts not just in schools but in whole communities. The power of several individuals to change a community is real, but if we languish in the argument that not enough members of poor communities will make a choice we basically keep the multiplier effect at zero.

While three potential effects of school choice are described, they are not exclusive. Others effects would surely result as well. Students who need to travel by public transportation would gain confidence and maturity. Specialized programs to attract students and associated funding would surely grow. Hybrid schools combining on-line and face to face learning would help meet the growing demand of customized choices. Attracting top talent would be a priority; teacher and administrative salaries could grow based on performance and the recognition of how important their contributions are to an outstanding school.

All of these potential opportunities to focus on what all Pennsylvanians desire, improving our educational system, become limited and stifled when we narrowly focus the debate on vouchers. Broadening the scope of the dialogue to include the potential effects on overall school improvement will help erase the lines in the sand and hopefully stop the contentiousness.

If nothing changes, nothing changes - is an unacceptable alternative. Too much locally, nationally, and internationally is at stake. Our students are growing up in a technological revolution that demands nimble, dynamic, engaging, uplifting and responsive organizations. Public education in Pennsylvania has done an impressive job through the industrial revolution, several wars, the space race, the fall of communism, and the rise of developing economies around the world.

But if Pennsylvania schools are going to meet and exceed international standards and truly set a course for measurable improvement, something must change. Piecemeal change has resulted in marginal gains. A wholesale funding shift has the potential to spark real change, innovation, and ensure significant improvements for schools by affording families the choice to seek and demand excellence.

Preparing Students for a Global Economy - Humanistic Holistic Education vs Standards & Accountability

Globalization is defined as the development of an increasingly integrated global economy marked especially by free trade, free flow of capital, and the tapping of cheaper foreign labor markets. The rapid pace of globalization over the last several decades has dramatically changed the world. As Thomas Friedman  postulates in his book The World is Flat, global markets are becoming level playing fields and worldwide competition for opportunities is becoming more rigorous. Workers with necessary skills are being utilized from areas that had historically faced geographical barriers to economic growth.

Those geographical barriers have been circumvented by technological advances. High speed information exchanges like e-mail and virtual conferencing make fast-paced worldwide collaboration feasible. An example Friedman  describes is how software programmers in India link to product manufactures from China. The Indian programmers correspond about product design with workers in the United States. The new products are manufactured in China and sold worldwide. Friedman also describes how programmers in India created a secure system that allows accountants in India to electronically complete United States citizen’s tax returns. These two examples of collaborative, barrier less globalization show that organizations are changing. Fresh new skills are demanded so that organizations and the people who work in those organizations can keep pace with the dynamic, integrated global economy.

What those fresh skills look like is further defined by educational essayists Adler and Holt. While they wrote two separate essays, they found agreement that a more general, humanistic education would aid the needs of future workers; future workers who must maintain a malleable skill base and avoid what Alder calls the “barbarism of specialization”.  Business leaders repeatedly express their desire for workers who are enveloped with the ability and willingness to learn, grow, and change. Educational author Francine Fowler’s  statistics on increased numbers of career changes an individual experiences during their working life supports the need for workers who can learn and adapt. A change to a more resilient education may help future workers and may be provided by combining Adler’s liberal arts focus and Holt’s  emphasis on liberated, autonomous learners. As Ray Kroc, founder of McDonald’s, once put it, “When you’re green, you grow. When you’re ripe, you rot”. Skills associated with liberal, autonomous, lifelong learning keeps the individual and the overall economy green and growing.

Researchers  have claimed entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial skills are some of the most necessary skills for organizations, workers, and the economy to grow and remain green. They based the importance of these skills on the prediction that future economic growth will occur primarily among small business enterprises. Gendron  more specifically identified needed future skills based on interviews with six prominent business entrepreneurs: Steve Case, Matt Goldman, Tom Golisano, Geraldine Laybourne, Jeff Taylor, and Alan Webber. The skills identified included: teambuilding, experiential learning, emotional understanding, self motivation, listening, selling/marketing, creative design, managing complexity, risk tolerance, and global understanding.

These future skills align with definitions of entrepreneurial skills developed by other researchers. Peck  and Morrison both emphasize entrepreneurial leaders who are skilled in sharing powerful visions of what the future may hold. Peck specifically calls for entrepreneurial skills among leaders in education, so the educational system can move beyond maintaining the existing and move toward dramatic changes and future needs. As he notes, in most schools “everyone has a brake pedal, but nobody has a gas pedal”. However tempting rapid change is - a leader with a lead foot may be problematic. A pragmatic and measured approach to change is a skill that may not often be attributed to entrepreneurial leadership. Tucker’s analysis of over 1,200 workers in both government and business sectors found a counter-intuitive finding about entrepreneurial leadership skills. He found that entrepreneurial workers and leaders are not exceptional risk takers. They are atypically motivated but are pragmatic and tend to avoid risky circumstances.

Entrepreneurial and humanistic holistic skills are important enough to future economic success that researchers Nunn and Ehlen  argued that university business schools in the United States should adapt to deliver curriculum and instructional methods that cultivate entrepreneurial leaders.  Nunn and Ehlen  further speculated that university trained entrepreneurial leaders would then propagate a culture of entrepreneurship among their employees and create the type of dynamic, creative, nimble organizations that are able to compete globally.

If the need exists for universities in the United States to prepare students for entrepreneurial organizations, then perhaps it would be beneficial for schools at the secondary or even elementary level to develop entrepreneurial skills among students. A European Commission Report outlines a potential connection between elementary and secondary school entrepreneurial curriculum. The report recommends that primary schools develop entrepreneurial attitudes such as creativity, spirit of initiative, and independence so that future schooling can focus more precisely on enterprise building.             

While European commissions look for a route to innovate change among its schools, the United States still maintains a level of hesitancy towards systemic educational change. An implied theme throughout Fowler’s  book, whether she is describing economics, political culture, or values, is that the United States educational system changes slowly. Fullan notes that implementation of top down dictates and improvement sustainability are challenges for our current educational system. Our educational system is like a huge vessel on an ocean. The ocean, with its wind and currents, is our societal climate and culture. An organization like Amazon or Google can hoist the most modern and efficient sails to catch the climatic changes of our collective culture because they are organizations that strive for innovation and creativity.

A question is whether the United States’ educational system can adjust its sails and harness the power of entrepreneurial characteristics to meet the needs of the changing world markets. Fowler describes demographic changes that will yield a population with a smaller percentage of members in schools. She also provided employment data that indicates the elasticity of skills needed for the modern American worker to stay employed. Friedman writes of increased competition and the need for workers with a resilient skill base. If resilient, dynamic skills are needed by future workers then all levels of schooling may have to hoist their sails and enhance the pace of systemic change.

The United States’ school systems can look to the example of the European Union and discern new change directions. To better capture the winds of change and influence overall economic growth, a European Commission  report calls for member states to “…integrate entrepreneurial education into all schools’ curricula”. The European Commission suggest that to more efficiently harness the winds of change, schools will need to focus on the fundamental characteristics of entrepreneurial organizations to mirror and teach skills needed for future success. If a future direction for education depends on developing broad based humanistic and entrepreneurial characteristics then determining current levels of these characteristics and their resulting influence in schools becomes essential information for determining educational system’s current coordinates and setting the future course for systemic educational change.  

Gaming for Life

Ernest Shakleton’s view of life as a game:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Shackleton

“Some people say it is wrong to regard life as a game; I don’t think so.  Life to me means the greatest of games. The danger lies in treating it like a trivial game, a game to be taken lightly, and a game where rules don’t matter much.  The rules matter a great deal.  The game has to played fairly, or it is no game at all.  And even to win the game is not the chief end. The chief end is to win it honorable and splendidly.  To this chief end several things are necessary.  Loyalty is one.  Discipline is another.  Unselfishness is another.  Courage is another.  Optimism is another.  And Chivalry is another.”

Choose a team:

The first step to a game is choosing a team.  Consider the following players and decide which team to play with:

Left:                                                                            Right:

Born to a family with a history                                   Born to a solid family

Male                                                                            Female

A paperboy                                                                 A paper girl

Religious                                                                     Humanist

Teacher’s Pet                                                               Class Clown

Boyfriend                                                                    Girlfriend

Excess                                                                         Moderation

Highly educated                                                         Went to work

Smoker                                                                       Non-smoker

Jailed                                                                           Free

Married                                                                      Single

Disabled                                                                     Healthy

Rich                                                                             Poor

Poor                                                                             Rich

Employed                                                                    Unemployed

Found a Community                                                   Switched organizations

Abandoned family                                                      Beautiful family

No Choice                                                                   Pro Choice

Foe                                                                              Friend

Friend                                                                          Foe

Husband                                                                      Wife

Sister                                                                           Brother

Teacher                                                                        Student

Student                                                                       Teacher

Mom                                                                            Dad

Son                                                                              Daughter

Dad                                                                             Mom

            Before starting a game it’s important to know the team.  Look at the lists.  Take time to see familiar faces.  Do they look familiar?  The game is about to begin. What team will you choose?   Trick question: both lists make one team for a game.   

            Take a look because we are all  on some team, and who doesn't want to play?  To play a game take time to read.  Time is the measure of how to choose things.  So if you’re reading, you’re committed to decide.  If you don’t have time, you’re deciding whether to go on.  Either way you must decide.  It’s your time.

            You may be looking at the lists and thinking.  Where and who are these team mates?  Or maybe you are thinking about other people.  People you know, maybe family or friends, or maybe someone you have read or heard about.  It’s a tough decision whether to take the time to go on.  But again, we all need to be able to play well together and who doesn't like playing a game every now and again? Time’s up. Did you decide?

            Here is a thought.  We’re on both teams.  We are both teams.  But so are many more team mates.  All people are on both teams.   So to truly play a fair and honorable game maybe decide to play both sides, the left and the right. 

If there’s balance between the two teams, playing ball is a possibility!

Suit-up:

            It’s time to dawn a uniform so that the team can be balanced.  Whether playing by yourself, or playing with others, a team uniform is needed.  The colors brought to the game are the colors shown when playing.  Balanced colors usually lead to  balanced play.  A hard game with lots of unseen hits can get very blue.  But in time true colors come back and the game continues. 

Sometimes it takes awhile to get colors to shine again.  Sometimes deep blues are in the game for a long time, especially when the rainbow of team mate colors are forgotten. 

            It takes practice to show and see true colors.  And it takes practice to play with different team mates with differences.  Like playing basketball, the ball that makes playing fun can’t pass back and forth alone, it needs help.    

            Most team mates and games aren't black or white.  True colors make a well balanced team and make for a fun game.   

Kick off: 

            How does a fun, colorful game start?  It helps to see strengths rather than weaknesses.  This helps keep the ball in play, balanced, and in the air.  During the game, the ball can’t always be in the air, sometimes players must dribble.  Before dribble comes tip off.

            Core values, honesty, fairness, teamwork, and trust help get the game started - but where to play?  A home field is needed, also known as common ground.  This is a place to connect with teammates and play a fun game. 

            Every team needs a goal.  Focusing on strengths and practicing them over and over again makes a team ready for achieving goals.  Without a focus on strengths, the game can get really blue and wasteful of energy.  The team would never reach a goal. 

            To play well in the game, teams focus on strengths, and agree on core values.  A team places value on honest and fair play - it's at their core.  Teammates who balance honesty and fairness trust teammates to keep the ball in play, even if the ball gets lost, teammates take the ball after asking, and teammates run with the ball when asked.  If passing, trust teammates to catch the ball; if receiving, trust teammates to throw the ball.  And for a kick, hold the ball very carefully.  Then a fun game may  begin.

Play Catch:

            The ball is kicked, a ball is caught.  The teammates support the ball.  Because if a ball is lost that means the team is out of balance, the core values are lost, and the game stops.  And if the team is unbalanced, the ball is lost, points and goals are hard to attain. 

How can all the balls stay in play?  Play catch!

            Playing catch starts with two and can multiply at any time.  The point of catch is sharing core values on common ground.  Keep all the balls in the air through honest and fair play and points are attainable.  Attaining points makes for a fun game and achieves goals. 

Keeping the balls in the air keeps the game going strong.  Playing catch is accepting differences and building on strengths.  A left team mate may have strengths.  A right team mate may have strengths.  The game of catch is getting the ball securely to team mates and hopefully attaining goals. 

To play catch, it helps to understand teammates.  So that may mean seeing and accept all uniform colors and team mate differences.  Adjust the point of the ball, so team mates with differences can catch.  Adjust the point, so pinks can catch: adjust the point so reds can catch and so on and so forth .  Adjust the point so all the different team mates succeed on common ground and work towards attaining mutually enjoyable goals. 

            Catch is a two way street.  Playing catch is giving and receiving.  The same rules apply when giving and taking.  Look closely at the colors and differences. They all share common ground, and catch and support each other. 

To catch points, it’s important to keep the ball’s color and different team mates values in mind when giving and receiving a point.  If not, the point could be lost and fall, making the joy of goal attainment challenging. Who dropped the ball?!?

            This question can end a perfectly fun  and enjoyable game of catch.  Since teammates are responsible for keeping the ball in the air, blame only squelches a fun game.  If you threw the ball and felt responsible, picking it up, apologizing, and getting back to the game may help.  If you caught the ball and felt responsible, picking it up, apologizing, and getting back to the game may help. 

Remember the home field of common ground?  How do you get the game back on after a dropped ball or point?  Asking a good question that leads back to common ground may help. 

            Catch can get old after awhile.  One way to keep the ball in the air is to get more players.  When playing catch with a variety of different team mates, there is a beautiful group of throws and catches.  This can make the game of catch, or any game, more interesting and fun! It also expands the field of common ground.

Sometimes it’s a challenge to understand the different points being thrown and caught, when so many team mates have different points of view about where the point is coming from and should be going to.  Understanding is critical when playing with many. 

Another challenge is adding more balls and points to the game.  It takes paying attention when several points are being shared.  Balls and points may be missed or thrown off balance.  Remember:  there is common ground and core values –that’s a key point - pick up the ball, understand, and ask a good question.  That way team mates feel support and not dropped. 

A Football Huddle or A Rugby Scrum to the same goal?

            Points are fun in a game and so are goals.  Teams want goals and often cheer for them.  There’s a need to support and understand strengths to reach a goal.  Is it a football huddle, or a rugby scrum?

            In a football huddle, there’s one in charge with a set play.  To execute a play, teams must push to the goal.  This can hurt and cause injury.  Pads and helmets are needed.

            In a rugby scrum, every player is put into a position of strength.  The team is carefully aligned toward the goal and pushes together.  Sometimes the team gets pushed back but the game flows forward.  If a ball gets dropped, the team must get back to the ball, get back in balance and support each member of the team towards reaching the goal.  The team builds a supportive bridge to the goal without one individual running forward without support. Glory of the goal is shared support in rugby not individual attainment.

Turns are taken but leading, following, and supporting is the goal in rugby.  There isn’t a set time for reaching the goal.  Sometimes a goal can never be reached.  But flowing together as a team based on strengths and keeping the ball in play is the goal. 

            What happens when a goal is reached?  Get together, support each other, and play again! 

Swing Away – Wrestling Alone:

            Sometimes it’s good to play alone - hitting a ball, scoring a point, reaching a goal, and on to the next goal.  

The alone game still shares common ground.  If a ball is in play, the individual is responsible for getting the point.  Can the point be lost?  No, it finds a way home.

Remember to bring the point full circle.  A ball lying around is pointless. Remember the home team.  Sometimes balls and points get lost and fine themselves in the shallow waters or high rough.  The key is that points don’t get lost there. 

Keeping the ball in the air, staying balanced, and remembering core values.  Swinging away and alone can be just as enjoyable as a big game of catch. It can expand common ground too. 

            Sometimes team mates  find themselves alone with team mates no where in sight wondering about how to keep playing?  An alone team mates uniform colors may have gone to a deep blue.  But remember there is common ground. 

Team mates toss a supportive rainbow of colors.  Playing catch and taking them in often brings a warm array of colorful feelings.  Trust your team mates no matter how much they may wrestle with deep blues. Team mates often help bring on a new rainbow of colors, get team mates to a new point, a new goal and play goes on.

Binding:

            Teams need glue to bind together.  A glue that holds together for the duration of any game.  Love is the answer.  Hate hurts.  Love heals.  Look for love in the eyes of your teammates.  It is there and they want you to receive it.  Understand your teammates and catch it.  Then turn left or right and pass it on. 

            Teammates are counting on you, and know you’re counting on them.  Balance your core values with the glue of love and your ball will be in the air until the game is over. 

Equipment:

            You have the tools needed to play a fair game.  The team needs you.  You have strengths.  As a team, we are webbed together on a common ground, with core values, making points, and reaching goals.  All ages are watching and learning.  Balls will be dropped but understanding teammates will support.  

“Men must build bridges”

-          Brennen July 25, 2004

“Yayh!!!”

-          Kevin clapping at seeing a Sebastian Ollie, July 25, 2004

First Draft - July 26, 2004