Linger in the Chasm.

This week Mount Vernon Presbyterian School's Institute for Innovation hosted design thinkers of all levels from across the country at their annual design thinking workshop called Fuse. Some of the country's foremost scholars, consultants, and practitioners of design thinking in education descended on the ATL for a week of intentional empathy and community-based collaboration. I was fortunate enough to have a conversation with Julie Wilson. Julie, who founded the Institute for the Future of Learning, was a featured MoVe speaker at fuse14 this week. As part of fuse14, the Museum of Design Atlanta hosted an event Wednesday evening to showcase their exhibit Design for Social Impact and played gracious host to #dtk12chat The Show 'MoDA Edition'. It was a great show and you can watch it here. I'm a moderator on the weekly design thinking chat, which is how I was invited to attend fuse14 as a coach. Before the show, we were given the chance to explore MoDA and really take in the exhibit. This is when I met Julie. Julie noticed the tattoo on my forearm, and asked how it was received (having tattoos) in my school. For me, my tattoos have always been a connection point with my students. It's a nugget of insight into a culture that we share and it's one of the few times that I have a connection with students that other teachers may not. And I just might be proud of that.

Julie asked me about my job and what I did. Having just ended a contract at a position I loved, and being unsure about how happy I will be with my new position, that was a difficult question to answer. I explained that I was about to start somewhere new, and proceeded to tell her about the place I was leaving. I talked about the statistics; the ones who frighten other educators and give me way  more street cred than I actually deserve. She said I must have tons of stories about my students and our experiences together, and one in particular came to mind. I talked for the next fifteen minutes about a former student of mine and the journey our relationship has taken over the past four years. I've taught him twice, and have seen him grow from an 11 year old rebellious thug wanna-be to an excited, empathetic, poignantly playful 15 year old. Our relationship has evolved and has taken many different roles over the years. I showed her a picture of me and the student on my phone as I would if he were my own child, and she smiled warmly at the picture, just like I do.

I told her that I was worried about my new school, and more specifically worried that I wouldn't have the opportunity to connect with my students the way I had at my previous school. I told her that I'm afraid that I won't have the same window with a new demographic of students the way I did with my former students. Read: I'm afraid I won't be needed. She told me that there will always be a window, and that I should always find it. She told me that I should live in that window, because that is where I will make a difference.

A great friend of mine was explaining the challenges of design thinking today, and described the way we look at problems like a canyon. You stand on one side of the Earth and there is a need or a desire to reach the other side. The only thing stopping you is a massive gash in the landscape, a space in the surface between one place and the next. Often in the productivity-centered society we live in we only focus on the two sides of the canyon. They can be called many things: beginning/end, young/old, beginner/expert, problem/solution. But no matter what descriptors you subscribe to one thing remains: the chasm is forgotten. Instead of seeing the chasm as a void I choose to look at the chasm as a place for growth; an undefined place in which infinite possibilities can exist. On either side of the chasm the spaces are concrete and unchangeable, but the future of that place between is unknown. It could grow and evolve until it is expansive and consumes the landscape, or it could shrink and close up,  even still permanently changing the surrounding terrain.

The chasm is more than what stands between point A and B, and yet we spend our lives trying to cross it as quickly as possible. As a teacher, I have been caught in that stereotype with my students. I inherit them at point A and am expected to guide them to point B. I am the sherpa on the trail of learning from August to June, but what if I focused less on the end point and more on the journey? In my admittedly little experience, what I have found is that I am at my best with students in the cracks. I teach them more when they aren't behind a desk, and I see more growth in the moments when it isn't being measured. Julie told me to keep finding that window and to seek my students out. What if it isn't so much of a window, but instead a crack? What if I am the most effective teacher when I meet my students in the chasms instead of herding them from one side to the next? I cherish the moments with students that were unintentionally beautiful because of what happens in the crevices between lessons and tests. The cracks are where life begins; not on the other side.