my income good afternoon
a key question that governments parents
and students ask themselves is what
education system is right for us for our
citizens for our children and for
ourselves this question is a million
sometimes billion dollar question
education is a fundamental right and the
key to the future of any country there
are very few places in the world where
education is not at the top of the
agenda education is a means of
empowerment of guaranteeing a country’s
future it’s because of this that we hear
constant announcements of education
reform of curriculums being standardized
packaged and shipped all around the
world in order to be competitive on the
global stage we must constantly be
updating our content to compete with
international benchmarks so having the
right answer to this question of what
education system is right for us is an
important one but what if I told you
that that million sometimes billion
dollar question is the wrong one
education is a fundamental right it’s
one of the most universal experiences we
have in modern civilization and to me
that means that we often take for
granted the question of why it’s
important why do countries invest in
schools why do parents put their
children through school and why do
individuals pursue higher education
often at great personal cost education
shouldn’t just be about what we learn
but why we learn now an economist may
argue that the reason countries invests
in education is to create citizens that
are self-sufficient who aren’t a drain
on society but I believe that we should
be a little bit more aspirational the
goal of Education isn’t simply to
prevent people from being a drain on
society it’s to shape citizens that will
contribute to the community around them
education should be about thriving not
surviving about contributing to
something much greater than the
individual
it’s about empowering people to fulfill
their potential so if education is about
giving back and serving the community
it’s important that we return those
communities to the center of our focus
now if we all agree to work with that
understanding of education then the aim
of Education becomes to graduate active
citizens who are problem solvers for
their communities we want to graduate
students who are active an active part
in the cultivation and creation of the
world around them that means we have to
connect what they learn with where they
are learning it they need to understand
the communities and the context that
they will serve that means we need to
create systems that ground that content
in the context and ensure that teachers
understand the communities that their
students will serve now I work in an
international education setting and I’ve
had the opportunity opportunity to
attend many strategic planning sessions
and professional development trainings
and over time a pattern seemed to emerge
to me and I’m going to share that
pattern with you that I believe you got
a sneak peek at so this is a Penrose
staircase it was drawn by two
mathematicians father and son in 1958
and at first glance it does just look
like your average staircase but I know
some of you may know it by its other
name the impossible staircase that’s
because if you follow it around it feels
as though you’re making progress but
you’re really just going in a circle the
illusion of going up is alluring
even though progress isn’t being made
you’re in constant motion so it’s easy
to believe that you are this to me is
symbolic of an education that isn’t
grounded in context it can be boxed and
shipped anywhere in the world completely
ready to roll out it captures and keeps
our attention because it requires
constant maintenance now I want to
reimagine education with a focus on
context instead of thinking of
international education as a graph that
we attach to an educational sector I
would like us to think of it as a seed
in order for the seed to germinate
it needs soil the soil and the seed are
equally important to one another they
both have potential but that potential
can only be actualized when those two
are brought together the seed cannot
take root and thrive without the
nourishment it receives from the soil
they have a symbiotic relationship they
rely on each other now if we think about
our content as the seed and our context
as the soil we can begin to imagine a
more productive system for education if
it’s truly tomorrow’s problems that we
want to solve and tomorrow’s leaders we
want to create we need to start by
cultivating students who understand the
context and the community that they will
serve that means that we need to spend
time making stories we need to spend
time creating space for stories of who
we were who we are and who we aspire to
be in our education systems and we need
to make sure that our teachers and our
administrators understand those stories
and respect them because it’s through
these shared stories that we begin to
understand who we are and allow each
other to shape our understanding of who
we are collectively our schools cannot
continue to function independently as
Islands or a staircase is separated for
their communities and for me it feels
like for decades we’ve been inviting the
world into our classroom and we’ve
forgotten to extend that invitation to
our communities we need to believe that
both sides have something valuable and
they bring that value to the table we
need to believe that where you teach
enriches not limits what you teach so we
spend a lot of time focusing on
curriculum and we build our schedule
around modules and units but often time
what we do is that we lose the
opportunity to talk about our context we
expect students to be time travelers to
move forward and back in time but we
rarely spend the time to talk to them
about where they are today
context to me is the key to a purposeful
education and I don’t need I don’t think
context needs to mean a specific country
it can mean a time
space a feeling I believe that with if
we teach things out of context I think
that students don’t believe that
whatever you’re teaching them holds much
appeal so teachers always get the
question of what’s the point and if we
take the time to explain context to our
students then I believe that we can
eliminate that question altogether and
we can do this by highlighting problems
that are real to them and inspiring them
to channel their passions towards
solving those problems problems or
issues that affect their day to day life
sadly a lot of the world’s problems seem
so daunting and so distant that it’s
hard for one person to imagine that they
can tackle them globalized education has
created a sort of apathy towards an
intervention it’s known as a bystander
defect that we can see problems but we
don’t really believe that it’s our
responsibility to solve them so I’ve
been thinking a lot about sustainability
about creating sustainable ecosystems
and sustainable economies and for me
that brought me to thinking about our
food systems so with their food a lot of
the time the things that we eat seem to
appear as though by magic we don’t see
the people that plant the food the
people that pick the food or the people
that stalk our supermarkets and then you
spend time with students and you try to
explain things like famine or drought or
food shortages and sometimes it seems
that they can’t fully grasp that idea
because we haven’t taken the time to
explain to them how their food arrives
to them and why it can fail to do so in
other parts of the world because when
they arrive at the supermarket the food
is there so for me something that was
really interesting about the blockade
was the disappearance of dairy products
and now we’ve never seen the cows that
produce our milk it’s never really been
something that’s centered heavily in our
lives but all of a sudden we were forced
to think where are the cows because to
us milk came from the fridge not the cow
and we should be asking ourselves this
on a regular basis because this is
something we consume regularly and I
believe that it takes a lot of effort to
maintain the normal than the world
around us normal it’s not something that
happens instantaneously there are people
hard at work keep
everything around us running smoothly
and so we need to make those gaps in the
system visible to our students so they
can begin to address them we don’t know
the names of those people who are
working to keep our communities and our
country safe and more to the point our
teachers don’t so when our students go
into classrooms and they have questions
our teachers don’t have the tools to
engage in meaningful conversations with
those students when all the problems
that they discuss in the classroom seem
so far away it can mislead students into
believing that there is no need for
their passion or their curiosity in
their context they can make invisible
they can make invisible how necessary
the passions that those students hold
are to their community because they
limit the visibility of those who are
already out in the community pursuing
similar passions and channeling their
passion towards improving the world
around them we’ve deep personalized
education but to me the point is that
we’ve decontextualized it and we do this
all to avoid going outside our comfort
zone of curriculum and really inviting
the community in now if I can take you
back to the Penrose staircase one more
time as students get older we ask them
what do you want to do or what do you
want to study and to me there’s really
an answer with any passion behind it
it’s usually businessman engineer doctor
but to do what and why we don’t teach
them that what they need to do is find a
problem and a passion and channel their
energy towards bringing those two
together instead of what do you want to
be we should be asking them what do you
want to do what do you want to solve
what do you see in the world today that
you want to be a part of what do you
want to work for what inspires you and
that conversation can start today but we
tell them to wait wait until you’re done
studying wait until you have experience
we’ve put them on a staircase as well
students currently graduate thinking
that they’re ready to enter the real
world their degree certifies that
they’re ready every conversation that
they’ve
about their education has painted a
wonderful picture of them walking into
the workplace and revolutionising it but
oftentimes when they do enter the
workplace they stumble and they realize
that the workplace is miles away from
the curriculums they spent years and
years studying we need to route what
they learn and what they are part of
today we can’t promise that it will be
relevant in the future we all can only
ground it in our understanding of the
world that they see around them today
it’s up to them to do the rest if we
truly believe that the goal of Education
is to empower students to become
tomorrow’s leaders then we once again
needs to Center our learning on why we
learn we need to put ourselves in our
communities at the center of our stories
we can use our country and our context
as a gateway that we connect to the rest
of the world that to me is the power of
a contextualized education the power of
focusing not on what we learn but why we
learn thank you
[Music]
[Applause]
a key question that governments parents
and students ask themselves is what
education system is right for us for our
citizens for our children and for
ourselves this question is a million
sometimes billion dollar question
education is a fundamental right and the
key to the future of any country there
are very few places in the world where
education is not at the top of the
agenda education is a means of
empowerment of guaranteeing a country’s
future it’s because of this that we hear
constant announcements of education
reform of curriculums being standardized
packaged and shipped all around the
world in order to be competitive on the
global stage we must constantly be
updating our content to compete with
international benchmarks so having the
right answer to this question of what
education system is right for us is an
important one but what if I told you
that that million sometimes billion
dollar question is the wrong one
education is a fundamental right it’s
one of the most universal experiences we
have in modern civilization and to me
that means that we often take for
granted the question of why it’s
important why do countries invest in
schools why do parents put their
children through school and why do
individuals pursue higher education
often at great personal cost education
shouldn’t just be about what we learn
but why we learn now an economist may
argue that the reason countries invests
in education is to create citizens that
are self-sufficient who aren’t a drain
on society but I believe that we should
be a little bit more aspirational the
goal of Education isn’t simply to
prevent people from being a drain on
society it’s to shape citizens that will
contribute to the community around them
education should be about thriving not
surviving about contributing to
something much greater than the
individual
it’s about empowering people to fulfill
their potential so if education is about
giving back and serving the community
it’s important that we return those
communities to the center of our focus
now if we all agree to work with that
understanding of education then the aim
of Education becomes to graduate active
citizens who are problem solvers for
their communities we want to graduate
students who are active an active part
in the cultivation and creation of the
world around them that means we have to
connect what they learn with where they
are learning it they need to understand
the communities and the context that
they will serve that means we need to
create systems that ground that content
in the context and ensure that teachers
understand the communities that their
students will serve now I work in an
international education setting and I’ve
had the opportunity opportunity to
attend many strategic planning sessions
and professional development trainings
and over time a pattern seemed to emerge
to me and I’m going to share that
pattern with you that I believe you got
a sneak peek at so this is a Penrose
staircase it was drawn by two
mathematicians father and son in 1958
and at first glance it does just look
like your average staircase but I know
some of you may know it by its other
name the impossible staircase that’s
because if you follow it around it feels
as though you’re making progress but
you’re really just going in a circle the
illusion of going up is alluring
even though progress isn’t being made
you’re in constant motion so it’s easy
to believe that you are this to me is
symbolic of an education that isn’t
grounded in context it can be boxed and
shipped anywhere in the world completely
ready to roll out it captures and keeps
our attention because it requires
constant maintenance now I want to
reimagine education with a focus on
context instead of thinking of
international education as a graph that
we attach to an educational sector I
would like us to think of it as a seed
in order for the seed to germinate
it needs soil the soil and the seed are
equally important to one another they
both have potential but that potential
can only be actualized when those two
are brought together the seed cannot
take root and thrive without the
nourishment it receives from the soil
they have a symbiotic relationship they
rely on each other now if we think about
our content as the seed and our context
as the soil we can begin to imagine a
more productive system for education if
it’s truly tomorrow’s problems that we
want to solve and tomorrow’s leaders we
want to create we need to start by
cultivating students who understand the
context and the community that they will
serve that means that we need to spend
time making stories we need to spend
time creating space for stories of who
we were who we are and who we aspire to
be in our education systems and we need
to make sure that our teachers and our
administrators understand those stories
and respect them because it’s through
these shared stories that we begin to
understand who we are and allow each
other to shape our understanding of who
we are collectively our schools cannot
continue to function independently as
Islands or a staircase is separated for
their communities and for me it feels
like for decades we’ve been inviting the
world into our classroom and we’ve
forgotten to extend that invitation to
our communities we need to believe that
both sides have something valuable and
they bring that value to the table we
need to believe that where you teach
enriches not limits what you teach so we
spend a lot of time focusing on
curriculum and we build our schedule
around modules and units but often time
what we do is that we lose the
opportunity to talk about our context we
expect students to be time travelers to
move forward and back in time but we
rarely spend the time to talk to them
about where they are today
context to me is the key to a purposeful
education and I don’t need I don’t think
context needs to mean a specific country
it can mean a time
space a feeling I believe that with if
we teach things out of context I think
that students don’t believe that
whatever you’re teaching them holds much
appeal so teachers always get the
question of what’s the point and if we
take the time to explain context to our
students then I believe that we can
eliminate that question altogether and
we can do this by highlighting problems
that are real to them and inspiring them
to channel their passions towards
solving those problems problems or
issues that affect their day to day life
sadly a lot of the world’s problems seem
so daunting and so distant that it’s
hard for one person to imagine that they
can tackle them globalized education has
created a sort of apathy towards an
intervention it’s known as a bystander
defect that we can see problems but we
don’t really believe that it’s our
responsibility to solve them so I’ve
been thinking a lot about sustainability
about creating sustainable ecosystems
and sustainable economies and for me
that brought me to thinking about our
food systems so with their food a lot of
the time the things that we eat seem to
appear as though by magic we don’t see
the people that plant the food the
people that pick the food or the people
that stalk our supermarkets and then you
spend time with students and you try to
explain things like famine or drought or
food shortages and sometimes it seems
that they can’t fully grasp that idea
because we haven’t taken the time to
explain to them how their food arrives
to them and why it can fail to do so in
other parts of the world because when
they arrive at the supermarket the food
is there so for me something that was
really interesting about the blockade
was the disappearance of dairy products
and now we’ve never seen the cows that
produce our milk it’s never really been
something that’s centered heavily in our
lives but all of a sudden we were forced
to think where are the cows because to
us milk came from the fridge not the cow
and we should be asking ourselves this
on a regular basis because this is
something we consume regularly and I
believe that it takes a lot of effort to
maintain the normal than the world
around us normal it’s not something that
happens instantaneously there are people
hard at work keep
everything around us running smoothly
and so we need to make those gaps in the
system visible to our students so they
can begin to address them we don’t know
the names of those people who are
working to keep our communities and our
country safe and more to the point our
teachers don’t so when our students go
into classrooms and they have questions
our teachers don’t have the tools to
engage in meaningful conversations with
those students when all the problems
that they discuss in the classroom seem
so far away it can mislead students into
believing that there is no need for
their passion or their curiosity in
their context they can make invisible
they can make invisible how necessary
the passions that those students hold
are to their community because they
limit the visibility of those who are
already out in the community pursuing
similar passions and channeling their
passion towards improving the world
around them we’ve deep personalized
education but to me the point is that
we’ve decontextualized it and we do this
all to avoid going outside our comfort
zone of curriculum and really inviting
the community in now if I can take you
back to the Penrose staircase one more
time as students get older we ask them
what do you want to do or what do you
want to study and to me there’s really
an answer with any passion behind it
it’s usually businessman engineer doctor
but to do what and why we don’t teach
them that what they need to do is find a
problem and a passion and channel their
energy towards bringing those two
together instead of what do you want to
be we should be asking them what do you
want to do what do you want to solve
what do you see in the world today that
you want to be a part of what do you
want to work for what inspires you and
that conversation can start today but we
tell them to wait wait until you’re done
studying wait until you have experience
we’ve put them on a staircase as well
students currently graduate thinking
that they’re ready to enter the real
world their degree certifies that
they’re ready every conversation that
they’ve
about their education has painted a
wonderful picture of them walking into
the workplace and revolutionising it but
oftentimes when they do enter the
workplace they stumble and they realize
that the workplace is miles away from
the curriculums they spent years and
years studying we need to route what
they learn and what they are part of
today we can’t promise that it will be
relevant in the future we all can only
ground it in our understanding of the
world that they see around them today
it’s up to them to do the rest if we
truly believe that the goal of Education
is to empower students to become
tomorrow’s leaders then we once again
needs to Center our learning on why we
learn we need to put ourselves in our
communities at the center of our stories
we can use our country and our context
as a gateway that we connect to the rest
of the world that to me is the power of
a contextualized education the power of
focusing not on what we learn but why we
learn thank you
[Music]
[Applause]
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