For centuries, philosophers have been thinking through what it means to be good, what doing good entails, what a good life looks like and even how do you know if you are doing good. The world has a wealth of ideas of what it means, and yet good is not something that we are taught to interrogate. In twelve years of education, I was taught what it meant to be good…be quiet, do as you are told, don’t make a scene, don’t make others uncomfortable, get good grades AND if I was good at being good, I would be able to go to a good college. That good college education would get me a good life, and while I wasn’t limited in my dreams for that good life, it was shaped quite a bit toward self-interest…have a job, get married, buy a house, have kids, go on vacations.
Of course, school isn’t the only place where I was socialized. I grew up in the LDS church. It was here I was exposed to a host of contradictions. On one hand, I learned the importance of service to others, and on the other hand, I heard phrases like “White is Delightsome” which were exemplified in stories in the Book of Mormon. My grandfather, who was a convert to the church a few years before I was born, was a raging bigot. I both loved him and despised him. I had the keenness to distinguish a lot of this rhetoric and to recognize hypocrisy. While I often think about much my early indoctrination took from me, and still takes from me, I also recognize that without those early experiences I would likely not be where I am on the learning journey, with the relationships I have forged and the work I’ve been able to do.
I was really pushed to start examining and interrogating good in school in 11th grade English class. I really latched onto Transcendental philosophers. By this time in my life, I had outright rejected Mormonism and refused to go to church. Thoreau and others offered a way of looking at the world that was more in line with how I wanted to live. Abolitionists, environmentalists, anti-war. My senior year was also filled with philosophical exploration in some of the classes I took. In Humanities, the three focusing questions were “Who am I?” Why am I Here” and “Where am I Going?” I was pushed to interrogate good.
I want very much to make good decisions, and I try to live by my values, even though this world is at odds with many of them. Our systems are just not set up to allow us to live our principles fully. We can make good environmental choices, but in the end we’re contributing to global warming because we need to use gas powered transportation to get to work. We might be anti-war, but half those federal income taxes we pay go to fund war. And, not paying taxes is nearly impossible.
This is also true in education. We want to treat everyone with dignity, but kids have to ask permission to use the bathroom. We want schools to be kind places, yet grading is a divisive practice. We want everyone to succeed, but we define success in very limited ways. Our individual goals as teachers might be to do good, but the systemic impact for many students is far from good. We have to reconcile this disconnect, and we can.
The first step in this reconciliation is to not say what we are against in our education system, but what we are for. When we begin to honestly examine the outcomes of our policies, structures and practices against our purpose, then we will be more aligned with our hopes for our students and our communities. We will be truly educating for good.
So what is good? That’s debatable depending on which school of philosophy you belong to. However, in an aspirational democracy like the United States, it refers to the common good, a state where each individual gets what they need to live their best life without harm to others or the community and the community’s future.
As it relates to schools, Educating for Good looks like sustaining community, joy and meaning and avoiding harm.
Sustaining Community
Emphasizes collaboration and cooperation over individual success.
Stewardship of individuals, systems, and environment
Works to ensure each individual finds joy and meaning in a just community
Joyful and Meaningful
Seeks to find learning opportunities in all experiences.
Works toward joy even through struggle
Works to support individuals finding purpose and role in sustaining their community
Avoids Harm
Practices and policies do not harm students and community by:
· Limiting Access to Opportunities
· Extracting Information
· Creating Conditions that work against Mental Health.
· Creating Barriers for Individual Success in Community
· Continuing Cycles of Harm Created through White Supremacy Culture
The following set of questions were created to use with curriculum documents including lesson plans, unit planners and assessments. It’s not an exhaustive list of questions, but can help teachers start interrogating their practice for Good.
Considerations for Sustaining Community
Are the skills students will demonstrate clearly aligned to the school’s Vision, Mission and/or Portrait of a Graduate?
How does the curriculum plan emphasize building community, collaboration, and cooperation?
Where will students practice stewardship? Stewardship is defined as taking care of individuals, community, and environment.
In what ways do the questions, resources and activities work to create a just community?
Considerations for ensuring Joy and Meaning
How is reflection used strategically?
What questions and activities will likely bring joy? What questions and activities will require strategic thinking and transfer of skills and knowledge?
Where in the plan are students asked to use individual strengths to contribute to community?
Do the learning activities provide opportunities for learners to practice and demonstrate the intended skills?
Considerations to Uplift Identities and Avoid Harm
Will all learners be able to access the activities and resources? If not, what accommodations are included to ensure everyone feels a sense of belonging?
Are resources provided to learners in varied formats, from authors and creators who come from varied backgrounds and cultural identities, and explore different perspectives of the same topic?
Are there topics that could be considered triggers? What strategies are in place to mitigate additional trauma to learners?
Are there any activities or resources that will alienate or disconnect learners from one another or their culture?
In what ways might this experience cause harm to individuals or communities?
*A note on triggers and discomfort. Emotional triggers can cause acute distress, anxiety and are barriers to students demonstrating their best. They are deeply connected to lived trauma. Discomfort in engaging in difficult conversations or topics can be barriers, and it is important, especially around topics of race, poverty, gender and identity that we help learners be comfortable in the discomfort these topics might cause them RATHER than avoid them. If these topics presented have a possibility of being triggers or discomforts, what in the instructional plan can teachers do to mitigate those?