Political Economy Round Table Discussion

How can we work with our students to understand their political and cultural identities in a world of constant change? In this episode, we’re joined by three educators to discuss the domain of political economy, identity, privilege and culture with a futures focus.

Loretta Smith is an educator with more than 20 years of experience in international schools. She grew up between cultures, moving several times during her childhood. She is also the mother of two multi-racial, Cross Culture Kids. Her experiences of straddling several cultures as a child, adult, parent and educator have made her aware of how people negotiate belonging in different spaces. This tension drives her curiosity, inquiry and research into belonging. Her study on young children’s perceptions of belonging in culturally, ethnically and linguistically diverse settings is a part of the recently published Handbook of Research on Critical Issues and Global Trends in International Education. Loretta has the privilege of serving the Frankfurt International School Wiesbaden Campus as their associate principal and curriculum coordinator.

The Acting Head of Primary at Renaissance College, Hong Kong, Jason Doucette is originally from Prince Edward Island, Canada. He has worked in Hong Kong since 2002, in various kindergartens and primary schools, as a teacher, Head Teacher, PYP Coordinator and Vice Principal. Jason is a member of the IB Educator Network (workshop leader), an IB School Visiting Team Member, and a qualified Performance Coach. When not spending time with his wife and three young children, he enjoys reading, exercising, and travelling.

A grown up third culture child, British by birth, but raised in Hong Kong, dual British/Canadian citizen, Neil Scott has taught in South Korea, Qatar, Ontario Canada, and now in Hong Kong. He has 16 years experience in education and is currently finishing up an M.Ed. He is the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion lead at Kennedy School, Hong Kong.

Our guests shared the following resources - 

Sylvia Duckworth’s Wheel of Power and Privilege - https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Wheel-of-Power-Privilege-and-Marginalization-by-Sylvia-Duckworth-Used-by-permission_fig1_364109273

Emily Meadow’s Wheel for International Schools - https://www.cois.org/about-cis/perspectives-blog/blog-post/~board/perspectives-blog/post/can-diversity-equity-and-belonging-initiatives-create-division-in-schools-and-a-framework-to-help

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Find out more about MSB and download our paper, Futures-Focused Leadership for International Schools, at www.makingstuffbetter.com

Contact the team about our Futures-Focused Pledge at https://zcal.co/t/makingstuffbetter/talktotheteam

You can find us on Linked in at

Matt Hall: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-hall-msb/

Naomi Ward: https://www.linkedin.com/in/naomi-ward-098a1535/

Transcript

This Transcript is AI generated.

[00:00:00] Matt Hall: Hello and welcome back to Principled from MSB. 

[00:00:07] Naomi Ward: This season offers international school leaders a provocation to think differently about the future of education and their role in the creation of this future. It's an opportunity to continue thinking seriously and deeply about the legacy that school leaders leave behind through concerted action in the present.

To frame this provocation, we will be bringing together the latest research and thinking about futures focused leadership, alongside insights from interviews with experts from across the international school sector and beyond. 

[00:00:39] Matt Hall: Each episode, we will explore a different domain, and in the following episode, we will put the thinking through its paces with a panel of school leaders, some highly experienced, some new in role, and some emerging.

We're so pleased to have you join us. Hello listeners. It's really lovely to be back another week, another fascinated group of human beings to talk to, um, as we dive into yet another domain of, um, the futures focus leadership, I'm here with my good friend with Nomi, and we're going to have a really interesting conversation about this kind of political cultural domain.

So Loretta, hello. 

[00:01:17] Loretta Smith: Hello. Um, yeah, Loretta, I'm at Frankfurt International School. I'm the Associate Principal and Curriculum Coordinator on the Wiesbaden campus. It's a small school from pre K to 8, um, and we have around 225 students. I've been at Frankfurt for 21 years now. I was born in Sri Lanka. I grew up in Germany as a refugee, and then my family immigrated to Canada.

And then I left for my first job in Singapore, and then I decided the Canadian International School, and I decided I'd always been too sensible. So I decided to quit my job and travel the world and find out what I wanted to do. And I realized I really missed being around children and their imagination.

And so, um, halfway backpacking through Australia, I got a call asking whether I would teach the bilingual program here. So I came. Ended up staying, leaving, coming back, um, yeah, so it's kind of that like roundabout way of like, where's home, where are you from, I don't really know, but right now it's, it's Frankfurt and FIS.

[00:02:15] Matt Hall: Thank you. Lovely to meet you. 

[00:02:17] Loretta Smith: You as well. 

[00:02:18] Matt Hall: Hi Neil. 

[00:02:19] Neil Scott: Hi, um, born in the United Kingdom but moved to Hong Kong when I was four or five years old and grew up here in Hong Kong. Um, then afterwards back to the United Kingdom for some university but then left Hong Kong. Pretty soon after to live and teach internationally, 11, 12 years in Canada, became a Canadian citizen, and then returned back to Hong Kong.

So, uh, when I think about where I'm from, I don't really connect with any one specific place, but I feel comfortable in lots of different places. Different places, if you will. Uh, I'm teaching here at the ESF, of which I'm also an alumni. So, came here as a child. And, uh, now I'm teaching here, a year five teacher, and also the school's leader for DEI.

[00:03:07] Matt Hall: Thanks, Neil. Hi, Jason. 

[00:03:10] Jason Doucette: Hello, good evening, everyone. Um, there seems to be a threat of being Canadian or having some time in Canada, uh, with the, uh, people who have introduced themselves so far, so I'll join those ranks. Um, I'm originally from the East Coast of Canada. Um, from Prince Edward Island, a very small place.

I'm in Hong Kong as well, like Neil, and I've been here, this is my 23rd year, but I'm currently the head of primary here at Renaissance College, also an ESF school. My time at Hong Kong, I've worked in four different IB schools, so that's really influenced my, uh, beliefs and values and orientation towards the world and supporting learning and teaching.

[00:03:44] Matt Hall: Thank you, Jason. So let's go. I, I, I'm, I, I, we often ask the same question, um, which is this, I'm gonna throw it out. Where, where do you see the world? Now, where are we now when we think of society, politics, culture, what comes up for you? 

[00:04:01] Neil Scott: I think for me, Matt, I think we're almost at a crossroads right now. Um, I see a lot of pushback in, um, swings to the right or what the middle ground is.

Um, and how sort of, um, through different types of media, social media and social media algorithms, how easy it is to sort of manipulate and guide the conversations and the thought processes. of young people. And I, I think it sort of suggests that we, we should have some bigger conversations, you know, societal wide conversations around, you know, just because we can, does that mean we should?

Those type of things. So I do see that sort of influence of social media. There's sort of an increasingly sort of neoliberal political sphere sort of taking a bit of media dominance. I do seek to think we're at a sort of Crossroads at the moment, uh, just in terms of the wider political, um, global political stage, but also spinning out into more local.

And of course, having big elections on the, on the horizon doesn't help matters either. I agree with you, Neil. I think, um, the 

[00:05:08] Jason Doucette: phrase that might be used for all of human existence, um, is that we're currently in interesting times. Um, I was connecting with what you said, obviously, Neil, being, um, from Canada, connecting to the American election with fingers, toes, legs, arms, everything crossed, um, for, um, a particular outcome, especially given, as you shared, um, with the conversation today, that, um, political, cultural context.

I guess there's, there's, it's a twofold piece that the bigger fold being just that awareness piece, um, where people are so much more aware today. And I think obviously us as leaders in schools, leading in international schools. continue to have and cultivate that awareness. So where, where you hear the awareness or make connections to that awareness, um, within our own context and, and also, you know, in, in the areas of the world, in the pockets of the world where these interesting times are being lived, um, it's for us to connect with and wait with bated breath, hope for the best, um, in the essence that, you know, that awareness will continue and we'll keep making incremental progress to do something.

Better. 

[00:06:19] Loretta Smith: Yeah, I read the McKenzie report last year. I think it was, and it talked about how we're moving as a society away from globalization to polarization. And it's just like Neil and Jason just mentioned, you know, in social media, in politics. This polarization, but also just in individual lives and in social context, how people seem to have the sense of who am I and wanting to find that sense and really holding on deeply to one stance, feeling like that is who they are and creating those those gaps between I am and you are rather than simply Seeing it as a society where there is that reciprocity and we are still mixing and mingling, then I feel like that's like translating and transpiring into all, all sort of aspects of life is polarization.

[00:07:08] Matt Hall: I just want to add to note to listeners, we're recording this on the 29th of October. Um, and by the time you listen to it, we may know the outcome of the, of the U S election. So, um, hello from the past. Uh, we don't quite know what happened. Um, But we hope it was what you wanted. With that in mind, um, curious about what that means for your school.

The, the, the kind of responses you've just given me there. What does that mean for your school and the young people in it? 

[00:07:38] Neil Scott: I think, you know, one of the big implications of this, it's sort of It behooves us to not just give students the technical skills to be able to navigate, you know, in an increasingly technological world, but really the critical thinking skills.

And I just sort of wanted to connect a little bit to what Loretta was just saying around, you know, social media. I think one of, one of the great potentials of social media is that it can expose us to a plurality of views and the diversity of perspectives. But the way the sort of the advertising and that rolls into it is that you end up.

Becoming exposed to a lot of the same things you already believe, and it becomes somewhat of a an echo chamber, self confirming, um, Biases then, then evolve out of the, the media we're exposed to and, and how I, how I see that as an educator is just really helping my students to just employ those critical thinking skills to sort of hone in on these messages and to, um, maybe think a bit more carefully about the messages giving to them, given to them, but also understanding that the messages they are receiving are not, it's not random and it, it, it's very much intentional, you know, What they're being exposed to by, you know, people who are trained and experts in, in, in what they're doing and how these messages are getting pushed out across the whole, not just social media spectrum, but the media, media spectrum in general.

[00:08:59] Loretta Smith: We talked at the very beginning about how we're all essentially educators, and once you're a teacher, you're always a teacher. And I've spent a lot of years working in the early years, and one of the things that the three and four year olds and I would often explore at the beginning of the year was, how do colors play together?

And what happens when colors come and they meet? And what happens when colors meet in different on different mediums, like on different papers or on different spaces like chalk on on concrete? And then that whole question of what happens when we come together? And how do we interact? And what happens when we meet in different spaces?

And this whole idea of like, how do we speak? Um, how do we not just stay true to our own individual identity, but then how do we also create what we want and what our needs are within that context of other people and in our society, and in our school settings, how do we create that community and move from our individual identity and still preserve that, because that's important to our school identity, our community identity, like even our like global identity, and I think there's that again, that awareness that Jason mentioned earlier, right, that so needed right now.

And I think that a very awareness around like identity centered as well. When Neil talks about like all of these messages that you're constantly being bombarded by by social media because they figure it out the way you think and they're just going to feed into that and they're going to keep giving you these things.

Well, it's becoming aware of your identity, your experiences that have shaped that and being aware of that in order to be able to sort of see what's going on. Okay, this is the way I'm seeing the world because this is who I am right now, but I can step outside that and I can recognize that and I can recognize that there are other ways of seeing this world and other ways of being.

And so I think it's, again, like, in our context, I think it's, it's that identity centered education for ourselves and for other people. For all of our kids, no matter what age 

[00:10:54] Jason Doucette: I so connect so deeply to what you're saying, Loretta, the conversation we've been having in our context for a little while now is that identity, uh, piece on one side and the belonging piece of the other on.

And I think it's such a beautiful idea in terms of, I think of it as a pendulum in terms of we understand ourselves in relation to others. Um, and that's how we, you know, that understanding of others, then it. helps us as, as grow stronger in terms of who we are, and yet you have to understand other people to, to cultivate that as strongly as possible.

So, you know, you, you talk about, um, the power of narrative, for example, and how we're not a single story. Each individual is not that single story. You know, the question around where are you from, uh, is so loaded now because Goodness, how many days do you have to listen to my story type thing? Um, and Neil, what you were saying, I think in that piece is so powerful around the critical thinking piece.

I love the idea of also in terms of that capacity building and recognition for the educators with whom we're privileged to work with every day as well, to again, cultivate that awareness, that sense of identity in relation to belonging, especially given the context where we are in Hong Kong. Um, I know such a powerful activity we engaged in as a school last year with the teachers and leaders in the school was looking at Sylvia Duckworth's Wheel of Power and Privilege and how confronting that was for some in reference to you know again living working that privilege in Hong Kong in the context in which we are and Recognizing what some of us that power and privilege that we have unbeknownst to us, um, living and working here.

So again, the full circle and looking at awareness, um, I feel that's such a powerful thing in terms of that identity, identity piece and connecting what you were saying earlier. 

[00:12:45] Neil Scott: Yeah. And I, I think identity, it's such a, uh, a complex term in the international school paradigm. You know, we, we have this, a sort of dominant culture or a Or a dominant power structure within international schools, often where we are, it's quite, you know, European or Western based and finding or helping children to see their identities and spin that out from conformity, but to be self developed identities and to embrace that.

It's really challenging. Um, and there's no developmentally, it's sort of difficult sometimes for students to see because they, they do, I think, or we'll have this sort of pressure around conformity and whether that's not always coming from, well, I wouldn't say coming from the teachers, but often it's coming from home.

You know it's you're going to the international school and this is why and how does that conflict with their own already internally developed identities. I think it's a really complex issue that we we do talk about quite a bit you know we are trying to understand the uh cultural complexity of our school and it's not a straightforward checklist like where do you identify on this list.

check and this, you know, it does, it spins out and it has so many, well, it's multifaceted. There's so many different areas for us to explore.

[00:14:06] Matt Hall: Hi folks, just jumping on to interrupt this broadcast because, uh, I want to share something that we're really excited and proud of at MSB. We are launching right now, our futures focus pledge, which is Our way of acknowledging the launch of our research paper, but also trying to live a little bit by what it proposes and what is valuable in it.

The pledge is really simple and is as follows. Between now and the end of December, for any programs that we run in the schools or our open programs, for every place that you book, we will sponsor a colleague in your organization to also join that program. And we're particularly encouraging you to think of emerging leaders or someone maybe who faces barriers to progression typically.

In addition, for every place that you book on one of our programs, we will also sponsor a charity place. On a program with one of our charity partners in. Different parts of the world. We're calling it our futures focus pledge to time with the paper. And for us, it's, it's a way of living by our values, but also increasing our impact and reach as we go into 2025.

If you'd like to have a chat with one of the team about it and take us up on this offer. Then do hit the link in the show notes. Now back to the podcast.

[00:15:35] Naomi Ward: It feels like we've, um, sort of taken this macro global view and that polarization and you've naturally moved into your context. And I think this is one of the provocations in the paper, isn't it? Is our agency and student agency around the future about making the global local. So if we were. Perhaps to turn our attention to the future and, and, uh, and you've said the word conversation so many times, um, what's the connection you're seeing between imagining the future, a better future, you know, you use the word interesting times, we could use so many other words, um, but how are you working with students or what might you do with students to sort of imagine this future?

Um, and, and be in relationship through that, but what are you already doing? 

[00:16:36] Neil Scott: Well, I, I think just to reference the, the white paper, I think it was Colin Bell at Cobus who's quoted talking about moving away from a sort of superficial charitable school exchange, but to really building like a global culture of international schools where, where if we're helping each other and, and, um, facilitating each other's growth, I think it's a much more powerful, um, um, Ways to look into it rather than, you know, you know, often schools will send their children out to Rural cambodia in our part of the world or somewhere to help build Something but really what are the what are the take homes from that?

It might be a one week experience, you know, helping somebody, but I think growing that sort of global network of help and support, I think is a much more is where I see the future going, you know, with the, with the sort of embedding of AI into what we're doing and how that can foster communication across language barriers, across, uh, different cultural contexts.

I really think the future is. It's, you know, it's, it's wide open. I think there's, there's so much potential for us to, to, um, foster communication globally than there is now. And just, yeah, that's sort of move away from the superficial or the one off helping the one off charitable cause, but making this an ongoing, uh, network of support.

[00:17:57] Loretta Smith: Yeah, what I really loved about the paper is the concept of future and how it reimagined it and rather than looking at the future as a progression, as something that is about to come, that's ahead and this sort of very linear way of looking at things. Um, the idea that the future is right now, that the past and the future are part of the present, right?

That there's like this, like this whole holistic view of looking at it, this reciprocity between the past and the future and the present. And I, I love that whole idea. And I think that's what it is for us. Like when we, as educators are in our school system, it's not about thinking about the future. Like, we're going to prepare you for the future because Okay.

Um, it's more about the future is right now. We are living the possible future. And so what are the things that we're going to put into place? And then thinking about like that whole idea of identity centered again, um, Jason, you mentioned, um, the, the identity wheel privilege. I, I don't know if you're aware, but Emily Meadows has just released one specifically for international schools.

And again, interesting, but just like this whole quote from Nina Mikkelsen that I think about a lot is in the past education has all been about like creating children or, or people that are more like us and like the things that we've taught very traditionally, like we're going to teach you these things so that you can fit into society.

Right? And Neil talks about how that pressure might be coming from home because I'm going to send you to the system and it's going to create it. This identity, but that our role as educators really is not to teach them who we are or make them more as who we are, but to help them discover to help Children become more of who they are right.

And that that there is that real tension then in a school system, which, you know, has been around forever. How do you Create more of who you are in a framework in a system that's so much still linked to traditional ways of being and doing things. And I think again, it's like those opportunities where things kind of intermingle, like going out into the forest and learning outdoors.

You are in learning outdoors and it might not seem like a big deal, but all of those things and the messages that you are sending when you do that, we're going to walk away from the boundaries, the physical boundaries of this classroom. And, and in a way you're walking around from a walking away from the traditional boundaries.

of what binds you in the school system as well. You're elevating different voices. You're enabling children to have different power structures from the usual adult at the front of the room, kids sitting down in a circle. So even something as simple as like that, like just reimagining spaces and ways of being together in that power struggle and really look like that whole idea of identity centered learning, um, helping children become more who they are.

[00:20:49] Jason Doucette: I, I agreed as well, um, in reference, I love the phrasing in the paper, but the history and context, because I think, you know, at the moment, it is that contextual piece, saying we have to look at our context, um, in reference to all these ideas, um, being in, in an IB school, in an IB framework for so long, you know, you connect to that idea that their mission, and, and part of it that ends talks about the idea that people with their differences can also be right, Um, and our principal every year mentions it at our induction, and every year I'm, I'm like, yes, and hmm, um, especially, you know, you're given, uh, what that difference can be.

The foundation of our school is built on relationships. Live to the point that, you know, alumni, when asked about what they remember about our school, they're saying, it is the relationship piece. It's how the teacher made me feel. Um, it's what the teacher said to me that they connect with. So I think, you know, connecting to, to the idea of building the capacity of our teachers in school as, as a collective community is such an important thing as we move forward, you know, seeing, uh, with that action piece as you were, Neil, Neil, when you were talking about the Cambodia aspect is we talk all the time about purpose in terms of learning what we're learning, but it's the, okay, we've got the so what, but now what, what are we doing as a result?

Talking about our own purpose as individuals going. Okay. Now that I can do this and know this, what will I do as a result? I think we're coming into such interesting times in in the relatively near future We got to listen to young xiao speak just a few weeks ago, and he was sharing The notion that in, in the not so distant future, there won't be enough employment in the world for the number of people.

And so, governments will have to figure out how to ensure that people have purpose in life with no employment. And you're thinking, what does that mean for us as educators in schools? What does that mean, you know, on so many levels? Um, and such a, um, an exciting thing. But a challenge at the same time in reference to, again, how we were trained, what we know to be doing, um, in our focus with, with our students and with the community within which we work.

Yeah, it, it's brilliant, um, and potentially scary at the same time. 

[00:23:09] Naomi Ward: It takes me back to what Loretta, you were saying about those structures, or what the paper calls practice architectures. All those powerful structures that are holding the past in place. How do we liberate ourselves from that? Is one thought.

And also, The existence of the past, right, and a reckoning with the difficult inception of international schools. The stories that perhaps we're not having the conversation about. I'm thinking about our king recently, the Commonwealth, not taking the opportunity to talk about reparations. So how does this figure in the future, you know, a reckoning with the past and the conversations that we are fearful of?

[00:24:06] Neil Scott: The organization Jason and I work for is, you know, it was established under British colonial system. It was established for the purpose of educating the children of British colonial administrators, such as myself. And it did make me wonder about the nature of Our international school or maybe international schools in general and what particularly made our organization international because it was really bunch of British children taught by British teachers learning the English national curriculum.

So was it just the context of simply being outside of the United Kingdom that made it international? I know certainly when I was a student here in the late 1980s to the through the 1990s, there wasn't an awful lot of cultural diversity within the schools themselves. As I said, it was It was really the Children of the British Civil Service who were attending there.

Um, I think our organization has done a really good job of just recognizing that So that was our establishment and our foundation that we've moved beyond that and that we are constantly reflecting on the changing demographic and the changing nature of our student body and what that looks like and trying to be responsive to that.

You know, we're running, um, some. Um, workshops around culturally responsive teaching. I've been reading a lot of, uh, Zoretta Hammond recently about culturally responsive teaching in the brain and, and how actually, um, by making those sort of connections with your students and their culture, it's, it's actually good for neuroplasticity and, and learning.

So I, I, I think organization wise, we've done a really good job of valuing and bringing in those different perspectives, um, trying to understand those, those different, um, cultural backgrounds of our students to make connections, which is going to really. Talks about our pedagogical practice, moving away from the, uh, English national curriculum into the international baccalaureate.

It's also seeing the schools being able to hire far more internationally, uh, international staff. You know, there was at one point where this was basically all British teachers. And now I know when I went to school, the single Canadian teacher we had was the French teacher and that was it. And there was, there was nobody else that you would see that was even born anywhere else.

So. Now, I think even amongst our staff, the diversity is starting to grow. Connecting to the International Baccalaureate has enabled us to get a far broader range of nationalities and different cultural perspectives of teachers in here, as well as the students, um, like the makeup of the students growing exponentially also.

[00:26:42] Loretta Smith: Who we are. And I keep coming back to this whole identity thing isn't just our experiences and our passports and our backgrounds that influence it, but also the history that history, whether we like it or not, is part of who we are in that present and also the social constructs of, you know, what it means to us.

What it means to be Canadian or what it means to be female, what it means to have an ethnicity or a race, like all of those, that history influences who we are, whether we like it or not. And this is very personal, but I think this is the easiest way for me to sort of understand. That question, but also where we go with it is that, um, you know, I grew up in the, I was born in a colony and I grew up in Germany and then moved to Canada.

And so all of those experiences influenced the way that I perceived education and the way that I would show up as an educator in the classroom. And so to me, you know, what made the most sense were pre scripted packages of this is what we're doing. This is curriculum. This is right. This is what we do.

Okay. But I grew up in a, in an environment that was full of stories and storytelling was so important and yet I didn't allow myself as an educator to use storytelling as a practice in the classroom because I felt like it wasn't real. It wasn't, it wasn't teaching anything. This was like made up. And yet even as an adult, I remember my grandfather's stories could explain the world to me, even when they made no sense at all, you know, and so I think after having children of my own that have really questioned things that have forced me to re examine international schools that I always thought of as like these safe havens where everyone is welcome and it's just so beautiful and colorful and we're all holding hands to like, Which identities are we nurturing and what messages are we sending even if that isn't our intention to like decolonize myself and we look at myself and really bringing in in the way that I show up as a leader, but also as an educator with adults as well as children.

This idea of storytelling and really valuing that and and creating opportunities for people to share stories and build those relationships like Jason talked about. But also that understanding. That who I am is how I see this world, but who you are might be different, and that even though we are different, it does not need to be polarization.

There are still some connections that can happen. 

[00:29:07] Jason Doucette: Yeah, I connect to so much, um, this is an amazing conversation. Um, but I think the idea, you know, Shelley Moore reminds us about the importance of place. Um, not necessarily location, but place, and I think, you know, your question, Naomi, about that the international school setting, um, is so complex, um, and so, um, you know, wicked in terms of the nature of how do you define that, how do you enhance and, and continue that level of awareness within members of the community so people feel they're safe in that place to have that ongoing dialogue.

Um, and so to scaffold that as best we can, and then to continue to engage in that, to cultivate that awareness, however incrementally, um, we need to, to, you know, that's beneficial. It is, you know, part of our role in the everyday. Um, normalizing that conversation, um, to support our educators, our teams, to be as critically reflective practitioners as they can.

Um, as, as they are on their journey, they're that continuum of understanding, um, in reference to who they are and where they are in place and time. I love that idea, as you shared, you know, in terms of the curriculum. We've done lots of, of discussion lately, as Neil mentioned, in terms of the, the shifting demographic here in terms of, you know, authentic discussions are, well, actually, students are the curriculum.

They're who we're responding to proactively, reactively, in reference to how we're supporting them, and how best do we do that as, as a team? Um, in reference to again, where we are and what we hope, uh, they're able to, to, um, to achieve, um, and be successful. 

[00:30:51] Matt Hall: So with all of that in mind, and you know, we clearly could talk about this for hours, and I hope we can find some opportunities to do so.

I'm wondering if you're feeling optimistic about the world and the future lives of your students. Nodding's not great for podcasts, I want to say something. 

[00:31:13] Loretta Smith: Yes, definitely, absolutely. 

[00:31:18] Jason Doucette: I'm reminded of Richard Milner quote, Start where you are, but don't stay there. I think again, with the cultivation of awareness that we have, you know, the world is never going to be an ideal place.

Never was, never will be, but, but that's relative. However, you look at, um, the children we have in front of us every day and their capacity. Um, and obviously that's a reflection of us and our belief in them. We are in a great place, I think, with our awareness and how we're supporting those young minds to engage in the world.

Um, you know, our support of them, but also again, with that belief, what they know of themselves and what they're showing to us reflected that way. We're always going to run into fantastic opportunities and terrible challenges. And yet, if we look at the world positively, Especially given, you know, where we are and who we are.

I think, yeah, we're headed for great things, um, regardless of, um, some of the, uh, some of the instances of things that might happen that continue to happen as part of human evolution. 

[00:32:23] Neil Scott: Definitely, Jason. And I would just really agree, just that, that word opportunity, Jason, I think it's so important in what we do in our classrooms is that, yes, we, we, we see lots of problems around the world, but really, We're looking for opportunities.

It's not doom and gloom all of the time. The students, I think, are just really good at seeing that and exploring where the opportunities lie and looking at, not necessarily solutions, but where we can grow and where we can go together. So, you know, I'm super optimistic about the future. These children, young people are just so They're so open minded.

I think they just had so many great inputs from their just, you know, from their teachers and from from what's coming from home. Um, I'm just I'm very, very optimistic for where we're heading. 

[00:33:08] Loretta Smith: Same super optimistic to quote Neil. And like Jason said at the beginning, these are interesting times. But my parents said that these were interesting times and their parents said these were interesting times and their parents said they were interesting times.

And if you ever feel like the interesting times are just weighing you down, go hang out with some three and four year olds, especially in the forest with some muddy puddles. And just that joy of discovering the imagination, the curiosity, like let's make sure that we allow ourselves to live in those moments with those children.

And they will guide us. To a brighter future if we allow them to, and I think from three to 18 and beyond, just continue talking, having conversations and sharing stories with each other and allowing ourselves to be who we are together.

[00:34:07] Matt Hall: Lovely. Well, another, another rich conversation, plenty there to think about for me. Um, it always seems to go in so many different directions. What resonated for you? 

[00:34:19] Naomi Ward: Well, one of the things that resonates is just the opportunity to have conversations like that. And the act of a conversation, you know, we, the word means literally to turn things over.

And I feel like in this specific domain and throughout the paper, we are being asked to look at things, turn them over, have lots of different people involved. Um, and I feel that's, that's what happened. Um, And this is one of the domains that is, you know, it's sensitive and we need to get better and be braver at having these conversations around social justice, the foundations of the international school sector and talk about that in community in order to sort of design this future.

And I feel like we really were getting there. Um, so it was, uh, and it ended up, I think being a really joyful, hopeful conversation because of, because of that. 

[00:35:21] Matt Hall: Yeah, it was a great conversation and It really reminded me of a Meg Wheatley quote that I'd heard years ago. Um, and I was moved to look up kind of immediately after we spoke and, and she says, the future cannot be determined.

It can only be experienced as it is occurring. Life doesn't know what it will be until it notices what it has become. And I was really brought back to that idea, which I know is in the paper. And, but it was really highlighted in that conversation about, It's what we're creating now. Um, and it's those educators just, I sense really intentional and really kind of conscious of what they're creating with kids.

Um, and yeah, it's kind of real, really important reminder that you don't notice it until it's become. So you've got to be getting it right now, which I really sense there was a lot, a lot of that in that conversation. A lot of intention around that. 

[00:36:13] Naomi Ward: Yeah. And another thing that's staying with me is the awareness and the consciousness in the moment, um, around how schools operate.

And I was so struck by what Loretta said about the things that were in place that we can challenge, um, and to have the consciousness to do that and to invite students and young people to build those, those skills. So as always, Here are a hundred more conversations to have and, um, we hope that you are enjoying these conversations and can take the paper, take some of the provocations and questions, and, and convene a conversation.

There's no reason why not, and. You probably are already, but if not, why not discuss one of these subjects and see what arises. 

[00:37:01] Matt Hall: Absolutely. Here's to the next one. You can download a free copy of our paper, Futures Focus Leadership for International Schools, by signing up on our website, makingstuffbetter.

com. And don't forget to like and follow Principled, so you don't miss an episode. 

[00:37:19] Naomi Ward: You've been listening to Principled from MSB. The podcast was produced by Emily Crosby Media, with music by Lucy Farrell, released on Hudson Records. 

Thanks for listening.