OK. I’ll admit it. I miss Portland. – SCN Encourager 10/9/2013

I’m not sure I’m cut out to be an Agent of Change.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about attending the Agents of Change 2013 conference in Portland, Maine.

It was spectacular. (The conference, that is. Not what I wrote.)

But now that I’m back on the job in my school communicator role, I might put my shiny badge that certifies I’m an official “change agent” back in my top dresser drawer.

Even though I know it only certifies that my personal check for the conference fee didn’t bounce, I’m kind of proud of it.

It’s  impressive – Agent of Change.

Unfortunately, it didn’t come along with any guarantee that I could actually impact any critical school issues.

Consider the famous guy on the left. He had it easy by comparison.

He only tackled solve-able problems; tasks like destroying a menacing stockpile of nuclear weapons, protecting Fort Knox from gold thieves, or preventing a government shut-down. (Oops. A bit of wishful thinking here.)

Anyway, since my returning from Maine, I’ve been reminded that the problems and issues in our world of education are not as defined and supported as we might like.

007 could achieve results without ever having to be publicly compared and ranked by the media, the legislature, or the Mackinac Center.

Not us.

007 also had lots of cool gadgets within his reach to help him while he completed each of his assignments one-by-one.

Not us.

Our environment is largely BYOD and our challenges are multiple.

When Cindy and I were walking in Portland, I spotted this sign in our path.

I hope you can see the wording at the bottom of it because it caused me to think about our work in our schools.

In overlooking the literal meaning of the header “terrible mojitos, but great beer selection,” I was struck that this business could choose to “not do something well” (mojitos) in order to totally focus on doing “something else well” (great beer).

Rarely do we have the luxury of this kind of choice.

We typically have to be pretty darn good at everything demanded of our schools… and the list only keeps growing.

So while I may be wondering today about what kind of Agent of Change I’ll ever really be – I’m glad to be in profession composed of hard-working individuals like you.

Thanks for the encouragement!

It helps me to be only “stirred, not shaken.”

Tom Page, SCN

 

 

 

He had it.

Mojiotos .. moving on…choices   but not alone…