Education: FREE vs Freedom

There is this inherent conflict present in education... as a non-profit provider, my organization thrives in direct proportion to the failure being experienced in schools by students and parents. Schools love getting "FREE" inputs, but do professional educators love when the value of labor is reduced to FREE?

As a person that was "let down" by his education experience, my own methods in respect of education take a direct line to a changed outcome and context of value. As a parent that was "let down" by education, my solution is directed at the kids who want more, and the parents who expect to make it possible by any means necessary.

When I am asked to teach workshops for educators, I am seeking to connect with people that sense the need to bring new methods into contact with existing requirements. This open-ended, hands-on constructive education approach is what I call "Entrepreneurial Maker EdTech"... it directly confronts the goals of education to affect the methods of education and influence the outcomes of education. I am projecting the value of a maker education for personal social change in these efforts.

I do FREE learning events for OPEN access communities. Here and here.

I have relative disdain for the affect that Corporate philanthropy has on OPEN methods due to its need to check the boxes that point to serving very segregated methods where "At Risk" populations are defined inside of closed boxes. I seek girls to lead and learn in our communities. Our mentors are 60% women. I seek low-income, rural, at-risk communities and try to remove obstacles to participation. I would NEVER target segregated empowerment methods by naming my efforts "Black People Make", "Girls Coding", "Poor People Makers"... and thereby deny an open participation context for community learning. FREE serves these methods, and the results get hyped more than is deserved given their actual influence on the future.

I am in astonishment that smart people will project research findings suggesting "Segregated Learning" methods empower communities. Considering the great integrated efforts of actual leaders to change that outcome, I find it disrespectful to our moment. Instead, I push OPEN community participation opportunities where internally, teams may form, and natural affinities may be expressed, but always in view of differentiated views on what is possible, exposed to Individual learners for social influence. Segregated learning efforts today receive a great deal of financial support from Foundations and Corporate giving budgets, and the social pressure to give in such ways is tremendous... but it is short-sighted and naive. Instead, I appreciate the efforts that deny the ease of naming an effort by such segregated methods, instead focusing on the empowerment of place and keeping an open context for participation. These are the real leaders.

In response to a recent conversation I was having with adults, where young students were present to "listen in" with their big ears, concerning the presence of segregated methods in our community, and the lack of collaboration that emanates out of such efforts while pulling value in... a 9 year old student asked: "why do girls need their own special coding education programs, they seem plenty smart to me...?"

Bingo... light bulbs... what message is actually being created and propelled into the future where social outcomes are real and influential? Are we separating girls and people of color in order to empower them, or in order that the open community that exists around their empowerment should look upon them as "different", "in need", "special" and "disadvantaged"? 

I am all for empowering "at-risk" communities, but nuance matters. Names matter. The #LikeAGirl campaign to change how we allow ourselves to communicate about the inherent capabilities of "girls" is a tremendous idea, and one I stand behind, advocate on behalf of, make space for in communication, and will do my best to be an active participant in changing my own communication failures, because yes, they have happened. But not at the expense of OPEN community empowerment.

If education within our public infrastructure wants to make an impact, it must look within and challenges some innate assumptions involving how our methods today are directly influenced, in fact controlled, by the goals we bring into every classroom. This directly confronts the nature of a system that must stand accountable for the valid question as to whether public education is actually an "education system", or whether it really is prioritized as an "employment system".

For me, a professional development workshop for educators is an opportunity to inspire aggressive participants to pursue new possibilities for their classroom... methods that work and are being validated outside of the spaces where credentialed education has substantiated a protective employment system. I want to attract the fertile minds, and let the rest know that my efforts are inherently conflict based, because your systemic failures are the seeds of my success.

If jobs are the goal of education... then change may never be necessary. Going to school, studying hard, earning degrees, climbing ladders of success within employment contexts is availed to all.

But if jobs are not your goal, if instead you seek self-empowerment and the opportunity to influence social possibilities using entrepreneurial methods, then I will give you the same advice as was given to me when I enrolled as a Freshman at George Mason University in MGMT 499: Developing An Entrepreneurial Mindset, taught by a co-founder of the Discovery channel...

As soon as you figure out you are an entrepreneur, this place, within these walls, is the last place for you... your real education begins in the real world... and it is waiting for you.

 Today, I find two tremendously important types of educational thought missing from our public schools:

1. Entrepreneurial thinking
2. Computational thinking

As the National Science Foundation recently tweeted, but has in my experience not done enough to influence the highly educated researchers directly controlling access to the funds they use to support advanced research methodologies, we need entrepreneurial thinking to influence STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) education methods. This is what we are doing at kidOYO, and how we are developing our methods using OYOclass, our own advanced community platform and student-centric learning tool.

At the nexus of accessing change, we must confront the subsidized methods that project FREE opportunities, whether by looting data value or serving failed Corporate giving contexts, so that the freedom we enjoy is not adversely affected in a future where Individual leaders will be defined by their ability to stand up their own capabilities with personal integrity and socialized opportunity that serves all people productively.

Staying on the path we are on, adding an hour of code to those methods, is a recipe for failure. 

But don't take my word for it... time is gaining acceleration at the hands of technology...just wait long enough, and your children will tell you all about it for themselves. 

Leading organizations must take risks and make profound choices to invert the flow of relationship value, or else the failure of irrelevance will sneak up on employees that guard their stable revenue/brand/operational silos... and that will be a shame.