Leading Edges - Access & Equality

Equality of access is a big fat hairy concept in many conversations today. I find that it can be challenging to understand the perspective being derived by communication of this contextual concept, and this notion of perspective is all-important in approaching any kind of reasonable outcome that looks anything like "equality" in the real world. Why?

What is it about human communication that produces so much noise, and detracts from meaningful progress. Look at any chart of human progress over a long enough timeline and it appears unquestionably clear; life is getting better on this planet for humans. Infant mortality, poverty, sickness, life expectancy, general education and many other metrics may be analyzed with the same overview. Life is getting better for people on planet Earth.

Yet, enter our 21st century communication mediums, and it will start to sound like that data does not apply. People are yelling and talking past one another in an effort to make sure people know that, hey, "black lives matter"... being "like a girl" should a be a positive thing... more, more more needs to be done to bring equality into practical view today.

In education, this is an especially potent conversation. Equality of access to leading edge tools, resources, classroom methods is a systemic cry and motivation. But is it possible?

Is it possible to have equality of access within an education system?

Point at the education system. Show me where it exists in your life. Is that how it exists for everyone in your mind? What kind of education are you receiving? How does it compare with other options?

If you read this blog, you will notice a theme concerning the way in which we participate as Individual human beings within systemic outcomes and creations, like education. it is my belief and experience that any Individual that falls into a reliant relationship with the systemic deployment of resources will experience something other than "equality" when measured as access or empowerment availed to any Individual person.

1st, when it comes to education, and its systemic deployment into the world, most often by schools and Universities, it is critical to evaluate the prime motivation for such a system to exist. While educational outcomes are its goal, the methods used to both employ and drive towards employment-based results, define the nature of the goals being operationalized.

2nd, any Individual on this planet has the potential of discovering a self-led path of education, and increasingly, of self-defining the path of learning they will engage.

While systemic efforts are constantly improving, and leaders are demonstrating how to bring old models of education into contact with present-day opportunities, Individuals are creating, testing, using, advancing, discarding, remixing, and creating anew methods with goals directly aligned to the real world that changes everyday.

So while employment systems practicing education have their goals set on continual improvement, and have at their disposal massive budgets for the management of systemic resources and obligations, Individuals are quickly accessing and iterating what is possible today, and tomorrow, before any system is able to act.

This edge driven experience defines the future.

Individuals at the edge of Society, self-leading their own learning and work discovery, are finding a new infrastructure for education coming to life on this planet, and are navigating opportunities at a speed that no system can keep pace with. Those people functioning as herds of Individuals within the walls of an institution gain the benefit of consolidated proximity to resources, but are not able to Individually define learning paths in the same manner.

Individuals are the base component of humanity. As individuals are strengthened, the whole of us are empowered. Constituencies may influence this empowerment for good and/or bad... but Individuals make it so.

Everything about technology is aimed at Individuals...for better or worse.

As a species, we are advancing Individuals at the leading edge in spite of, and hopefully increasingly with the equal access help of institutional resources.

In the meantime... there is no equal access. There is the access that you create for yourself, the access you bestow on others, the access you fight for, the access you accept, the access you will not settle for any less of than the optimal experience of...for yourself and your community.

Identity is the beginning of access equality. So few among us know what that means, and it will not be possible to achieve true systemic equality until we do.

Education is no different.

Individuals at the leading edge make the best teachers and students.

Own yourself. Make the world....