By Natalie Irons, Associate Director, Instructional Coaching Programs
Coaching Partnerships Blog
With all the challenges school communities have been facing this year, when I came across the headline “Math and Career Education are Top Grant Priorities for Ed. Dept.”, I felt some hope. Over the past several years I have trained math coaches and career and technical education mentor teachers in Cognitive Coaching, so my interest was peaked. Maybe there are some bright spots for supporting educators at this time. Yet, the year has taught me to be cautious.
In this cautious optimism, I also believe that more than ever life is offering opportunities to navigate polarities. For example, wanting to support career and technical education for students AND wanting to support college readiness and preparedness for higher education. I believe both have importance and value in providing students both sets of skills. Another example is supporting thinking, feeling and doing in schools, and workplaces. As a recent CC participant who supports mental health in schools noted, “Feelings are a part of our everyday lives, so we need to give attention to them in schools, too.” Paying attention to the emotional well-being of the learners around us while also attending to the academics is part of the hard work as educators. Polarities remind us that we can hold two things, or multiple things, as valued and important.
As for the top priorities in schools right now, I wonder if it might be to listen closely to the people we support and remember that the world is facing much uncertainty that might be out of our control. As Walter Ecton, an assistant professor of education at the University of Michigan, who studies higher education and the workforce said, “I think it’s fair to say that we don’t know what the workforce will look like in 10, 15, 20 years. Because of that, it’s really important for students to have a broad set of skills that allows them to be nimble, that allows them to change careers if they need to, that allows them to go back and get additional education if they need to.”
As you work with your students and teachers, what might be the skills that will carry them into an uncertain future? Who might you need to be to support your communities at this time?