Author Archives: David Truss

Lines in the sand

I recently listened to ‘Awareness‘ by Anthony De Mello. In this book, which is actually an audio recording of him speaking to an audience, he shared a story that goes something like this:

An Indian man is imprisoned in Pakistan. His captors take him on a field trip to see his homeland. They drive him into the countryside and pull up to a ridge overlooking a beautiful valley. The passenger of the truck points out to the valley and says, “Behold, your homeland.”

The prisoner sheds tears of joy as he looks out at the forested valley, looking upon his motherland. A couple minutes later, after conferring with the driver, the man who pointed out his homeland says, “Our driver made a mistake, we aren’t at the border yet, we have to travel another 30 minutes to the South-East.”

It’s amazing alarming how much we pay attention to worry over lines in the sand.

Neighbors – 1952

Grad celebration

Tonight I’m off to Victoria for my daughter’s university convocation tomorrow. Then on Wednesday evening my high school graduation ceremony is combined with our school award ceremony in an event we call iHub Annual (named so by a former student). Being a small school, we started this tradition in order to create a bigger audience for our grads, but this year we are only inviting grads and their families and we are hosting a YouTube Live event for the rest of the students. This might become our new way of running the event from now on.

Graduation is a special event for students. However, I didn’t go to my first two graduations. I was undergoing nose surgery for my high school grad, straightening a break that happened in a water polo game. Then my first university graduation happened almost 3 years after it should have and I decided not to go because I literally would have known no one else in the grad class. I hadn’t even set foot on the campus for two years at that point. Oddly enough, this delay was also for water polo, I took my final courses at a different university so that I could play varsity water polo for a year, then I ended up not applying for graduation… not knowing that this was necessary.

The first time I crossed the stage was for my UBC education degree with my new wife in the audience. Then she was there again with me when I crossed the stage in Eugene Oregon for my Masters. When I got my first university degree I shared, “I’m done with school, never again.” When I finished my Education degree, I declared again to anyone who would listen, “I’m done with school, never again.” Since finishing my masters, I haven’t said it… because that phrase doesn’t seem to be something I follow through with as intended. 🤣

Despite missing my first two grads, I understand the significance of the celebration. I know that for students it’s an important day. The end of high school, the end of a hard earned degree, these are big transition moments in a students life, a time to both look forward and back. It’s a time of trepidation and of excitement. It’s as right of passage ceremony that signifies the end of one part of a student’s life and the start of a new adventure.

Digitally (Dis)connected

One thing that I really enjoy doing is going to conferences. When I go, I learn so much… not just from the sessions, but from conversations that I have while at the conference. Here are three examples from SXSW EDU in Austin back in 2017:

David Jakes

Jeff Richardson



Miguel Guhlin

A decade ago I’d chat with these guys, and other amazing educators regularly on Twitter, and when I’d get to a conference I’d meet them and it was like I was a distant friend that hadn’t seen them in a while… even if it was the first time we met. In fact, I’d meet educators face-to-face for the first time and we’d hug like long lost friends. This conference was only the second time meeting Jeff and we roomed together.

I’ve made some amazing connections through Twitter. It was rich online conversations which built up the social capital and made meeting face-to-face so special. However I’m barely on social media anymore. This blog gets auto-posted to my social accounts, but beyond that I do very little to engage socially with my digital friends.

I got an email from Barbara Bray inviting me to a Breakfast Social she hosts at ISTE, but I’m not going to New Orleans this year. This invite got me thinking about all my digital friends and how disconnected I am from them. Other than Kelly Christopherson and a few others who I connect with on Twitter around daily fitness, I really don’t engage in social media at all. There are so many educators that I used to ‘speak to’ on a daily or weekly basis who I just don’t connect with anymore.

I miss the camaraderie, the conversations, the learning, following links to educational blogs, and the fun banter that was around the early days of Twitter. But I don’t know if it’s just Twitter that changed or if it was me as well? I just hope that when I start heading back to conferences that I’ve built enough social capital that I’ll still feel the amazing connection I have felt in the past when I meet these awesome digital friends face-to-face.

Bad script writing

I watched a movie last night. It could have been good, but it wasn’t. There were many tropes, predictable chases, gunfire, and dialogue that would never happen. The bad dialogue more than anything is the thing that drives me crazy when watching a movie.

Confessions are made to people that were strangers just hours before. People open doors to strangers and invite them in and then over share information. People obviously guilty say, “I didn’t do it”, and then the response is, “If I ever find out you were responsible…” as if this is some kind of clever foreshadowing. And people say things like, “You do know how dangerous this could be!” And then there is this agreeing nod as if to say, ‘Yes, this is so dangerous but we have to do it anyway!’

All this leading to the great final battle where all seems lost, then bad guy does a monologue or confession, then breaking all odds the hero saves the day. Then a somewhat happy finale where thanks and appreciation are given and/or family reconnects. The end.

I didn’t mention the name of the movie, but I bet you have seen one that fits this description. If you told me which one you were thinking about it wouldn’t be the same one I watched.

When I watch a poorly written movie I roll my eyes, I laugh at how bad it is, and unfortunately I ruin any chance for my wife to enjoy it because I make easy predictions of what’s next and I make fun of the dialogue. When I think of how much money is spent making a movie, I wonder how people can read a bad, predictable script and think, ‘We can make this good’. I guess people think if a formula works once, it can be done again. But then again when the formula is good… it can be repeated!

The Future holds promise

At Inquiry Hub Secondary we had the privilege of getting Richard Campbell to present to us. He did 4 topical presentation, chosen from a list of 20 by our students, as well as an AMA – Ask Me Anything session. Here was the day’s schedule:

9:10am-9:40am
30 minutes
Richard Campbell: Overpopulation & Food
Can we make enough food to feed the world population? What’s the maximum number of people the world can feed?

9:45am-10:05am
20 minutes
Student Presentation: Maiya – How to train a dog

10:10am-10:40am
30 minutes
Richard Campbell: Climate Change & Alternative Energy
Are solar power and electric cars the answer to climate change?

10:45am-11:05am
20 minutes
BREAK

11:10am-11:20am
10 minutes
Student Performance: Koen – Piano

11:25am-11:55am
30 minutes
Richard Campbell: Future of the Internet
How will the internet evolve and how will that impact us?

12:00pm-12:10pm
10 minutes
Student Presentation: Agata – LARP Announcement

12:10pm-1:00pm
50 minutes
LUNCH & Student Performance: Colin – Bagpipes

1:05pm-1:35pm
30 minutes
Richard Campbell: Jobs of the Future
With technology becoming involved in more and more jobs, how will jobs evolve? How will the workforce be affected? What jobs will be eliminated?

1:40pm-1:50pm
10 minutes
Student Performance: Mari – Singing “Part of Your World” in Japanese
Student Performance: Maiya – Singing & Piano “Try Everything”

1:55pm-2:15pm
20 minutes
Student Presentation: Jazmine – Designing and Building a Model of a House

2:20pm-2:50pm
30 minutes
Richard Campbell: Ask Me Anything!
What questions do you still have? Do you have questions about topics not covered today?

2:55pm-3:10pm
15 minutes
Debrief and Feedback

I’ve written a few thoughts on the future here on my Daily-Ink, but when I look back at these I see some dystopian views, and conversations about how we won’t see time travel and we won’t holiday on Mars any time soon. Yesterday I got to hear a lot of promise about the future ahead, and it was really refreshing.

Yes, the population of the world is growing, but that growth has slowed and the global population will likely peak at less than 11 billion. Advances in food production will continue and we will be able to feed the world.

Yes, energy production is a problem, but currently the two cheapest ways to produce energy are wind and solar, and their financial viability will make them more desirable. Also while fusion reactors are decades away, small modular nuclear fission reactors are an amazing technology far safer than current nuclear reactors. So the future of energy production holds a lot of promise.

Yes, climate change is one of the biggest concerns today, but in the coming decades we won’t just have the technology to reduce carbon emissions, but in the process we will develop the technology to the point that the byproducts of this process will be economically desirable. Richard posed the challenging question of how low do we take the carbon levels because if they are too low, that could create weather issues with more dangerous storms and shorter growing seasons… the problem won’t be too much CO2, but rather how much is too little?

It was so fascinating to have a futurist come to the the school and share with our students (and adults) the promise of a better future. I think that we often get the message that there is nothing but doom and gloom ahead. Having someone share a big picture view of a future that holds promise, new kinds of jobs, and exciting advances, was absolutely refreshing.

Presentation day

Yesterday was a day at school when many students were doing year-end presentations for their inquiries. In the morning I visited the Grade 9’s and watched the tail end of one presentation and then the full following presentation. In the afternoon I got to see several Grade 11 & 12 presentations. Overall, I was very impressed!

My biggest takeaways were first how confident the students were. We have created a great culture where presentations happen all the time and students demonstrate that they are comfortable in the front of the room. Also, student feedback is awesome. Students in the audience share genuine praise and feedback.

But the thing that really impressed me was the design of the presentations. The slideshows each had clear themes, and almost all of them were not typical to PowerPoint. They didn’t feel like students took a theme and plugged their slides into them. Rather, they had the look and feel of something designed by the students, and in many cases they did fully design every slide themselves… making sure to have continuity from slide to slide.

From grades 9 through 12 the slide design was better than almost any presentation we would have had at the school 5 or 6 years ago. The students also had a story line through their presentations. Good delivery, good design, good storylines, these students can really put together solid presentations. I could definitely learn a few things from them about creating and delivering a good presentation!

Lost for words

The past few days I’ve been really stuck on my daily ink. The ideas are not flowing, and when they do come they feel more like essays than short daily writes. But then I’ve wasted too long staring at the blank page to have time to write long, drawn out ideas. So first my writing feels rushed, and then my whole morning routine does too.

This exercise of writing daily has been very positive for me. It has helped me feel creative. It’s not just an outlet for my writing it’s a drive to produce, to create something every single day.

Every. Single. Day.

Well recently I have felt like I don’t have a lot to share. I feel like the things I want to share infringe on the lives of people close to me that may not want their story shared publicly. And most of all I question myself, wondering why anyone would bother reading my daily dribble?

I remember a while back some people were sharing a daily photo. I love photography and tried a couple times to do ‘A Photo a Day’, but my love for photography made me stop both times within a couple weeks. I would look at these forced photos that I had taken and think to myself, ‘That’s a photo I had to take, not one I wanted to take.’ Then I’d quit.

I feel that way about writing right now… but I don’t want to quit. I don’t want a period of not feeling creative to undermine a habit I’ve built for almost 3 years now. What I’m fighting isn’t just writer’s block, it’s self doubt that I’d have anything else to share after all this time. Mental menopause preventing me from creating any fruitful work.

I’ll push through. I’ll accept that what I’m producing now will not be my best work. I’ll tell myself that the muse will come back. But for now it’s more of a chore than an expression of my passion for writing. I said earlier that I struggle with sharing stories of others that aren’t mine to share, well the story I can tell is my own. And for now, that story is how I’m struggling to write daily. The story to tell is that I’ll muscle through, and while it’s not easy, it’s not a time to give up either.

Measuring success

Pull out a ruler and measure how happy you are. Start a stop watch to measure your success. So many people measure success by their ability to achieve goals, but many of these same people reach their goals only to realize the goal wasn’t enough, they need more:

  • You won a tournament, but you still aren’t world champion.
  • You made your first million, now you need to make 10 million.
  • You a ran a personal best time, what’s the next goal?
  • Target reached? Look ahead to yet another target you haven’t yet achieved.

There’s nothing wrong with trying to be better. Nothing wrong with creating smaller targets on a path to larger targets. It’s good to have goals that push you to be your best. But what happens when you reach a final target? Is there always one more target to add? Is there always one more achievement you haven’t measured up to yet?

Maybe. And that’s ok, because that drive is what makes you so successful. But what does success feel like? Is it a sense of achievement or a sense of never being enough? When you hit a critical target on your journey ‘to’ success does the celebration feel great, or empty?

Who helped you along the way. You did you hurt or lose along the way? How much do these other people matter? How much of your time was focussed on your targets versus the people that helped you reach them? What else did you have to sacrifice?

Is success measured by what you did, or how you feel about it, or how others perceive you? What does success look like and feel like to you? How do you measure success?

How long does it last?

Who else benefited?

Where does happiness or fulfillment fit in? What achievements really matter? And how do you really measure these things?

Take a moment and celebrate where you are right now. Maybe, just maybe, success is reaching a point where you don’t have to do more to feel good? Maybe, just maybe, success is not a destination you haven’t yet reached… because if every measure of success has another target ahead of it, you’ll never feel successful enough. I may or may not know you, but I’m willing to bet you deserve more than that. If you don’t feel successful, maybe you are measuring the wrong things.

University entrance

I find it interesting that universities struggle with retention and dropout rates, yet year after year they seem to focus on the same parameters for entry… namely marks. It gets more and more competitive to get into universities, with higher and higher marks, and these schools hire people whose sole job it is to help kids stay in school after they arrive. Despite having these teams do their thing to retain students, many universities don’t lower their dropout rate.

Maybe marks aren’t the only thing that matter. Maybe students can get straight ‘A’s in high school without ever getting the skills to be successful outside of classrooms that are set up to ensure compliance and following a teacher’s lead through a course.

I know a student who spent hundred of hours doing research projects that far exceeded anything a typical high school student does. I’m talking about computer programming and Artificial Intelligence research that required university level courses to be done on his own time. He applied to some Ivy League schools and didn’t get in. This kid will be successful wherever he goes… some students that will get into these Ivy League schools instead of him will not. Oh, and not only were his marks great, he was in the 98 percentile on his SAT scores.

But it’s the balance of drive, determination, focus, and interest in learning that makes this kid an amazing candidate, not his SAT score and good marks. He’ll get into a great school. He will be extremely successful. He will not drop out after 6 months or a year. But how many students will?

How many students will meet the university requirements, be accepted, and still not make it through their first year? And how is it that universities can’t figure out the data points to choose kids like this over kids with high grades that will really struggle when they leave a sheltered high school experience and head off to university?

As long as universities focus primarily on marks, this will drive high schools to focus on grades. This will drive high school students into classes and programs that are about outputting good grades, not producing intrinsic learners, passionate about learning, and ready to take on all the challenges universities have to offer.

Social gatherings

I went to a friend’s 50th birthday last night. It was a small gathering for dinner, with a delicious meal and some wonderful wine pairings. My daughter volunteered to be our designated driver and so my wife and I let loose a bit more than we usually do. Not so much that I’m paying for it today, but definitely more than has been typical the last couple years.

It made me realize a couple things. First, I prefer one-on-one conversations a lot more than groups. I’m introverted, and knew this about myself already, but even in a small group the noise level made it hard for me to hear well, and tracking a group conversation feels like work. Second, my wife and I don’t make enough effort to socialize. We really should plan more (small) gatherings with people we care about.

It’s one of those things where it feels like a lot of work up front, but the results are a rewarding experience that is worth the effort. It’s easy to get caught up in your own world and forget that there are awesome people out there that make rich company. Friendships don’t build without creating experiences to have with those friends.