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Now and the Future – iHub Grad Address 2024

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I can’t describe the joy of participating in grad at Inquiry Hub. These students are amazing. Our student focused show, with performances and videos that highlight the whole school are such a community building and community honouring event. The night warmed my heart, and I teared up more than once.

Here is my grad address. I really don’t have more to say, other than it was an evening that recharged my battery. It reminded me of why I love my job.

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Now and the Future – iHub Grad Address 2024

Greetings Honoured Guests, Parents, Family Members, Teachers, and Students including our very special Grads of 2024.

In your yearbooks, I wrote this as part of my message to you:

Asking questions is key to learning and I think at Inquiry Hub we do a pretty good job of getting students to ask good questions… and then answer them. There is a lot of conversations, dialogue, and debate that happen inside our school walls, and from that students learn not just about things, but they also learn the skills to discuss and negotiate and support their ideas in meaningful ways… and sometimes even to change their minds. A growth mindset is so much better to navigate life with, compared to a fixed mindset.

In a civil society, dialogue is the one problem-solving strategy that should be sacred. To do this, free speech is essential. But right now, outside the walls of our schools, there is a culture of ‘attack the opposition’ that is very scary. We need to be resilient when hearing opposing views, and understand that, we must be tolerant and accepting of opposing views, unaccepting of hateful and hurtful acts, and smart enough to understand the difference. When we can’t have conversations with people that have different views, we don’t grow as a culture or as a society.

That was a message for right now. There is so much conflict and strife in the world, and it can sometimes feel a little bleak.

But here’s the thing, I’m really excited about the future our grads have before them. It’s a future that is beyond my ability to predict, but I’m going to try anyway.

Our grads understand how to see the world from multiple perspectives.

You understand the challenges but you are also solution oriented. And you are going to have tools and strategies that no other generation has had. 

Here are four predictions:

  1. You will have better AI than we can imagine. What we think is amazing now will look like child’s play in the future. I didn’t have Google growing up, I had paper encyclopedias. In a few short years the Artificial Intelligence available will look to us now like what an iPhone would be to someone living in the 1920’s. (Oh, and by the way, I did not use AI to wrote this.)
  2. You will not live in a world that has an energy crisis, or one that harvests natural resources to create energy. Energy will be almost free if not completely free.
  3. You will live longer. Longevity research is reaching a point where more and more healthy years will be added to your life faster than you age.
  4. You will retire sooner. More of your life will be filled by doing want you want to do, rather than what you need to do to work and make an income.

All this to say that while it seems like us old folks have left you a pretty messed up world, we are less than a decade away from some key turning points where you have more freedom and choice, more access to cheap energy, and more free time than we could ever have imagined as recently as when you were in Grade 9.

It’s an exciting time to think about what the future holds, and when I think about you all as creators, artists, thinkers, dreamers, and leaders, I’m excited about your generation building the future I get to grow old in. 

Inquiry Hub isn’t perfect, but it is a very special school. It is a place where our students feel they belong. A place where you get to be courageous learners and leaders, and a place that I hope you carry fond memories from. 

To the class of 2024, I can’t wait to see what the future holds for you… and for what you will do to help shape that future. Be brave, be strong, and help build a community where everyone feels they have a place, and a way to contribute. 

Thank you.

Community of Learners

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Yesterday we had the incoming Grade 8 class join us for the day. Our Grade 9’s, under teacher supervision, organized the day. We welcomed our nervous, shy Grade 8’s with some icebreakers and a challenge to work in groups to do maximum 3-minute a skit that showed a challenge of working in groups. Then a 1-minute solution.

One example of a skit students came up with was a team worked hard to get a presentation ready and then the day it was due the person responsible for building the PowerPoint was away and didn’t share anything… and hadn’t actually done what they were supposed to do. The solution the students came up with was asking for a one day extension. The other things our teacher and other students suggested as a solution included:

How could they share their knowledge without a PowerPoint? Could they come up with about 5 slides in 10 minutes that would be a good backdrop to their presentation? And going further: What could they do to ensure that this student does more visible work before the presentation next time? And/or what would be a better role for that student next time?

The skits were not judged on how good they were, they were about a team facing a challenge and seeking a solution. They were dissected to learn, as a community, how to work effectively in a community. The skits were humorous, and often included things like dealing with tyrannical teachers with unrealistic actions or expectations. One skit had a teacher that threatened to beat kids up with a ruler. But even in this silly scenario, there were lessons to be learned.

Our Grade 9’s made sure everyone felt welcome. Our teachers made sure students worked together and shared what we expected from learners at our school. And the Grade 8’s moved slowly from nervous visitors to members of our community. After school a few students stuck around for an hour waiting for their parents to join us for our PAC (Parent Advisory Council) pot luck and then AGM Meeting. During that wait, the Grade 8’s mingled with the Grade 9’s that were also waiting, and it was great to see them all in cross-grade groups chatting and laughing.

We will continue the community building in September, and the beautiful thing about hosting a visit like yesterday is that there is already some momentum built. We won’t be starting from scratch, and our new students will start in September excited to reconnect. It’s so much easier to build a positive learning environment when a strong community of learners is established.

Passion Project Presentations

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I’ve had the privilege of watching a few final presentations for our IDS courses – Independent Directed Studies – at Inquiry Hub. Our students choose a topic and put 100-120 hours of work into research, design, and creation of their own courses. The topics vary considerably from making a movie to learning to suture stitches, to designing a facial recognition doorbell, to creating a tabletop role playing game based on the student’s heritage.

I love seeing the diversity of the presentations, and the passion and enthusiasm students have sharing their work. I’m so impressed by both their presentation skills and so their slides. These students could teach a thing or two about how to create a slideshow to many professional presenters I’ve seen.

That’s because they get a lot of practice designing presentations and presenting. They have to do so in groups and on their own many times a year… more than in any typical school. And they get feedback, lots and lots of feedback, from peers as well as teachers.

For these final presentations parents are also invited, and even if parents can’t make it, students still have an audience beyond just the teacher. Students can invite anyone they want to watch, and we’ve even had two of our secretaries invited because they have similar interests in the topics, one on hairdressing and another on embroidery. The community aspect of these with parents, mentors, and community members joining in is absolutely wonderful. Our assistant superintendent also joined for a couple presentations.

It’s pretty special watching these final presentations. I think that every student should get a chance to delve into an area of interest that they choose. Learning shouldn’t just be about transmitting knowledge but about knowledge construction, and what better way to do this than to have students design their own learning experience?

Boxes Made to Fit

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William (Bill) Ferriter shared a post on LinkedIn about the struggles his daughter is having at school. While I will share a key quote from his post, I encourage you to read the full post here. Bill said,

Should we be failing students who pass unit tests and quizzes but don’t turn in practice tasks? Were those practice tasks essential as a vehicle for preparing students or assessing learning if a student can demonstrate mastery on the unit test without them? How many assignments do we really need to determine if a student is working at or above grade level? Could we use something other than zeros — think codes like INC or placeholder grades like 50s — to report on missing work? Does every student have to do every assignment?

On a more philosophical level, are we cheapening our professional credibility when we report that a student who passes most/all of our quizzes and tests has failed our class? Are grading policies with rigid consequences for missing work effective for encouraging learning? For changing behavior? Is the purpose of grades to report on student mastery of essential outcomes or to report on the ability (or lack thereof) to keep up with schoolwork?

I left Bill the following comment:

In my first year teaching a colleague (also in his first year) was experimenting with grading and asked a simple question that has stuck with me:
“Are we counting marks or marking what counts.”
(See the first half of this old post – if you go past the first half, sorry that the image links seem to be broken.)

My daughter was training 24-26 hours a week in Synchronized Swimming and missed some gym classes going to Provincials and Nationals. Despite consistently being the second fastest girl doing their weekly runs (behind a Provincial level soccer player), she was told at the end of the year she would only get a ‘B’ unless she made up a run and did a volleyball rules quiz she missed.

I share this because it exemplifies the idea of just counting marks.

To me this undermines the professionalism of teaching. It says, ‘We only care about the numbers’, and that my friend is exactly what AI can do better than us. I hope to see educators around the world thinking more deeply about what really matters to students in school. We need to stop building schools and courses like boxes students need to fit into and more like boxes made to fit students!

All Around Wonderful

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Last night our school put on a spring formal for our senior students. The event was a huge success. I had a chuckle at the end of the night when I got feedback from three students. The first from a gushing student telling me what an amazing night it was. “It was so wonderful, I didn’t know what to expect, but this was such an amazing night, thank you!”

The second was a student who thanked us and said how impressed she was. One of my teachers said, “See, start with low expectations and things always turn out great.” The student replied, “Actually I had pretty high expectations, I knew it was going to be good, and it still exceeded my expectations.”

The third one I’d like to share was actually said to me between these two. This student, who always calls me by my last name with no ‘Mr’ (which I don’t mind) said, “You know, Truss, any time you do something the first time, you can expect things to go wrong, but I have to say that tonight was pretty good. You got so much right, and I can’t think of anything I’d change. Good job.” Now that’s from a kid who understands radical candour and isn’t afraid to give hard feedback, especially to me, because he knows I want to hear it.

But the reality is that the event was the success that it was because of the wonderful team I work with. Every teacher and one of my secretaries was there helping to make the night a huge success. This event was the vision of one of our counsellors, who wanted the kids at our school to have an event like students at bigger schools. And the entire team stepped up to make the event something our students wanted… and enjoyed.

A student prepared a welcoming toast. Another one did a full ten minute speech that had everyone laughing and repeating quotes he said. Not platitudes, but humour that resonated with our entire community of students and staff. And a parent raised so much in gifts and prizes that most kids left with a gift card that was at a minimum 2/3rds the cost of the ticket, and many students left with a lot more.

I feel blessed to work in such an amazing environment with a fantastic team, and wonderful students, who all understand and appreciate that an event like this is a lot of work… and appreciate the effort it takes to do it right.

Being tough vs having high expectations

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In your schooling you’ve probably had some really tough teachers that gave you no slack or leeway, and some of them you might have liked and others you didn’t. What made them tough and likeable versus tough and unlikable?

I think it comes down to high expectations, consistency, and connection.

• When a teacher has high, but realistic expectations the message is that they believe in you and your capabilities. But this is individualized, not every student can achieve the same thing, but every student knows the difference between a teacher wanting them to do better rather than just expecting results they know they can’t achieve.

• When a teacher is fair and shows consistency, students feel respected. Favouritism undermines morale, and invalidates the integrity of the classroom. High expectations can’t be mixed with greater strictness for some students without them feeling picked on.

• When a teacher connects with students and shows genuine interest in them high expectations becomes an honour not a challenge. Students recognize that the teacher wants them, expects them, to be successful… and believes in them.

Having high expectations, being fair and consistent, and genuinely caring and connecting with students can build a classroom environment where a teacher being strict comes across to students as wanting to get the best out of them, and believing in them. But take any one of these three things away and being strict can seem mean, unfair, or even vindictive.

It’s a pretty special classroom where students are all held to a high standard and they feel like their teacher sincerely wants the best out of all of them… and believes in them.

It Works The Other Way Too

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Yesterday I had a great conversation with the teachers from a nearby Grade K-8 home learner’s school in a neighbouring school district. Out high school usually gets 1-3 students from this school a year and these have been some exceptional students.

At one point we reminisced fondly about some of the really special kids they sent our way, and one of the teachers said, “You know, you always hear about how much a teacher matters to a student and how thankful students are for the influence of a teacher, but you don’t hear enough about how a teacher can learn from and be grateful to a student.”

We all agreed.

There are some kids that make teaching special. They are gems. They stand out and they leave a lasting, positive memory. They enrich our lives as educators and remind us why we love to teach. This isn’t just about a teacher’s pet. It’s not necessarily the kid with the best grades, it might even be a kid that’s a bit challenging to teach… but these one-of-a-kind kids inspire us, delight us, humour us, teach us, and/or influence the way we think about teaching, learning, and building community.

So this is a ‘Thank You’ to those kids. It’s a message to say that while we can inspire you and leave you with fond memories of a great teacher, it works the other way too, and you can be a positive influence, admired by your teachers. Thanks to those special students that don’t just go through our classes but also send positive ripples through our lives and the lives of students around them.

One-of-a-kind kids whom we will always remember and be grateful to have taught.

Empowering students

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There is an element of control that needs to be given up by teachers if they are truly empowering students. There has to be a willingness to accept a potential outcome that is less than ideal… An understanding that students won’t always hit the high standard you expect.

This isn’t about lowering standards or expectations, in fact, if you are empowering students you need to make your high expectations clear. Rather, this is the realization that students bite off more than they can chew (or rather can do), and then they end up scrambling to do less and still produce a good product or presentation. It’s an acceptance that a student’s vision doesn’t match yours but their outcome is still good, or (and this is the tough part for teachers) good enough. It’s about mistakes being honoured as learning opportunities rather than as something to penalize.

Empowering students doesn’t happen with outcomes that are exactlywhat the teacher envisioned and expected. Outcomes will vary. Results will be less predictable. But the learning will be rich, authentic, and far more meaningful and memorable for the students… As long as they feel empowered, and are given the space to have autonomy, lead, and learn in ways that they choose.

And while that won’t always end with results that the teacher envisioned or expected, it will always end with learners feeling like they owned their own learning. Shouldn’t that be the essence of a great learning experience?

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Related: Teacher as Compass

AprilMayJune

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One of the biggest challenges in being a school principal is the month of AprilMayJune. Three months that feel like they are condensed into one single month. From here to the last day of school it’s Go-Go-Go… It doesn’t feel like there is a break or a transition, it’s just non-stop action.

Good things will happen, wonderful events will be a big part of this extended month. So, it’s not just a slog, there will be some special moments to come. It’s just that things go so fast, and the pace feels accelerated, and then at the end of June we will look back and we won’t remember anything that delineates separate months from now until then.

To all the educators out there, have a fantastic AprilMayJune!

Google proof vs AI proof

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I remember the fear mongering when Google revolutionized search. “Students are just going to Google their answers, they aren’t going to think for themselves.” Then came the EDU-gurus proclaiming, “If students can Google the answers to your assignments, then the assignments are the problem! You need to Google proof what you are asking students to do!”

In reality this was a good thing. It provoked a lot of reworking of assignments, and promoted more critical thinking first from teachers, then from students. It is possible to be creative and ask a question that involves thoughtful and insightful responses that are not easily found on Google, or would have so few useful search responses that it would be easy to know if a student created the work themselves, or if they copied from the internet.

That isn’t the case for Artificial Intelligence. AI is different. I can think of a question that would get no useful search responses on Google that will then be completely answerable using AI. Unless you are watching students do the work with pen and paper in front of you, then you really don’t know if the work is AI assisted. So what next?

Ultimately the answer is two-fold:

How do we bolster creativity and productivity with AND without the use of Artificial Intelligence?

This isn’t a ‘make it Google proof’ kind of question. It’s more challenging than that.

I got to hear John Cohn, recently retired from MIT, speak yesterday. There are two things he said that kind of stuck with me. The first was a loose quote of a Business Review article. ’AI won’t take over people, but people with AI are going to take over people.’

This is insightful. The reality is that the people who are going to be successful and influential in the future are those that understand how to use AI well. So, we would be doing students a disservice to not bring AI into the classroom.

The other thing he said that really struck me was, “If you approach AI with fear, good things won’t happen, and the bad things still will.”

We can’t police its use, but we can guide students to use it appropriately… and effectively. I really like this AI Acceptable Use Scale shared by Cari Wilson:

This is one way to embrace AI rather than fear and avoid it in classrooms. Again I ask:

How do we bolster creativity and productivity with AND without the use of Artificial Intelligence?

One way is to question the value of homework. Maybe it’s time to revisit our expectations of what is done at home. Give students work that bolsters creativity at home, and keep the real work of school at school. But whether or not homework is something that changes, what we do need to change is how we think about embracing AI in schools, and how we help students navigate it’s appropriate, effective, and even ethical use. If we don’t, then we really aren’t preparing our kids for today’s world, much less the future.

We aren’t going to AI proof schoolwork.