Unreasonable? Maybe. Making a difference? Yes!

It’s Saturday morning of Memorial Day weekend. As I look out at the rain coming down on the lake, I can’t help but think back on the past few years and our work in the Spring Lake Park Schools.

We have accomplished so much, and I am so proud of my colleagues and staff throughout the district. There are wonderful things happening for students within the walls of our schools. It is so gratifying to walk through classrooms across our district and see the personalized, engaging instruction that is taking place. We have a wonderful staff! It is exciting to think about how, with the planned expansion of technology beginning in the next school year, this learning will extend beyond the walls of our schools.

Yet, there is a tension that I feel. Why?

In addition to our digital learning initiative, we are expanding and deepening our efforts around what I believe is an even more significant initiative. Without the focus on this initiative, the expansion of digital learning means nothing. This second initiative will deepen efforts throughout our school district around creating personalized experiences that result in college-readiness, and the development of academic, life, and career skills, for each of our students.

This work is exciting, and at the same time daunting. However, there is not any work I would rather be doing. I spend each day working with colleagues throughout our system to make the dreams of over 5,000 students in the Spring Lake Park Schools a reality -- and helping many of them establish dreams for themselves that they may not even yet be able to imagine.

As I wrote in a previous blog, while we have made progress towards our vision of being a world-class learning community -- great progress -- we haven't arrived. Our students deserve a personalized learning experience each and every day; a learning experience that fosters self-direction and curiosity; that results in their seeing no limits to what they can accomplish.

I believe this quote from Robert Fritz captures the importance of our vision, as well as how I hope each of our students view their future, “If you limit your choices only to what seems possible or reasonable, you disconnect yourself from what you truly want.”

Is our vision unreasonable? Maybe. However, what’s the alternative? I cannot want less for any of our students than I want for my own two kids, Sam and Sydney. Each of our students has a first name and a dream for their future.

So, as I sit and look at the rain on a Memorial Day, nearing the end of another school year, I can’t help but be excited about the work we do for young people, and the opportunities we have to make a difference in the future.

All I ask of you – no matter your role in the school district or relationship to it – is to join me in doing all you can to make the hopes and dreams of the young people in your sphere of influence a reality.

As Seth Godin, in his online book Stop Stealing Dreams, wrote:

When we let our kids dream, encourage them to contribute, and push them to do work that matters, we open doors for them that will lead to places that are difficult for us to imagine. When we turn school into more than a finishing school…, we enable a new generation to achieve things that we were ill-prepared for.

When we teach a child to love to learn, the amount of learning will become limitless.

When we teach a child to deal with a changing world, she will never become obsolete.

Enjoy your Memorial Day weekend!

Jeff