Here’s a few things we can learn from our Harbor Freight Fellows work when thinking about standards and variation.
White oak toolboxes were made with common parts, but allowed infinite variation in design – How do standards allow for infinite variation?
Put a young person in a woodshop, their hands will work to the advantage of their brain and they will become a philosopher while thinking themselves only a craftsman. -Jean Jacques Rousseau Grasping precedes language. Duh!
Great 2nd call with Automotive Service Excellence - ASE has 2,300 accredited programs and 126,00 students. They are interested in Harbor Freight Fellows-type programming powered by B-Unbound for the automotive service industry. Anthonette demoed B-U and we all continued the conversation about how to move forward. FYI only 2% of all automotive service people are women.
Big Picture Living
How and Why the Language of Medicine Must Change is something we should all look at a staff meeting. As practice changes you must have new language for it and the language chart in this document serves as a model for us. The author of the article is Dr. George Lundberg. He served as editor-in-chief of JAMA (including 10 specialty journals), American Medical News, and Medscape. This same logic on changing practice and language is how we changed The Met and Big Picture.
When I reviewed our Family Engagement materials written 20 years ago to my surprise it had most of the ACLM measures in it focusing on sleep, eating well, having healthy relationships, managing stress. Hopefully, we are all keeping these front and center in our daily practice in our schools and B-U.
My College Unbound course on Lifestyle and Well-being ended. There were loads of artifacts and next steps coming out of it. The plant-based recipes everyone contributed to will be posted on BPLiving. There will be meetings with the Mayor’s office, the RI Department of Education, Providence Schools and College Unbound. At the C-U board meeting we spoke about the incorporation of the ACLM measures and the social determinants of health into their “Big Ten.” I had a follow-up email with Dr. Sylvia Spears Vice President for Administration and Innovation and also Distinguished Professor of Educational Equity and Social Justice. Things are moving.
This week Tanya Riguet arrives from Australia to do a professional development tour of our schools for the International Big Picture Learning Credential (IBPLC). Tanya will be around for way over a month and will be at Big Bang. I’m hoping that all of our schools and anyone interested can attend workshops both face to face and online to get to understand the IBPLC and the big implications for us using it as a way to show that there is a plural nature to perfection, not a one size fits all.
Namahana Charter
After 3 ½ years of waiting, the Namahana Charter went through their charter review process. Long before COVID there were complications with the DOE in Hawaii figuring out how to award charters and now after 3 days of hearings we wait till the end of June to find out. I’ve helped write and support many charters and without a doubt Namahana was the most innovative, detailed and developed. Lots of BPL people were involved including Javier, Charlie Mojo, myself and Andrea who went to represent us on the Namahana committee this week.
As is always the case the young people testifying stole the show and for me the special thing is that I knew all of them from the camp Kapua ran this past summer. This will be on incredible place with, in and for the community.
College UnBound Board Meeting
Here’s Dennis and me getting ready for the College Unbound board meeting that took place on Monday and Tuesday.
It is apparent that C-U is really taking off and I was glad I was there to understand all the connections there are to this k-16 articulation of our work. Later in the week on a call with board member Gary Reeves and retired Super Bowl Champion and soon to be President of the NFL Retired Players Association Walter Thurmond we discussed getting players their degrees who never completed. Given that women are the high percentage group returning to college to complete their degrees(about 85% are women) it is important for these players to show the way as role models to other men. C-U has the potential here to be that place to award degrees.
The Color of Wealth is a seven-part series coming out in the Boston Globe focused on the disparities in wealth among white and Black Bostonians. “Did you know the household median net worth in Boston for a white family was $247,500 and the net worth of a black family is …..get ready….$8. That is right, a Starbucks coffee.” This is going to be an eye-opener for the Boston Metropolitan area.
As we all saw from Beth’s Thank God I’m Back – TGIB last week, there’s some very exciting work brewing in Vermont that we both had a zoom about and will be following up next week. We are all glad you are back and landed safely.
Be well!
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Elliot Washor
Co-Founder of Big Picture Learning