The other week, we talked about being the weavers—rather than the rippers—of our national social fabric. In keeping with that theme, we might find wisdom in the words of Ed Schultz, an old friend of Leonard’s from his time in grad school who has had a long career working with students suffering through severe emotional issues and illnesses. In his opinion, there are, at the very core, only two rules that schools really need to enforce:  

Rule #1: You cannot hurt yourself
Rule #2: You cannot hurt other people (or, of course, animals)
 
Echoing, in many ways, Ed’s sentiments, a 2017 piece in The New York Times offers a series of truths, so to speak, about children and about how they think and feel and are. We’ve reprinted this material below; take a look for yourself.
 
The truth is kids want to be part of the conversation.
The truth is kids are more curious than many adults.
The truth is kids know that lies are bad.
The truth is kids think cash is still cool.
The truth is kids don’t let differences divide them.
The truth is kids learn something new every day.
The truth is kids are smarter than you think.
The truth is kids can turn anyplace into a playground.
The truth is kids can make a difference right now.
The truth is kids feel things as deeply as adults do.
The truth is kids don’t need candy to feel better.
The truth is kids will inherit the earth.
The truth is kids have big dreams.
The truth is kids want to discover the world.
The truth is kids expect honesty.
The truth is kids think the simple stuff is funny.
The truth is kids bring people together.
The truth is kids appreciate a good story.
The truth is kids can handle the truth.
 
This brief piece might, in turn, help to form a foundation for educators’ attitudes towards children, their feelings, their developing values, and their senses of how to socialize with others—and some of these truths might thus function as rules in and of themselves. “The truth is kids know that lies are bad,” for example, could well be translated to the commonplace classroom rule that students are not to lie to one another—or to the teacher.
 
Really, though, what these truths do is reinforce Ed’s basic argument that, at heart, there are very few fundamental rules that need to be enforced in order to encourage children to be involved and ambitious and kind to one another.
 
But, as always, let’s converse in the comments below! Do you think that Ed is right about there being so few truly necessary school rules? Are we missing something here, and, if so, what is it? Do you get a different reading from the material from The New York Times?

Recently, David Brooks, our favorite New York Times columnist, wrote on our collective social fabric—as well as its “weavers” and “rippers.” “Every time you assault and stereotype a person,” he argues, “you’ve ripped the social fabric. Every time you see that person deeply and make her or him feel known, you’ve woven it.” He notes that our society has been living with sixty years of hyper-individualism, of an emphasis on “personal freedom, self-interest, self-expression, the idea that life is an individual journey toward personal fulfillment” (Brooks 2019). 
 
The whole concept of a “social fabric” is a very relevant one—both for us as people but also for us as educators. And it’s worth asking ourselves: How and to what extent do schools weave rather than rip the social fabrics of their local communities? And also: How do schools overcome the harmful effects of the premium our society places on hyper-individualism—particularly in light of heightened economic and social inequalities? 
 
This all connects to Neil Postman’s (1996) urging that we think of schools as an end—rather than as a means—to making a living. In other words, he suggests that schools and educators should pursue their profession as a way to actually make a life—rather than simply making a living. Such an enterprise, he is careful to warn us, is not, of course, a walk in the park—“since our politicians rarely speak of it, our technology is indifferent to it, and our commerce despises it. Nevertheless, it is the weightiest and most important thing to write about” (x). In Postman’s view, schooling needs to be about creating a transcendent and honorable purpose so that education itself “becomes the central institution through which the young may find reasons for continuing to educate themselves” (xi). 
 
But how do schools engage their communities to create a transcendent and honorable purpose for schooling? There is no short answer to that question—and certainly not one short enough to articulate in a single blog post—but it all starts with how we conceive of ourselves. With how we work to craft and define the purposes and values—the narratives—of our educational practices. 
 
In 2012, Dena proposed a community dialogue promoting and prioritizing a future-driven mindset and pedagogical and administrative philosophy, one which asks teachers to consider their plans for their students, school, and community as far ahead as 2025. Right away, this re-frames our thought processes because it makes us look beyond short-term problems, short-term solutions, and short-term consequences. It begs the metaphysical question: What will be our reasons for living—and therefore our reasons for schooling—so far into the future? As we work to reconcile with what might well be increasing inequality, climate change, and social discord, how will our communities change, and how will we change to address their changing needs? How does our narrative change to reflect a changing world, and how can we change the most problematic aspects of both our individual and our collective narratives to tell a better story with a happier ending for our students, ourselves, and our communities? 
 
For, as Postman (1996, 7) ultimately concludes: “[W]e are unceasing in creating histories and futures for ourselves through the medium of narrative. Without a narrative, life has no meaning. Without meaning, learning has no purpose. Without a purpose, schools are houses of detention, not attention.”
 
So what do you think? What’s the story you want to tell through your educational practices and policies? What does the story you’re telling right now look and sound like? What do you like and dislike about it? How do you want it to change? 
 
Let us know in the comments below, and let’s do our best—our absolute best—to be the weavers of our nation’s social fabric rather than its rippers. 
 
References:
 
Brooks, David. 2019. “A Nation of Weavers.” New York Times, February 18, 2019. 
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/18/opinion/culture-compassion.html.
 
Postman, Neil. 1996. The End of Education: Re-Defining the Value of School. New York: 
Vintage.