When I go back in time to read journal entries in blog posts from that first year teaching, chuckle, sigh, and cringe.
Most often, though, it’s cringe.
A few years back, I crossed paths with Eli Luberoff, CEO of the graphing calculator and activity builder called Desmos. As we crossed the lobby and took the escalator together, he gave me the short version of the workshop he was set to give later that day. He said something like,
It’s difficult to predict the face of technology or education 10 years from now, and in my hubris, I submitted a workshop that does both. Even in the last eight months, those predictions have changed. When I look back on myself five years ago, I think, ‘Man, I didn’t know anything! And I’m sure that five years from now, I will look back on my views today and say the same thing. We have to grow so quickly.
Since that lobby at a math conference, Eli and the Desmos team have dug even deeper into making graphs more accessible for students with visual and auditory disabilities, making their staff practices more inclusive, and taking a stand on difficult social issues that frighten some teachers.
Bravery in the face of vulnerability has been a theme for the last couple years of my professional growth. I’ve been a school administrator for a little over a month, and every day is full of new challenges and new ideas.
So when I was tagged in a tweet last week, I wasn’t very surprised. Like everything else in education, The Mullet Ratio requires evolution, modification, and critique. I’ve seen colleagues who are too invested in something to see issues with it, and I want to build stamina with hard topics.
So.
If you find content on this blog or my Twitter feed or my speaking arrangements that is problematic, insensitive, or just weird, this serves as an open license to offer your input and be heard.
This is how we get better: by looking back on our practice and exclaiming,
‘Man, I didn’t know anything!’
~Matt “I know a little more today than I did yesterday” Vaudrey
P.S. – Attendees at the CMC-South Conference next month will get a front row seat for Mullet Ratio and just how serious I’m taking this claim. Join us on Saturday at 9:30 in Mojave!
