On becoming teachers.
One summer I spoke at a faculty retreat on perspectives in academia as a non-academic. At the event I covered 4 themes close to my heart:
a) Being wrong. Making mistakes.
b) Expectations as parents.
c) The trust of dreamers.
d) On becoming a teacher.
Four themes that are important to me as an employer of talent, as a father, as a dreamer and as a teacher. Here are my notes from that day.
One. Making mistakes.
When we interview and hire talent for our firms, there is one specific attribute we look for.
Ownership. Initiative. Appetite for taking risks.
Small firms, challenger firms, especially in the tech sector don’t win by doing what everyone else is doing. They win by doing what no one else is doing. Talent that can do that is trained differently.
How? I built models for a living for 30 years. Still do.
A common theme that stands out across my field? Irrespective of domain, data or applications.
Real money in building models is not in building models. It’s in being wrong.
How do we teach our students to be wrong, make mistakes when academic grading requires students to be right. We penalize them when they make mistakes.
How do we encourage students to make mistakes, ask questions, challenge, provoke and explore counter narratives? Should we? What would that do to our class rooms? The key? Going against the model with experiments.
Teaching that allows our charges to test assumptions, validate opinions, explore boundaries, requires experiments in the class room. Controlled conditions and safety nets, yes. But still experiments. Rather than narration, experiential. Real life isn’t text book conditions.
Talent that can handle ambiguity, chaos, uncertainty and absence of structure is valued in real world. Growth happens when we push beyond boundaries. When we are uncomfortable. If we only encourage following instructions and towing the line, we will get mediocrity. If we want to rise above mediocrity, if we claim we train leaders for tomorrow, we need to encourage experimentation in the class room.
Not just by students. Also by teachers. If we don’t take risks in the class room and fail / fall ourselves, why should our students follow us?
Two. Middle class aspirations.
Growing up with middle class roots, I was encouraged to keep my head down and not rock the boat.
Don’t stand out. Don’t get noticed. Don’t speak up. Go with the flow.
The programming didn’t take but it certainly muted my behavior. As a middle class father when I send my child to your care, what do I want? What are my expectations?
I want you take the child we have raised and help him fly higher. Higher than you and me both. Help him break the chains we have wrapped him up in, dream bigger dreams. I don’t want you to tell him what is not possible. We do enough of that here in our home and within our family.
I want you to tell him what is possible.
I don’t want you to turn him into a cynic. I want you to inspire him enough so that he can change the world. The one thing that I don’t want you to do, that you should never do, is to give up on my child.
When you picked up the mantle to be a teacher, you signed away that right. We may give up on our children, but you, the teacher, can’t. It is not always easy. Make the model work with what you have. Don’t judge, label, grudge the child.
Try. And there will be days when you will be justified. Days when you would want to. When you will have every right to do so. When that time comes, don’t. Remember the choices we make, define us.
Three. Dreamers.
In ’09 while mentoring delegates to PASHA ICT Awards, a young O level student pitched his project.
I asked about his plans, what he was doing and he said, he wasn’t sure if he should apply to Stanford or UC Berkley for his undergrad.
O2, 17 year old. 13 years later, different chat with another student. This time about grad school. I asked why he hadn’t taken the big risks, the big bets. His answer made a different point. To have heart for big bets, you need to have hope. Without hope there is no appetite for risk.
Our default response to dreams, ours or otherwise, is no. Can’t be done, won’t be done, shouldn’t be done.
“Tread softly, for you tread on my dreams.”
Respect dreamers. For all dreams have a price. You don’t know how high a price they have already paid to get to you. May be in your world view, what they aim for is not possible. Maybe in their world view it is.
Don’t taint their world with your cynicism.
I am not talking about wishful thinkers. I am talking about the ones who mean it. Who give their dreams the commitment they deserve.
The 17 year old O2 student ended up with both Berkley and Stanford. Undergrad from the UC, Masters from Stanford. Dropped out of his PhD program to dazzle the world with his drive and hunger.
The prospective grad student? Made it out to his grad school. Not his first choice, but he made it work.
Making it work is hard. Don’t make it harder.
Four. On becoming teachers.
Other than building models for 30 years, I have taught for 28 years. The most important lesson I have learnt is we don’t have all the answers. It is ok to admit that in front of our students.
Sometimes they have the right answers and we don’t. Sometimes no one has the right answers.
Those are golden moments. Moments that fork the multiverse. A chance for us to explore, experiment, probe, push, discover, challenge boundaries.
To make the magic work when that happens, we need to become students. Not teachers. When we do and we let our students lead as fellow travelers we are blessed with what teachers live for.
The singularity. A pause in the universe when a student connects the dots. The point where it all comes together. The spark of self awareness. You can see it in their eyes. Light that fire. Like our teachers lit it all those years ago.
It doesn’t matter what you teach. Pass on the torch. The fire that consumes. Curiosity and imagination. It may not be the same fire that consumed you, but it will serve its purpose.
Change a life, a mind, a destiny.
Our purpose as teachers is to open doors, inspire and help our charges fly higher. Higher than we could dream of. Sometimes that requires us to ask, why? Sometimes, the right question is, why not? Why, or why not? It doesn’t matter. As long as we ask it often enough.
Remember the choices we make and the words we use define us and our students.
a) Create safe spaces for making mistakes
b) Encourage questions, not answers.
c) Ambiguity, uncertainty, chaos
d) Work with what you have
e) Don’t give up on my child
f) Dreams and dreamers
g) Singularity
h) Why and why not?
