The Failing is in the Failure to Fail

As she scrolled through her RSS feeds, she came across a post that was all too familiar in the recent weeks.  Against her best judgment (as it was 7:10 am and students were ready to stampede), she clicked "How The U.S. Education System Is Failing Students".  The young teacher reluctantly read the article and had anticipated seeing the same old diatribes targeting educators or parents or leaders or bowls of soup.  It made no difference to her at this point.  The conversations were the same despite "fresh" new research and analysis that made the issues even more muddled.

But this article was a bit different.  It seemed to have a spark that other resources were lacking.  There was courage in the argument that in order for the system to reinvigorate itself, it would essentially have to fall.  Did schools have that courage?  The courage to fail and learn from that failure?  The courage to inspire innovation in students by being models for change themselves?  The small optimist whispering from the tiny hairs on the back of her neck said, "Alright!  This is what we need to make happen!"  But the pessimist sweating through the pores on her body bellowed, "Yeah, that will happen.  And this will be funded how?"  

The smiles began to trickle in from the hallway, so she closed the article from their peering eyes.  Seeing a title like, "How The U.S. Education System Is Failing Students" was not something she thought her students should see that early in the morning.  They were already cynical enough as 8th graders.