Dismantle DEI

Dismantle DEI was first published as Dismantling DEI, Ideology, and Some Modest Proposals to Reimagine Purpose by Intrepid Ed News from OESIS Dismantling DEI, Ideology, and Some Modest Proposals to Reimagine Purpose Change always involves a dark night when everything falls apart. Yet if this period of dissolution is used to create new meaning, then chaos ends and a new…

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Education, Poetry, RattleBag and Rhubarb, The Sex Wars

Lying to the Young is Wrong

In his day, the Soviet poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko’ was something of an international rock star whose readings could fill sports stadiums. He was one of those A-List literati who make the front pages. His poem Lies was much anthologized in English teaching materials in the years following its publication in the Soviet Literary journal Novy Mir in 1959.  The kind…

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Art, Books, RattleBag and Rhubarb, The Sex Wars, WW2

Literal Nazis and the Retro-transing of History

 Researching Marienbad and the Savoy led me to Erika Mann and all the gossip, scandal, politics, and drama of her family. I wanted to read her account of life in pre-war Germany The Lights Go Down in part of my preparation for the 1940 Club and here. I couldn’t track down a copy so I read School for Barbarians: Education…

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Education, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Where’s Your School On This Spectrum? Where Do You Want It To Be?

If you’re thinking about branding and how to market your school (and who isn’t these days?) then it’s good to have a strong agreed upon sense of who you are, how you show who you are and what people actually think. Where are you? So try this quick test with your board, your admin team and the faculty. You can…

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Education, Poetry, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Those School Brochures: How to stand out from the crowd

If you’re in the market for an independent school – or a college for that matter – you will have seen your fill of those wonderful shiny brochures aka viewbooks that now primarily reside on websites. And as you read, you think Wow! This sounds good. Look at this stuff they do and how they care and how kids excel.…

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RattleBag and Rhubarb

How Change Happens: The Leopards Break Into The Temple

If you’ve ever been confronted by a dose of TTWWHADI (that’s the way we have always done it) or been reproached with the saying “That’s not the way we do things here,” “That’s not our way”… If you have ever thought that the barbarians are at the door threatening the purity and essence of your beloved institution with their new-fangled,…

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Education, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Blocked: Did Kindergarten Invent Modernism?

The maple wood blocks . . . are in my fingers to this day. – Frank Lloyd Wright I have recently rekindled my interest in the work of Friedrich Froebel – the educational pioneer often recognized as the inventor/ creator of the kindergarten. One aspect of this story is the connection between the toys, blocks and shapes that were commonly…

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Education, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Everyone a Planner Now: No More Status Quo

Ten Trends: educating children for tomorrow’s world An article in the Journal of School Improvement a while back examined ten major trends and looked at the challenges they present for schools. The author, Gary Marx, begins with this ringing statement: The status quo is a ticket to obsolescence. Why? Because the world around us is in motion, changing at dizzying…

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RattleBag and Rhubarb

A Rising Tide

They say that a rising tide gathers no moss. Or is that the rolling stone? Anyway – if that rising tide keeps rising, what happens to boats firmly moored and anchored to the harbor bed?