This is a question that business owners take a lot of time and effort to think about and work on when we help them with their brand. They may not see it right away but they care, deeply.
There is always a primary goal for a business, organization and system to exist. For the long established entities, we often need to go backwards in order to surface it : people are doing what they are doing because it has been working for them and their audiences until it doesn’t anymore. Based on their experiences and vision, they repurpose the business from the one they created 80 years ago.
And the updated purpose feels and sounds different.
This is quite common. Time has changed. So is the purpose. The important thing to consider is if the original purpose still serves people today?
This is the same for our public school system.
There are many versions out there about the original purpose for our public school system. Based on what we have experienced and observed, one version aligns more than the others: our public school system was created to support factory owners by supplying people who were well disciplined, following exactly what was taught in the classroom, behaved exactly what needed them to behave on the assembly lines, and believed their purpose was to fit in so the factories could run and profit the best with the least problems.
This made sense, for factory owners and people who choose to work in the factories.
In order to become a qualified factory worker, we need to know how to follow instructions by studying subjects like reading and math, we need to fit in by following authority and orders. When we are not, we’ll get punished, ostracized, and bullied. The culture and environment serve the purpose.
If this is what public school system is all about, that’s fine. The system just need to make it clear to all the children and parents, so we can choose and won’t misunderstand each other.
Because as parents, we hope our children get to learn, to follow their dreams, passion, curiosity and interests. Our children get to choose what they want to do and who they want to become, and we need our schools help children do just that.
There is a difference between studying versus learning. Just like there is a difference between the studying culture and environment versus the learning culture and environment.
The purpose defines the culture and environment, not the other way around.
When we don't align with the purpose, everything else is off.
Studying or learning or the both, what is our school for?
