But of course, I'm not.
And this is the most important component of high school: we're not our student.
Learning is discovery.
Discovery isn't dictated to students by teaching to tests or by statistical assessment of tests results. Discovery is the powerful ability to imagine how and then to do the rational sifting everyone said couldn't be done. Creative rational sifting is not a strategy for passing standardized tests.
When a pundit vilifies education, he or she misses the point because all such pundits can do is imagine what he or she would do in that situation. This rejects the opportunity to see high school through student eyes. The student perspective for the non-student is a new reality. Without the student reality an attempt to imagine the circumstances would lead to any action other than what is needed.
When a teacher can't see why students are not fully alive in class, or when standardized test scores drop even when teaching to the test, we're not seeing discovery from failure, but student shutdown. The flaw is not the students, but is the education machine. The eduction assembly line of conformity that created them can't teach them.
When we call a student out for not choosing to love doing boring stuff, when we resort to blunt teach to the test tactics, we create "dysfunctional students" who are bright. All students will learn more from a collaborative dialogue.
Discovery creates learning.
These are the symptoms that show us: parents, teachers, and administrators that we've forgotten how to draw students in and create unique classroom experiences. An experience that has no makeup that is unique to that class.
You don't have to be an entertainer to be great in the classroom, nor do you need to be unemployed to work on a task force on getting people back to work. What is required, though, is a persistent effort to understand facilitate discovery with discussion.