Systems Thinking for 5-year olds

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By Ed Johnson

I believe children are natural born systems thinkers (EastAtlantaPatch). But now, starting early in life more than ever, that very human quality is being educated out of children in the name of school reform, accountability, higher standards, achievement, closing achievement gaps, being college and career ready, global competition, racing to the top, and such other fuss. And let’s not forget Teach for America.

Well, unlike all that fuss, this lesson in “Systems Thinking for 5-year olds” warms the heart, lifts the spirit, brings hope, and just plan makes my day.

“Foundation for Healthy Social Systems” was the working theme of last October’s Christian Association of Public Theologians (CAPT) Eighth Annual Conference, held in Atlanta. It was my pleasure to present at the conference “My Mental Model of Why Atlanta Public Schools Works the Way It Works” and to engage conference participants in delightfully probing and eye-opening conversation. No one from APS attended the conference.

Since the CAPT conference I had not thought to much expose my mental model elsewhere, until now. 

Kindly let “Systems Thinking for 5-year olds” be preparatory to looking at “My Mental Model of Why Atlanta Public Schools Works the Way It Works.” Note especially bunnies and wolves.

Though the whole graphic of my mental model appears below, the attached PDF exposes and adds a smaller, color-coded aspect of it one at a time: 

· Starting with “APS Administration” (Reinforcing Loop 1, or R1)

· Then adding “APS Classrooms” (Reinforcing Loop 2, or R2)

· Then adding “Atlanta Citizenry” (Reinforcing Loop 3, or R3)

· Then adding “Atlanta Community” (Reinforcing Loop 4, or R4)

· Then adding “APS Status Quo” (Balancing Loop 1, or B1)

Exposing my mental model of why Atlanta Public Schools works the way it works helps me to continually examine the fact that plutocratic and corporate interests aim to balance against democratic and citizenship interests so as to effectively hold APS back from learning to improve beyond plutocratic and corporate interests (therefore, “APS Status Quo”).

(Asking about Teach for America: Does TFA greatly exemplify an educated but non-Systems Thinking cohort?  One that eagerly commits to being used as mechanistic-thinking cogs to be replaced every two years in service to plutocratic and corporate interests? One from which “African American” and other so-called at-risk children must quickly learn to cope with more fleeting, unstable human relationships than the children otherwise would have to? One that impresses upon children to become the next generation of willing mechanistic-thinking cogs that is ever more insensitive to qualities of humanness? One that contributes to creating more long-term social challenges to improving K-12 public education than otherwise would be created? And one that serves to hinder development of healthy social systems?

Mr. Johnson, a resident of Atlanta's Cascade community, is an education. He can be reached at advocate.edwjohnson@aol.