I love how Seth Godin uses his blog to succinctly articulate ideas with a straight forward, common sense approach. Seth, is an author and public speaker and I find a number of his posts have ramifications for education – something I thought when reading his recent post Alienating the 2%.
I find we often spend hours thinking about, worrying about, and strategizing over, the group Seth refers to as the two percent:
If you have fans or followers or customers, no matter what you do, you’ll annoy or disappoint two percent of them. And you’ll probably hear a lot more from the unhappy 2% than from the delighted 98.
I am not giving away any trade secrets when I suggest that as we propose innovations, we often have the faces of particular students, educators or parents in mind – wondering how they will respond, knowing that they often relish their role in Seth’s 2%.
Here are just three of the issues in education (as well as in the West Vancouver context) that seem to fall into the two percent challenge:
More Feedback, Less Marks – We have had almost universal appreciation for how teachers and schools are embracing the use of feedback through formative assessment, and in turn, results are improving. We have heard the concern that this approach to assessment has the greatest benefit for weaker students, thus shrinking the gap on the spectrum between those at the top and those at the bottom. This is great – except if you are at the top – the old way was working great for you and this new way, while it still works well for you, has just increased your competition for university.
Wireless Technology – On one level, it is a trust-in-government issue (can we really trust Health Canada’s statements on safety), and there is also some pushback around whether these “gadgets” are really necessary. We can lose sight on the conversation about what we are trying to do – provide access to information and collaboration through web-based, secured learning environments; provide assisting technologies to enable students with special needs to work with their classmates; connect with classrooms in other communities, provinces and countries, as well as to utilize digital texts, and extending learning beyond the traditional bell-to-bell of school.
Embrace First Nations Education – West Vancouver has very few First Nations’ students. As of the September count, we had about 30 students who self-declared out of our 7,000 student population. We are making a concerted effort to work with our local Squamish Nation, to better support our First Nations’ students, and also improve the understanding of all of our students about the Squamish Nation. For some, this is an add-on, or an initiative that is only about a small number of students – most of us see it very differently.
Back to Seth:
It seems as though there are only two ways to deal with this: Stop innovating, just stagnate. Or go ahead and delight the vast majority.
Sure, you can try to minimize the cost of change, and you might even get the number to 1%. But if you try to delight everyone, all the time, you’ll just make yourself crazy. Or become boring.
I am committed to not being boring, or having West Vancouver become stagnate. Whether it is continuing to embrace formative assessment, supporting wireless technology to transform learning, or more involvement with our local First Nations, for starters, we need to keep the 98% in the foreground.
The easiest thing to do in education is nothing. There is something sadly reassuring about our children’s education looking like our K-12 education experience – I heard once that the best advice to a vice-principal who wanted to become principal was to make sure nothing changed because nobody would complain, and in-turn, everyone would say you are doing a good job.
We have to be better than that.
cultureofyes.ca 
Interesting thinking Chris. I wonder what your thoughts are about graduation. Is 98% good enough or should we strive for 100%? Or for technology and equity – is it okay to be satisfied with 98% of our students having access to good technology and a transformative learning experience? Or in other words, do we do all we can for all students or just the ones we “can”? Doesn’t public education has certain obligations to all?
It is interesting the reference to the 98% graduation rate – that is the precise conversation we are having in West Vancouver – what we do to help those last 2% find their way to graduation. I see Seth’s point different than this context. I would agree we have a responsibility to meet the needs of 100% of our students but, in our efforts to meet the needs of these students, we often hear from a small vocal group who oppose a particular change.
While we absolutely have an obligation to all, I don’t believe this obligation requires unanimous consent before we more forward with any given initiative.
Hi Chris,
Well written. As a classroom teacher I made a promise to students that I would do my best to make classes as engaging as possible. When I became an administrator 5 years ago I challenged myself to continue to engage students as a vice-principal. Your reflections regarding Seth Godin’s comments about being boring are spot on!
In addition to your comments above I would add that a commitment to not being boring (so being dynamic and innovative) leads to better connections with students, staff and parents.
I have recently discovered your blog through Twitter and I’m enjoy reading your thoughts. Thanks for making a difference.
Thanks Grant for connecting and for the comment. It is great that we have a growing group of BC educators using social media to connect and extend ideas. I am finding in my role, where we have to support administrators who are not being boring (they can attract the attention of the 25), and have to continually remind ourselves and them, that we will not move our system forward without innovation, and with innovation comes some tension as we work through the change.
Chris,
Your comment that the easiest thing to do is nothing really resonated. The world has been turned on it’s head since I was in K-12. When I returned to the school system for my practicum after 20 years in the business world, I was stunned by what I found.
Technology like overheads, textbooks that were 10 years old as curriculum, teachers telling us not to use technology because “it’s a hassle” and little effort to connect to the real world (via field trips or based on teacher’s having real-world experience.)
Despite that 2% we pushed ahead w/ strategies like cell phone text polls, creating a Jeopardy Game in Flash for Accounting Students, bringing in a comedian (check out the Funny Money Man btw) and striving to engage the students.
After all as business people we were trained to serve our customers – they have changed – shouldn’t we?
Thanks Bret. I think your real-world experience between your schooling and your teaching experiences give you a great perspective. I think some of us (I am part of the us) that have never really left school – going directly from K-12 to 5 years of university and then back to teaching in the classroom, don’t have the same connection to “the real world” as those who have had other experiences. I find I learn a lot from a colleague of mine, Gary Kern, who interrupted his teaching career with 3 years in the business world – he brings a different lense to the work we are doing and a greater urgency.
And yes – our students are our customers so we should be working to meet their every changing needs.
I like Bret’s comment. In my school, as we explore the values of Assessment for Learning, I find that 98% of teachers get it but few imbrace the practice.
We all know that change is difficult but putting these practices in place is proving to be really difficult.
I would like to say that teachers don’t have the time built new resources to move forward as the hurdle that prevents Assessment for Learning from becoming common practice.
Rob – I agree that this is key to trying to move our system forward – finding time for teachers to work together to sort through the theory and turn it into practice in our very different contexts. Our three secondary schools are not doing anything revolutionary, but they have each buit in collaborative time into their schedules this year to give teachers time to work together. At Rockridge it is every week, and connected to the implmentation of the MYP IB Program. At our other two schools it is monthly. We all know PD needs to be more than something that happens 6 times a year – this is one way we are trying to make it more ongoing.
I know from my experience at Riverside that the Wednesday morning study group was one venue that provided some of thsi opportunity.
Funny how I came upon this tonight, as I just finished a 30 minute chat on facebook with an old 2% student I had about 10 years ago.
In our discussion about days gone by, he never mentioned anything about marks and here I thought that was what really mattered?!?
He went on to say how much it meant to him that I took an interest in his life and took the time to help him get into university years after he left our program.
When we “really” make a difference in a kids life, it is when we invest in their lives and not necessarily their book learnin.
Although I LOVE technology and it is central to everything I do in the classroom, I am not sure how you can “make a difference” using technology but hey it is a brave new world.
Keith – your story is great. You made a difference because of a face-to-face relationship (I believe this is so important and often lost in some of the discussions of online learning) but you have been able to continue and extend it through technology.
And who says Facebook is just a waste of time! 🙂
[…] have referenced Seth Godin in several posts. In 2010, I wrote on Seth Godin, the Two Percent and Education, and how we spend so much time investing in small groups of people. In 2011, I wrote on Seth and […]
[…] ideas and have related them to an educational setting. In previous posts, I have written about Alienating the 2%, Thinking of School as an Experience, and the Pleasant Reassurance of New […]