Gary Ackerman @garyackerman@qoto.org

If you don’t care to understand the rationale, don’t criticize the decision.

Education leaders who do not have students and teachers in mind when making decisions are always wrong. The problem is they don’t often know the difference.

If you have a “great idea” go ahead and do it. Assigning it to someone else just takes them away from more valuable work.

Leaders who believe they must give direct “orders” at every meeting are decreasing the effectiveness of the folks who report to them.

Unsolicited advice to new leaders: If you don’t listen to folks, you will be ineffective and disliked.

“One of the great delights of any new technology is that it is for a while, free” - Michael Crighton

Highly standardized computer-mediated curriculum and instruction may be a very efficient method of instruction, but it isn't great for learning.

Contextually complex problems of increasing relevance to students are the appropriate foci of curriculum.

Appropriate curriculum depends on individual’s existing knowledge as well as social context.

Those assumptions that are the foundation of you work... they may well be false.

"Brains are containers to be filled with knowledge " is still widely-believed.

One things I learned early in my career is that if you are writing during meetings, folks assume you are taking notes. Adopt this strategy to increase your productive time.

I'm at the age when I don't have time or energy for silly things. If the work isn't directly affecting things that are important to me, then I don't do it.

Someone at work has announced their resignation. They are currently in a group that was invited to a meeting 6 weeks after they are leaving. They accepted the invite. Sure it might be a mistake, but it demonstrates a lack of attention to detail.

Assumptions That Are Likely False https://hackscience.education/2023/12/09/assumptions-that-are-likely-false/

All disputes in science are resolved by evidence and observation, except for those that are resolved when old adherents give in... or die.

Note to leaders... if you intend to change anything, make sure you understand how the changes will (or will not) integrate with existing systems.

How many works can you add to a bibliography without looking them up?

“We therefore give the word 'intelligence' to this wondrously complex and multifaceted set of human capabilities. This shorthand symbol is then reified and intelligence achieves a dubious status as a unitary thing.” - Stephen Jay Gould

I do believe that schools are becoming irrelevant in the lives of young people. Adults are trying to "improve" schools by looking towards their past; “what worked for me will work for them,” is the misguided reasoning.