Nov 22nd, 2012 - Can't We All Just Get Along?

This has been one of those weeks that even passive news consumption has been too much. Teaching students about world affairs has always been a complicated thing, that much more so when the events of the day revolve around potential war.

I have long advocated that schools need to not only teach peace, but to be places of peace as well. If we can make every school a better, more humane place, we are well on our way to making every city, region, nation a better place. It’s a cumulative effect throughout the world – cumulatively good when we do the right things, cumulatively bad when we don’t take the time to teach what needs to be taught.

I wonder what our students think when they consume news on their own. I worry that they sometimes assume that what they see on TV is the only version of reality, the reality actually being that reality comes in different sizes, shapes and colors. I can imagine that news weeks such as this past one make a lot of young people’s heads hurt. As it does mine.

Don Adams, Head of School