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Could schools power future success?
By Mike Stevenson, Thinktastic
Schools as think tanks. Schools helping create a Scotland that's positive, inventive, outward looking, compassionate and enterprising. Why not? Has there been a better time for fresh thinking and new ideas? Where is raw creativity most abundant? I want primary and secondary schools to help shape neighbourhoods, towns and villages. Scotland will be all the richer, when we harness the ideas of our young people. As teachers you are at the beating heart of our future, surrounded by a treasure trove of creativity and imagination. Release it before it's blown away by the chill wind of adult cynicism.
Deny the doomsayers their influence. For too long they've stifled new ideas. With an economy in turmoil we need to think and do differently. Nothing is beyond our wit. Faced with adversity we create - wallow and we stagnate. In south Beirut, post-bombing, I saw traders ply their business amidst smoking rubble and children play in the midst of the destruction. In an art class in a South African township school, I toyed with a small wheelbarrow made from scraps of card, fencing wire and a roundel of wood - it worked.
I am talking about the inestimable value and power of human resourcefulness - once valued in Scotland, now buried by years of material growth.
Four fifths of the jobs today's primary children will go on to don't yet exist. Yet here's a generation that understands the explosive power of digital technology - why let them inherit a future created by those that don't understand it. I hosted an event where groups of young people set out in film their ideas on the future - then joined influential adults in table discussions. The result - an exciting new action plan for the area. Dynamite. Is that a portent of what's possible?
Teachers are as vital to Scotland's future as feeding milk is to a baby. That's both a responsibility and a privilege. You are valued and you are not alone. There are those outside schools with ideas, skills, passions and the resources to add value to your school. Step outside, make a few calls, create new connections, spend a few days in a creative agency or electronics company - look for opportunities to extend you and your school's sphere of influence. Many politicians, civic, public service and business leaders are tired and short of new ideas. Schools will never be. Believe me, these are exciting times.