A student-led revolt recently overhauled the mission statement of St. John's High School because it used the word "adequately" to describe the school's goals in preparing students for life. "Adequately," among other changes, has become "exceptionally." Kudos to students Shekinah Robinson, Rodney Burnell, and Meaghan Maxwell for having more common sense than the previous School Improvement Committee that originated that wording.
I'm guessing that mission statements came into common use in schools in the 1980s. Certainly prior to that decade everyone knew what the "mission" of a school was--education. Then the language of business crept in. Now education is a commodity or service in the same way as toothpaste or clothing. The school community no longer has teachers, students, parents, and administrators. It is made up of "stakeholders," as though it were some kind of joint stock company.
At St. John's "[the old] mission statement posters hung in every classroom, and officials read it aloud daily to students." Presumably the new posters will be hung soon. Maybe they will inspire, but maybe reading "it aloud daily" will also be mind-numbing.
Certainly the mission statement for C.E. Williams [published in the P & C]should be read aloud every day as punishment until someone gets the idea that it is made up up VERBIAGE:
"The mission of CE Williams Middle School for Creative and Scientific Arts is to create a safe and nurturing learning environment and to provide students with an effective, relevant, and meaningful program of instruction integrating the creative arts and sciences. Within this environment, we believe that students can learn when provided with diverse and enriched opportunities and resources. We accept fully the responsibility to maximize these opportunities for academic achievement for students while embracing cultural identities and ethnicities. The CE Williams community will thereby prepare our students for both academic and personal success in global society. " Yikes!
Perhaps you detect that I think time might be better spent on improving the education itself--too many captive hours spent building mind-numbing mission statements, I'm afraid.
On the other hand, for fun, try the mission statement generator on the Dilbert Comic Strip Archive. Here's a sample: "It's our responsibility to professionally restore quality intellectual capital as well as to competently simplify long-term high-impact infrastructures because that is what the customer expects ."
Now you can try it too. http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/games/career/bin/ms.cgi
Thursday, December 06, 2007
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3 comments:
Frankly, I find the thought of a school's mission statement being read out loud at the start of each day on the intercom to be just plain weird, something out of George Orwell's 1984.
It's not much different from the image of thousands of school aged Red Guards in China not so many decades ago waving in the air their copies of the Little Red Book and mindlessly reciting The Chairman Mao's quotations (out of context of course).
I'm so glad the students at St. John's realize the word "adequate" is not enough when referring to education. It's too bad SC judges don't think the same way they do.
It's a wonder more students, like the ones at St. Johns, don't speak out against the institutional put downs that can be found throughout CCSD.
I kinda like the ones that still can be seen on the old High School of Charleston building on Rutledge Avenue:
High above the street facade is "Enter to Learn; Leave to Serve".
Over the interior courtyard portico is "Erected for the Higher Education of Youth".
Funny thing is, CCSD saw no value in the property or what it represented in 1986, so it sold it. MUSC bought it and has since not only made use of the building...it found the mottos (mission statements?) to work quite well for the College of Health Professions at MUSC, too. How's that for a credo being more than just "adequate"?
Maybe the bureaucracy at CCSD should try this as their new mission statement: K.I.S.S. (Keep it simple, stupid!)
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