Personal Growth

Recently an esteemed colleague suggested in no uncertain terms that I stop living behind the lense of an educational developer or educational technologist and start paying attention to the way things are in their dynamic, organic ever changing ever unpredictable reality.

I’m paraphrasing here, but the notion has really stuck with me over the last few days and I’m slowly coming to grips with the implications of it all.

Prior to my new role I existed in an ivory tower of sorts, with only a theoretical grasp of what actually goes on in a university, and certainly not a practical comprehension of what the average academic or the average student actually thinks, feels or acts like.

So I arrived on Day One carrying some enormous assumptions and beliefs – even prejudices and stereotypes – about what things actually looked like on the ground, and on the front lines. It’s a bit embarrassing to realise how full of myself I really was.

Since then I’ve had a heathy dose of humility and reality, and it’s been wonderful. I’ve come to realise that I am just one element in the wider landscape, not its saviour – not insignificant, but not more significant either.

I’ve come to realise that my ideologies and opinions on education, learning and the need for change are absolutely critical – but they are just my views, and I need to be able and willing to recognise and work with people, conditions and circumstances from a spectrum of different philosophies and practicalities.

I’ve also realised that, in acknowledging the legitimacy of other schools of thought, and the entitlement of their advocates and proponents to embrace ideas different to my own, I become better able to introduce my own ideals into the mix – and importantly, that people will be more willing to listen to me, because I am willing to listen to them.

It might sound contradictory, but in admitting my own relative smallness in a big academic world I feel more empowered to make change and to pursue it than I did before. I think thats because I feel that I’m actually being listened to, and my opinions taken seriously while I have begun to take myself a bit less seriously.

Posted via email from Mike Bogle