Being Leaders for Socially Just Education

Our first course assignment is to craft a poem based on the “Where I’m From” format (see Christensen, 1997/1998). We each bring our poem to class and read it to our colleagues, with no apologies or explanations, simply read the words on the page. We pause to acknowledge the gift of the person’s words and then the next person reads their words. Here we provide fragments of our poems.

The poem experience is exciting, hearing about both good and bad experiences of others put together on a single sheet of paper . . . what has shaped them to become the extraordinary people they are today, the people who sit before me in class.

While writing my poem, I was reluctant to get too personal, in fear that my classmates would look at me differently. I have gained a new respect for my peers and admire their ability to strip themselves of armor and just release feeling. Simply listening to the poems being read, without a comment being uttered, is beautiful. Hopefully, throughout the semester I will have many more opportunities to open up.

I was kind of selfish in a way, prior to hearing everybody’s poems. I tend to say the misfortunes which have taken place throughout my life, but hearing what so many people have seen and done, I now perceive my life as a blessing . . . some have seen much worse days. Just hearing their stories is such an inspiration. I felt at ease that there was a soft, calm, and warm environment throughout the class where we knew that nobody was judging the next person up to read, but simply taking in the beauty of the words they had to offer to us and looking into the window they opened for us to see into their lives.

Our poems create a spiritual connection that moves us toward greater intimacy and trust, an opening to our communal inquiry. In the conversational domain of the leadership course, the poems illuminate “who we wound up being.” ⁸

Our informative learning begins with scholarly readings by Steve Tozer (2013; Joel Spring, 2012; Kevin Kumashiro, 2012; Theresa Perry, Claude Steele, & Asa Hilliard, III, 2003; and Jeannie Oakes, John Rogers, & Martin Lipton, 2006).

I believe it is true that there is ideological hegemony. Tozer’s article states that many assume that their culture is better than other cultures. This is absolutely not true. We see that students are taught in schools that working hard leads to success but later on they realize that social class affects success way more than hard work. From this, we see that students are educated to follow the instructions. Teachers have to make sure that students don’t lose the art of skepticism and become servile. I want my students to challenge me and other teachers to imagine alternatives that provide access to power and leave us all free to think for ourselves, free to express and act upon what matters to us.

When Joel Spring (2012) writes of the media that contributed to the Civil Rights Movement, I find it interesting because of how powerful media was back then, compared with how it is now. Martin Luther King, Jr. is one of my favorite civil rights leaders of all time. I enjoyed learning that he was influenced by Henry David Thoreau to uphold the theory of nonviolent resistance. Another interesting fact was that King was influenced by Mahatma Gandhi’s work and by the love ethic of Jesus to integrate a powerful change in the social system. Whenever I read about the Civil Rights Movement, I am always inspired by their leadership. They are so passionate and courageous about their beliefs. It is those qualities that I admire in leaders.

I definitely see how this is a continuous process, different cultures come to America (or are “discovered” in America) and they have to fight for the same rights that belong to other human beings. I see hope in people who are accepting and genuinely interested in learning about other cultures and working together. Still, the process continues. Maybe this is a healthy way to instill self-dignity within communities, a test to see if they can keep up in the society we live in. But when human beings are treated as inferior on the sole basis of their cultural background, that is oppression and it should not be tolerated.

I found it particularly interesting reading about the history of Asian Americans and their secret oppression to economic success. Bob Suzuki (quoted in Spring, 2012) stated, “Although they have attained high levels of education, the upward mobility of Asian Americans has been limited by the effects of racism and most of them have been channeled into lower-echelon white collar jobs . . . ” (p. 123). After reading about their political action, I am proud of Asian Americans for standing up for themselves and giving me, a first-generation Korean American, an opportunity to receive equal benefits as the White American population.

The historical legacy of deculturalization relates to my educational experiences and how I wound up being because had it all not occurred, I wouldn’t be here today. Without the Civil Rights Movement, no one would have known equality. When the Declaration of Independence was written, it stated that “All men are created equal,” but at the time that meant equality of political, social, and economic rights for white men, as stated by Spring. The meaning of equality developed over time as more and more rights were granted not only to people of other races, but to women as well. If none of that had ever taken place, however, circumstances would have been very different. Taking into consideration that at a given point, women were not allowed to attend schools, I would not have had any type of public or professional schooling; instead, I would have stayed home to help out around the house. This book will help my future work as a Newark teacher. It gives light to what it took for the students who I will be teaching to be sitting in the classroom. All the political struggles and the sacrifices which were made will come down to nothing but a classroom and what it is that I have to offer to the students.

Spring (2012) discusses how the Japanese community was isolated after World War II and how the government tried to curtail the Japanese language schools. However, Spring failed to discuss a more recent issue going on today. After 9/11, we have seen many people having Islamophobia. Because of this, many Muslim students feel isolated and left out. We need to make sure that students who follow Islam do not feel isolated as they have done nothing wrong. Coming from a family where politics was viewed with scorn, I now realize that ignoring politics is not the answer; solutions to social problems lie within politics. As I think about this, I wonder how I will invite my future students to consider the ethical and political impact of their actions on others? Mahatma Gandhi said to “be the change you wish to see in the world.” This is hard to apply when one doesn’t know what change is needed. If I want our society free from Islamaphobia, the solution could include visiting a Mosque to learn what Islam really is. This is being the change I want to see in the world.

The transformative learning part of our course involves a “textbook” of about 800 slides that we read silently as our professor reads them out loud. Created by Werner Erhard, Independent International Transformation Consultant; Michael C. Jensen, Jessie Isidor Strauss Professor Emeritus, Harvard Business School; Steve Zaffron, CEO of the Vanto Group; and Kari Granger, Performance Consultant at Sunergos LLC and Fellow at the Center for Character and Leadership Development, U.S. Air Force Academy, this slide deck is titled Being a Leader: An Ontological/Phenomenological Model of Leadership (see Erhard et al., 2012). Our professor took this course at Dartmouth Medical School where the dean, Chip Souba, co-led the course with the course creators. Impressed with her experience, and the course promise to leave participants “being leaders and exercising leadership effectively as their natural self expression,” she completed training to offer the course to us.

I saw that my career had been devoted to preparing teacher candidates to craft powerful philosophies of education to inform their future teaching, a crucial undertaking, but I was approaching this with insufficient attention to ontology (who we are being) or phenomenology (our lived experience) within the present. I re-imagined writing a philosophy of education as giving one’s word to high school students, their parents, the school administration and staff, and to the community, as a sacred vow. The leadership course occurred for me as the missing piece that could give students access to power that teachers desperately need, especially in today’s neoliberal “school reform” conversations and onerous testing mandates. There are three parts to the leadership course. The first includes the following four foundational factors: integrity (being whole and complete as a human being, achieved by honoring one’s word, including restoring one’s word as soon as you know you won’t be able to keep your word); authenticity (being and acting consistent with who you hold yourself to be for your yourself, and who you hold yourself out to be for others); being committed to something bigger than oneself (the source of the serene passion or charisma required to lead and to develop others as leaders and the source of persistence, joy in the labor of, when the going gets tough); and being cause in the matter (as a declaration, a stand one takes on self and life and acting from that stand, a place from which to deal with life that you have chosen for yourself). The second part is a contextual framework for leader and leadership and the third part is removing ontological perceptual and functional constraints that interfere with one’s natural self-expression (see Erhard, Jensen, & Granger, 2012). While I have never believed in teaching from power-point slides, I use these slides because they have been carefully crafted to enable a first person engagement on the court of our lives, a process of discovery, not a third person abstract engagement about what we might do someday. We academics often talk about the importance of a liberal arts education for providing access to new ways of knowing the world. The leadership “textbook” adds access to powerful ways of being in the world.

I have taken classes involving the study of sociology before, but this class has taught me more in 1 week than I have learned in two semesters of taking sociology elsewhere. This course gives the students opportunities to understand the material presented in a personal manner. Although the slides may seem primitive, the way in which they are composed and presented allows for a personal connection. Having every individual read the words on the slide and having the words directed at each individual reading them makes the learning process seem effortless. It is as if we are having a conversation with ourselves.

In one of our assignments, I saw that my pride could get in the way of me engaging in true, authentic self-reflection. To self-reflect, one has to take criticism openly. I take everything too personally and may be able to accept criticism openly, but my pride gets in the way, preventing me from understanding the point and leaving me knowing that I am wrong but not why I’m wrong.

As a professor, I often forget that I am in the transformative learning with the students. I can fall into a deceptive “expert” space of thinking I “know” the material and miss the amazing opportunities available as a member of our learning community. Like you, Aminah, I suspect it is pride and an already always listening of “I already know” that interferes with my authentic engagement.

This was a very interesting week learning about leadership and the power of context. I learned about the difference between conditions and context, context as being what I create and have control over and conditions as being given to me in everyday life. Context is most important with my effectiveness and my quality of life. Jean Lloyd is truly an inspirational leader and you can tell that she is passionate about creating leaders for the world. She is good at showing others her passion and I believe that is her strongest persuasion for others to become leaders. From her Youtube video, Living the Adventure Called your Life, I learned that everyone in this world inherits conversations. Being Asian, I have inherited a certain stereotypical conversation that is related to my ethnic group. I have dealt with the racism that Ms. Lloyd talks about. I agree with her strongly about wanting to abolish that “predetermined” conversation. I truly believe in her when she says that you have the power to alter those “conversations.” She challenges us to get in touch with what we deeply care about. I deeply care about my God, my family, my friends, my success, my future family and striving to become a better person with a just character. I am still sorting this out, but I want my life to be about people feeling deeply connected to each other, caring for others, and standing up for justice. This requires me being cause-in-the-matter, being more than just words, my actions being this in the world.

Jean Lloyd spoke about how she had no interest in stepping out into the dangerous world in order to avoid harm’s way. However, over the years she began to develop herself as a student and went from being an introvert to being an extravert and a leader. When she went to tutor overseas, in Finland, she was amazed at how the white girls wanted to look like her and wanted to have her brown skin. In Sweden, they did not like the people from Finland. To Americans, these two groups of people look exactly the same; however, discrimination is an “inherited conversation.” After her warm welcome in Finland, Lloyd found happiness in the human spirit and she felt that now she could pledge allegiance to the world, not only America. There is a world that goes with what we are labeled, that is, black, white, gay, straight, Jewish, Muslim, and so on. Most people believe that our circumstances determine our level of happiness, but that’s not the case. It is only an allusion that hinders us. We can make the best of our circumstances in order to reach our own level of happiness. Service and contributions are means of sustainable happiness.

This is one of the most touching videos I have viewed. I can really connect with Jean because she went through a crucible experience similar to what I did two years ago. She explains that many times people get accustomed to their environments and mind-sets around them. However, to be happy in your life, you need to make sure that you define your environment and not the other way around. This was exactly the crucible I was going through two years ago. I was completely lost during that time and was trying to be someone I was never meant to be. I didn’t know if I wanted to be true to my Indian values or American values. Just like I had conflict with myself, European settlers had conflict with the Native Americans and vice versa.

This week we got to see how to restore our integrity. ⁹ I could see the worry on the student’s faces when they walked into class late. However, when they restored their integrity it made the class a little more relaxed because we saw how students could be brave enough to stand up and do it. We also went over certain key terms such as functional constraint, which is something that holds you back. For example, if “who you wound up being” is a shy person, asking a question in class may be hard for you to do, ultimately hindering your chance of learning the material. “Who you know yourself to be” is not who you are, it’s simply a way of being.

Thinking back to the power of context assignment, I believe we must use our senses in order to reach our full potential as human beings. We must smell, hear, touch, and taste in order to fully experience ourselves and eventually experience the beauty of all aspects of life. I was guilty of not using my senses to full aptitude, because I believe that when I see something or hear something that I do not enjoy, I automatically deny it. Furthermore, I started thinking about how technology affects my context because I rely on it to do most of my tasks. Telephones, computers, and televisions are just a few examples. With such resources at my fingertips, I feel as though I no longer have to apply myself and use my senses in order to make discoveries; rather, I just rely on technology.

A very good quote from Anwar Sadat was given in slide 181: “He who cannot change the very fabric of his thought will never be able to change reality.” This quote is absolutely correct and is very much connected with a quote another great man said which is “A man is but the product of his thoughts. What he thinks, he becomes.” (Mahatma Gandhi). We need to make sure that we change the way we think because our thoughts define our lives and what we become in the future.

Authenticity is the key to personal success. As long as you stay true to yourself and maintain your character, personal success and satisfaction is bound to come your way in one way or another. Be unique, genuine and, most importantly, be authentic.

We went over this idea of choosing. The idea put simply is “I choose my life because I choose my life.” One chooses after consideration, not based on consideration. Initially, some students, including myself, did not fully understand the idea of choosing something for the sake of choosing it. “You don’t choose everything, but you just make do with circumstances you’re in at the moment.” “When you choose something you usually have options, right?” These were just a few of the many comments discussed in class. After going over the readings and discussing it further, I have a better understanding of the idea behind the term “choosing.” In terms of being, one has a choice, for example, “you’re stupid versus you’re being stupid.” Without the term “being,” the statement becomes very factual and definite, allowing little room for change.

For me the choosing activity seemed to be similar to viewing something another way, usually in a positive light. Professor White said this, “It’s like we’re given lenses to view life and we don’t even know we are wearing glasses.” I really connected to this because I feel like I’ve reached a stage where I can recognize that something presented does not match my reality of it and so I am forced to question both what I think I know and what I see before me. Sometimes it becomes frustrating because I find myself between people who don’t have this realization. At the same time, it’s really enlightening to speak with people who do experience this. In the choosing assignment, I saw a difference in actively choosing something and passively going along with something. When I am choosing to do something, I feel more responsibility, maybe this is why I tend to not take this approach.

Culture and my roots also play a large role in affecting my way of being and acting. From where I’m from, women and children are commonly seen but not heard so much. Even though I do have a say in a lot of things, ultimately my father gets the last say in matters and what he says typically goes—nobody defies him. Living in the United States almost all of my life, I realize how lucky I am for getting all the opportunities which have been made available to me. After having moved to Pakistan for two years, I realized how different the education systems were and had I lived or gone to school in Pakistan all my life, I wouldn’t have been as confident and outgoing as I am today. My dad always says that girls are the respect of a family, they make and break it. So if I were a boy, I feel that even though reputation would be a major factor, it might not be that big of an issue and things would be easier and laid back. I’m the eldest child, so taking the leader role among the three children in the family came naturally. However, since I’m a girl, I was always expected to be seen rather than heard. I developed a sense of fear of speaking out. Knowing that my ideas would be rejected, I learned to keep to myself. I knew not to take risks; however, acceptance of some things came hard to me. As much as I was just expected to accept some things how they were and not question them, I would commonly do the opposite, especially during my rebellious teenage years and that’s when I discovered the leader within me, knowing I could stand and own up to so much more than what meets the eye, but just not confident enough to do it.

Before taking this course, I would occasionally take a step back and reassess situations in my life. However, after taking this course and learning about the influences of context, I reevaluate almost every situation. By becoming aware of the context that is using me, I have the power to change the way I feel and act. I remember a specific moment recently where I could not help but think of everything I have learned about leadership thus far. The Rutgers Students Justice for Palestine (RSJP) group hosted a series of events for Israeli Apartheid week and on the last day they hosted a discussion of ways to boycott Israeli products. The event attracted a large number of people. The majority of those in attendance were pro-Palestine while there were only a handful of pro-Israelis. The two speakers, one Muslim and one Jewish, were giving a presentation on the boycott, sanctions, and divestments (BSD) movement to boycott Israeli products. There was one man who seemed very hostile, as if he just came to the event to criticize everything that was being said. Although I am a Palestinian and I support the BSD movement, I don’t agree with the way the man was being treated. While the man came in there ready to argue, passing out pamphlets about how Israeli apartheid does not exist, and so on, coming back at him with the same aggression would not solve anything. I analyzed the idea of context and how it was using people in the discussion. The context using the pro-Israeli man was probably one that had him believe he was a victim and that he was being attacked. While the contexts using the Palestinian supporters were probably ones that made them angry and aggressive. I find myself rethinking how to engage effectively in political action.

With 6 weeks of our course remaining, this article ends in the middle. In the midst of liberating ourselves from the constitutive force of what we have come to know as our past, we are disrupting, dislodging, disconfirming our habitual sense of who we are while generating new contexts that call forth new ways of being and acting. The conversational domain of the leadership “textbook” invites a reinvention of ourselves as human beings. ¹⁰ We are on the edge of a new politics of possibility. As Karen Barad (2007) advises, “We are responsible for the world within which we live, not because it is an arbitrary construction of our choosing, but because it is sedimented out of particular practices that we have a role in playing” (p. 203). This course prepares us for this responsibility. And, there is no end to our inquiry. Like integrity, authenticity, and radical democracy, all are mountains with no tops. Our task now is to love climbing.

Writing as inquiry (see Richardson, 2000) with Rutgers undergraduate students deepens my commitment to listening authentically to what they care about and the differences they want to make in the world they have inherited. While I want to give them knowledge, it is only what they discover for themselves that has lasting value. As this text goes to print, I prepare to teach this course inside a new institutional context. We will now inquire into the new politics of possibility with a new chancellor, Nancy Cantor, a leader who enacts those politics.