Knowledge emerges only through invention and re-invention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other. ~Paolo Freire
In the past thirty years of education, there have been extraordinary shifts based on the rapid journey of innovation. While we are learning something new, innovation continues to strengthen the capacity within education, at home, and in the workplace. The critical nature of developing students at an early age for the expectations that have yet to exist is a priority in education. As a country, we are simultaneously experiencing a pandemic, social causes and issues, and an economic crisis. These matters have provided communities with a better understanding of equity, access, and inclusion in STREAM.
Creating a Digital Environment
As educational organizations, we were propelled to create digital environments within a short timeframe and struggled with establishing an infrastructure necessary for excellence. Amazingly, we have come together to have conversations that would change how we see education today. As we witness the unfolding of fluid uncertainties, there is an immediate shift to our current structures and an opportunity to be more inclusive concerning decision-making and moving towards a culture of STREAM for all, which includes Research and the Arts.
An Educational Responsibility
We understand that we are living in a time where careers are ever-changing. We are responsible for ensuring that our students are prepared and exposed to various skills from an early age. Our students have been central to teaching and learning, entering the digital world. We have explored methods to engage children in an inquiry-based model of instruction where they take ownership of their education. It has been suggested that this model is exclusive to high achievers. Yet, we are encouraged that this model is consistent with exemplary educational practices for all students. We aim to generate the energy required to create 21st-century STREAM learning environments that would optimize students’ potential and professional learning opportunities.
A Forward-Thinking Mindset
The pandemic has shifted us to a forward-thinking mindset with equity at the forefront of discussion. We understand that all stakeholders are vital to the culmination of intensive discussion to understand the uid nature of change. The transformation of education is indeed at our front doorsteps, and collaboration will be instrumental to the process. It is necessary to leverage the combination of external and internal experts to support forward thinking. Technology and Wi-Fi have become essential tools for teaching, learning, and maintaining effective and timely communication for all.
Although many school districts were ahead of the curve in providing their students with these essential tools, it was evident that the most vulnerable were struggling to receive and provide access. Thus, equity would surface at the top of the list. Districts were faced with ensuring that we sustained a culture of care, trust, and encouragement to validate our strength in collaboration, unity, and equity.
Focused on Funds
The finance and operations of districts depended on ensuring efficiencies to secure the reallocation of funds aligned to the needs of our children and professional learning. Concerned with a reduction in funding sources, we became extremely frugal with our expenditures, repurposing funds, applying for funding allocation from numerous sources, and becoming proactive in forecasting budgetary constraints. Subsequently, we ensured consistency with our obligations to our community and children in maximizing and leveraging funds to support our children, staff, and families in STREAM.
The force of COVID-19 gave way to being mindful of the experiences, loss, and commitment to our social-emotional well-being. It was evident that self-care would be the force that propels us all to help one another. The loss of staff members, community members, relatives, and friends created a sense of urgency to engage all in mindfulness sessions of self-care. Having a continuous dialogue with families led to the opportunities we are seeing today, from disruption to engagement. Family engagement turned into empowering families to authentically connect with schools. This has yielded amazing results. It has revealed that our families, despite obstacles, can understand curriculum and instruction and support our teachers with furthering the home-school connections.
I have seen the power of technology through engaging families in virtual classroom activities understanding the impact of holding a pencil correctly, asking higher-level and critical questions, note-taking aligned to listening, reading, and writing skills, and becoming experts on effectively utilizing technology resources.
Joining Forces with the STREAM Community
Moreover, as school districts, we have practiced joining forces with our community at large. However, we know we can all improve and develop more effective ways to be more inclusive. Nevertheless, communication became instrumental in ensuring that educational organizations were consistent with transparency, addressing the needs of all stakeholders, and receiving immediate and targeted feedback. It has been important to always find a balance to accommodate sustainable and effective communication.
This is the case for video conferencing, which has enabled us to connect conveniently and in unconventional ways. It has provided one-way presentations with opportunities to receive questions, two-way communications with simultaneous dialogue, screen sharing, private and general sessions, recording sessions for future viewing, and utilizing our websites as a conduit of information and social media. I can recall the many sessions when our families were either excited to participate or confused about decisions being made. Either way, it highlighted connections, inclusivity, and transparency with our community.
Shifting Systems
This is the time to shift systems and structures as we face uncertainty and adversities. We were literally writing the blueprint while experiencing the changes within our eyes. Taking planned risks, if the term exists, was a common struggle for us all. It was the opportunity to increase the capacity of our students, staff, families, and community to have conversations about the future.
All of this occurs while we witness the transformation of working environments and the shifts to come in the next ten to twenty years. Therefore, preparing our students for this ever-changing environment will enhance their ability to be prepared. Hence, school districts must continue exploring new ways to establish instructional environments that empower students to solve world problems, take ownership of their learning, take risks, and learn from their experiences. This is where STREAM comes in.
Starting STREAM Young
Furthermore, our systems must change to accommodate the way our children think and learn today and approach the problems that are waiting to exist. As I visit schools, I see our elementary students engaged in building robots in maker space environments. The students are excited to use their creativity to create or transform robots with maker materials. Our students, from kindergarten to high school, are increasing their capacity through complex lessons that integrate science, technology, research, engineering, art, and mathematics. Communities inclusive of schools, partnerships, workforce, families, and students will need to connect to ensure that STREAM moves from an initiative to a movement.
This can only occur when the opportunities to engage all stakeholders exist. At the minimum, to accommodate the urgency and address the gaps that exist, it was clear that we had to tier professional learning. Seymour Papert states, “The role of the teacher is to create the conditions for invention rather than provide a ready-made knowledge.”
Taking Advantage of Technology in STREAM
The diversity of competencies to infuse technology through STREAM varies from one practitioner to another. Therefore, it was important to tier the staff into categories, build capacity within our staff, and capture the strengths of the highly competent technology innovators to serve as essential leaders. The ongoing professional dialogue and learning have resulted in our current structures, whereas in-person learning is primary, with the structure of choice for synchronous simultaneous teaching and learning. We can now benefit from lessons focused on building choice boards to increase differentiation and set the stage for inquiry, exploration, and discovery.
This mindset has helped us take bold steps to ensure that we coordinate efforts and maintain a collective voice in moving forward. We understood that serving our most vulnerable students would require us to support the technology infrastructure, Wi-Fi capabilities, technology hardware, and software tools. Therefore, we develop scally responsive and sustainable plans for 1:1 implementation that include every child having a technology device, Wi-Fi accessibility, and all of the resources for a high-level curriculum and shift on instruction model. This would also include the manipulatives that help students combine the creativity of design on a computer with the applications and building of structures. There is a magic that occurs when students are deeply engaged and struggling with learning while collaborating.
Raising the Bar on Equity
While serving as Superintendent for the Nyack Public Schools, placing equity as the foundation for a successful district is evident. The Nyack Board of Education has been instrumental in ensuring that we continuously raise the bar on equity for all students. Having equity as a central focus significantly impacted our daily conversations. Additionally, we are in pursuit of developing new relationships, disrupting the status quo, and uncovering the talents of all students.
To that extent, we embrace a variety of thought-provoking topics and ensure that all students receive opportunities to be successful. Hence, establishing a welcoming and arming space where the most uncomfortable conversations would be respected, encouraged, and valued. As a result, the Nyack Public Schools has approved a comprehensive equity policy outlining four pillars, our beliefs, strategies, and expected outcomes for all students.
Giving Our Students a Voice
Our students’ voices play a pivotal role in providing a better understanding of how they learn best and their future interests. We took the opportunity to reimagine and create a future-ready environment to increase the capacity of our digital world. We envision environments that would facilitate teachers to engage students in a continuously changing classroom. Increasingly integrating interactive technology tools and innovative furniture will increase collaboration and make connections to your immediate community, the world, and beyond. Our charge is to collaborate in teams to research and brainstorm ideas to explore ways in which we develop our students in STREAM.
The Power of Collaboration
The power of collaboration among superintendents and colleagues from across the country made it possible to survive this thriving commitment to change. However, I had a supportive family that understood my calling, contributed to every successful opening of schools and presentations, and was a continuous reminder that self-care would permit me to continue this work. Communication tools to chat, share, and exchange ideas became the norm for many to strengthen their own capacity. This is ironic as the workforce requires us to prepare our students with skills aligned to the Nyack 7 Cs: critical thinking, creativity, collaboration, communication, compassion, content mastery, and cultural awareness. The commitment that the 7 Cs transcend from school to home and, ultimately, to the workforce will require deliberate and continuous attention.
About the Author
EUDES S. BUDHAI
Mr. Eudes S. Budhai is the Superintendent of the Nyack Union Free School District, in New York. He is a visionary and innovative leader with a keen sense of forward-thinking to shape the lives of children, families, and communities. He has served in various capacities in the field of education for twenty-eight years.
Mr. Budhai’s educational experience began in a private school as an assistant teacher working with students who required extensive emotional and academic support. Since then, he has served as a teacher, a staff developer, a department chairperson, a building and district administrator, and an adjunct professor.
Mr. Budhai serves on various local, state, and national organizations as an instructional leader advocating equitable opportunities for all students. He has been instrumental in developing curriculum, providing professional development to administrators, teachers, and families, and securing funds that enhance the educational experiences to reduce the equity gap in the lives of students. He supported various states’ adoption of the Seal of Biliteracy during his presidency of the National Association of Bilingual Education (NABE). Mr. Budhai has been recognized by the district administrator and NYSED for sustaining graduation rates for students of color above the state average and NYSED Model School Research of Excellence.
Mr. Budhai is driven by the daily courage and perseverance exhibited by our children, families, staff, and leadership to increase our individual and collective capacity.
