Photo by Brady Fontenot, NYTEducation is at the heart of communication and I found this article about the Post-Katrina Classrooms in New Orleans to resonate with my experience working with the NCCN. In particular, this paragraph about Lousiana's state superindendent, Paul Pastorek's theory about education:
"His conclusion, more than a year into his work, is that fixing a public-school system is not at its root a question of curriculum or personnel or even money. It is a question of governance. It is simply impossible, Pastorek has come to believe, for a traditional school system, run from the top down by a central administrator, to educate large numbers of poor children to high levels of achievement. 'The command-and-control structure can produce marginal improvements,' he told me when we met last month at a coffeehouse on Magazine Street. 'But what’s clear to me is that it can only get you so far. If you create a system where initiative and creativity is valued and rewarded, then you’ll get change from the bottom up. If you create a system where people are told what to do and how to do it, then you will get change from the top down. We’ve been doing top-down for many years in Louisiana. And all we have is islands of excellence amidst a sea of mediocrity and failure.'"
Tough, Paul. "A Teachable Moment" The New York Times Magazine, August 14, 2008
In this article, I saw parallels between working for a network made of 8 diverse national park units and working for a school system. No, I'm not saying that the NCCN is broken like New Orleans, just that we're still figuring out the best way to manage, organize and maximize everyone's efforts.
You can read the whole article here.
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