Despair and Hope (Preface to "The Job")

Despair and Hope (Preface to The Job)

I despair at times that there will be any worthwhile changes in the schools here (and perhaps elsewhere) -- changes that bubble up, instead of being imposed with deafness and blindness from above, as they usually are, with all the damage that does.  I know it will not happen during the time I have left in the schools, but what bothers me even more is the realization that it may not happen for generations to come.

That doesn't mean one should not keep working towards that, in whatever minor way one can.

After all, it took hundreds of years before the transatlantic slave trade was abolished, and the repercussions of that trade are still visible to this day on both sides of the Atlantic. But at least it was abolished, and the slaves themselves played their part in that, however voiceless and disempowered they had been.  And even the mighty colonial empires receded, at least to some overt degree, and not from the kind volition of the imperialists.

In the link below are some personal reflections on my decades spent working in the schools.

The Job 

But let me salute here those who persevere in working towards those worthwhile changes, in very difficult circumstances -- and all of those who tried to accomplish this in the past.
 
Arjun