I didn’t write anything in April because everything else happened in April. Well, that’s not entirely true, for reasons I’ll explain in a minute, but I certainly didn’t write anything here in April.
The day before our campus’s first STAAR test, I received word that a 40-page graduate-level paper would be due a full month before had been previously listed. A rough draft of that paper, in order to graduate on time, would be due in three weeks. The same week, I was attempting to figure out the parameters for a research presentation for my job that I had to talk to multiple people to track down. And deal with a very stupid health insurance situation that involved paying over $500 for tests I already had done because the machine at the doctor’s office couldn’t read it despite the fact that I could see it on my phone.
Testing season is a notoriously miserable one for everyone in the proximity of public schools, but for those of us in high-needs schools is high-stakes accountability states, like mine, it’s particularly nerve-wracking. The kids are exhausted, we are exhausted, the public’s and the state’s understanding of our success hangs in the balance of 600 13-year-olds taking inequitable tests designed to trick them. It’s not ideal.
Finding out that I, in fact, also need to write a significant-sized research paper during this time was not fantastic. Neither was the state releasing accountability ratings for the past three years all at once (here’s a short primer of why), because they’d previously been tied up in court proceedings. Or every having to do anything with the healthcare system. Or basically any national news at all.
Hence the not really writing anything besides the big paper.
I’ve thought a lot this month about Brené Brown’s consistent reminder the “Clear is Kind.” Making things difficult to understand is unkind. Not publishing information that is known is unkind. Making people search hard for information that you have readily available, provided there is not a very good reason to do so (i.e. national security…I am NOT advocating Signal as a way to coordinate military strikes), is unkind.
My motto, for teaching and administration and life, is “logistics are love.” Clarity is part of logistics.
I also have had time to reflect on the ways my own lack of clarity can be unkind, and I am trying to work toward a higher level of clarity. My rubrics are simpler this year. My yoga cues are clearer. My communications are shorter (the amount longer it takes me to write a 40-page paper versus an 60-page paper or a 2-sentence email versus a 2-paragraph email will never cease to astound me). I have at least attempted to tell most people that I usually talk to why I am not currently talking to them (because I’m spending every waking moment writing or crocheting a baby blanket that was needed today that I didn’t start until Thursday because of said writing or doing any number of school tasks that require me to have one foot in this year and one foot it next year). I’m still struggling to give feedback quickly and specifically, and to balance the positive with the corrective. I am also struggling with the balance between giving people context without making them hold whatever I’m currently holding. I will probably never get this right.
One of my yoga teachers, after reviewing both ahimsa (non-harming) and satya (truthfulness) did add a caveat: “If you have to choose between ahimsa and satya, choose ahimsa.” I’ve also been thinking about this, as I’ve struggled with the lack of clarity that I feel like I can access and the lack of clarity that I’ve attempted to provide. I am trying, as often as possible, to choose ahimsa, and understand that sometimes difficult clarity, the kind that is uncomfortable to share, even though it’s to the recipient’s benefit, is kindness, even though it may not feel like it in the moment.
There have been some moments of lightness, or at least light-er-ness in April. Here are a few of my favorites:
I’d love to hear your feelings about the idea of clear being kind, and where your balance falls between ahimsa and satya. What clarity are you grateful for? What acts of clarity have enhanced your life? Where do you wish there was more clarity, and what clarity recommendations do you have for others?
I have two classes on the books in May; I’d love to see you there!
