A number of students, parents, teachers, and support staff made a fantastic effort. Through generosity and hardwork, the ISOI community pulled together a concert and overran our goal of 200,000 PKR, in a single evening.
Even at a horrible exchange rate (59PKR/1USD), that is $3,695.
Students danced, sang, auctioned off themselves, sold baked goods, read poems, and ran the show. Staff sang, dressed up as a turkey and then sang, led shy elementary school and nervous high school kids to the stage, and ran the show behind the scenes. Support staff delivered the "goods" time and again whether in equipment, technology, lights/sound, or finance. Parents encouraged their kids to perform and supported their efforts as well as our donation box. A laundry list of thank you's will not do justice to the efforts done by all.
Thank you, ISOI.
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I dropped in on a staff members "aftershock party" following the concert. There a interesting avenue of thought for the future came to my attention.
Actually, I will address only one of a number of ideas tonight. "Upwards management" is the phrase. The meaning goes somewhere along the lines of not looking at the people 'under' you (which would be the students in my particular classes for me) but rather at utilizing people from all levels to accomplish your objective, i.e. for management. [Yeah, I recognize that is a very abstract statement].
Some people have a very limited view of what they can accomplish; they only look down. They look at the resources around them (whether this is money, time, or people) and they manage these resources to meet there objectives. Their objectives or goals will always be limited by their resources.
[I would like to call this the economist view of the world - which by definition looks at the world with the view of limited resources].
Let's look up. There is potential inside ourselves to look around and upwards, rather than just below, as one seeks their objectives. Take global citizenship, or more specifically the Earthquake Relief Concert, as an example.
I wanted to run an Earthquake Relief Concert as soon as I made the connection that ISOI had experience with such a fundraiser, after last year's Tsunami Relief Concert. [A number of people at ISOI, despite the turnover in faculty, had this same idea]. I have worked as backstage crew for a few concerts in college, however, I never had experience with such a big fundraiser, rehearsals, publicity, talent, etc.
If I just looked at myself and my students, I would have never had such a successful event as tonight (or yesterday at this point in the evening). I looked around and upwards for help. I found great students I never taught, teachers with talents beyond my comprehension, and enthusiasm in a number of people I don't see daily. They made this event work - because they took ownership of aspects of this concert and made the overall vision of a great concert possible.
This point was made poignant recently in a email that detailed everyone's responsibilities:
A - audition, printing of tickets and program
B - audition, rehearsals, band equipment
C - audition, posters, program director
D - stage manager
E - audition, assistant program director
F - stage decoration, printing of giant posters
G - audio-visual system
H - HS facilitator :)
I - ES facilitator
J, K, L -Bake Sale Committee
Logistics
Scott Christian - fundraising & student volunteers (gate/tickets, stage crew, ushers, bake sale, etc.)
M - furniture, equipment, auditorium, manpower
N - Business Office ticket sales, registration of guests/cars
Now, a fine argument can be made that, despite my interest in the idea of an Earthquake Relief Concert, I did not manage this event - thus defeating this idea of "upwards management." I agree. I had no authoritative position over these individuals, i.e. they were not 'under' me.
However, I hope that it is possible to believe that, in one way or another, I helped facilitate this event as a whole. I gave guidance to talented individuals that, while perfectly capable of performing their individual tasks alone, were brought together under a collective vision of celebration and service to a worthy cause. In other words, we achieved more together than we could have alone.
[The sum is greater than the parts; I will be so bold as to call this the synergistic view of the world].
This is my first experience with this phrase of "upwards management" but the philosopy of it has been with me for many years, and it is a strong reason why I got into education. While I did argue with my first education course professor about why teachers should not teach values in the classroom, I feel these days that teachers can play an important role in developing strong citizens (whether global or not), be they students, or staff, or simply members of this great world.
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