Here's hoping...

   ​This past week I read an article called, “The Breath-taking, Life-altering Power of Being a Dork” by Jennifer Gonzalez.
   Love it.
   It’s like she was looking across the table, pointedly staring me in the eye. And that’s okay. It’s who I am. There are days even my husband tells me I’m being a dork, although I’m not always sure that is meant quite as complimentary lol.
  In her story, she recalls a boy from high school, a trombone player. Instead of jamming out to a song with a little air guitar, this guy fully committed to an air-trombone solo. Just being a dork.
   Jeez. I even played the trombone in band.
   I don’t know if I realized how dorky I was growing up. Being in band. Playing the piano. Always having my nose in a book. Being a total nerd about school.
   Trying.
   Not sure what other criteria there was, but pretty sure I met it. But so did everyone else in my family, and in the farms around us, so maybe I just didn’t know any differently.
   Not to say that I wasn’t aware of the social hierarchies, even in our small town school. Oh, I was. But when I hit university in the music department, well, I found my home. So many like-minded people who just did their thing. And were totally cool about it. My fellow dorks, I still love you all.
   This past week, I signed out two books out of the STF library. I read a lot, so really this isn’t worth mentioning. But this time they were Master’s and Doctoral dissertations on ‘Hope and the Instructional Leader.’ Even people who I book-swap and book-talk education with thought this was dorky…okay, they didn’t say that exactly….but I’m pretty good at inferencing.
   Especially when their actual response was:
   Weeeeird.
   Yep, I know. And that’s okay.
   Gonzalez says dorkiness means to ‘embrace your real passions without apology.’ I love to read and I love to learn. No apology from me there.
   But to walk my dorkiness back a little bit, these weren’t random dissertations I was looking for. One of the most amazing teachers and human beings EVER, Dr. Sharon Roset, taught at the elementary school beside us for many years. Despite her vast education, she never left the classroom and used her immense knowledge to help decades of students.  
   Not unsurprisingly, her studies focused on hope.
   And if there is anything I believe more passionately for our students, it’s that we should be harbingers of hope, not the destroyers of it.
   I’m only halfway through the first book, but I’m realizing that in 1999, how much ahead of her research is applicable in our classrooms today. Here’s just a couple of snippets:

1. Development of hope is a process and stands as the most fundamental prerequisite for life and growth.
2. Hope is an integration of components which include: goal setting perceptions of success, belief systems, resourcefulness, self-efficacy, and crucial in a person’s life experience as a whole.
3. Schools that adopt a theory of community provide students with hope by building family-like relationships within intimate settings where shared values and ideals fortify self-management and group responsibility.
4. The individual who hopes has a worldview that looks beyond the present situation and conceptualizes or believes there is a way to a more promising future.
5. Hope is the precursor of action because hope frames possibility in the move toward the realization of desires and needs…hope is the precursor for action.

 
   Gonzalez says dorks are inspiring people. They love learning. They ‘free the dork in others’ by going first. And they put a dent in the status quo. “The world becomes more interesting when brave people put themselves out there.”
   I think they are also hopeful people. In order to act, you have to hope and believe in the outcome.
   Right now I am riding in a bus full of over fifty hopeful people, travelling almost four hours to our destination halfway across Saskatchewan: provincial hockey semi-finals. I always have hopes before games. Mine are usually more about no one getting hurt, and my son playing his best. But now that it is playoffs, like everyone else, I’m hopeful for a win.
   I’m also hoping there will be some wi-fi there so I can get this blog post out to you too. This week, it was one year of blogging for me…I’m thankful for the personal growth it has given me, and hopeful that I’ll continue to find things to share too.
   Tawâw. Tervetuloa. Everyone is welcome.
   Edla.