Efficiency

I had a chance to sit in the board meeting room recently. It was my first time there since the district had done some modest remodeling of that space, namely to post new vision and value statements around the top of the walls. It gave me a chance to see a new part of our mission statement, to be efficient.

Though I value the need to be efficient in our daily conduct I deplore it held forth as a central value or mission of a school. I wouldn't have a problem if we were to instead dedicate ourselves to prudent stewardship or wise use of resources. Efficiency sounds like a mantra for quality control. Efficiency sounds like using byproducts in such a way that there is no waste, such as in a meat processing facility. Efficiency sounds like using every last physical and mental talent of the people you work with so that not a minute is wasted.

We would all benefit from finding ways to be more efficient in what we do as public school teachers. But efficiency can't be the most important principle, or even one of the most, when dealing with children and adolescents. Their quirks and needs defy efficiency. They grow at different rates. They possess different abilities. Dealing with them "efficiently" means dealing with them superficially and impatiently. In the case of students with disabilities, dealing with them "efficiently" is illegal and often inhuman. Efficiency is not what we really want to be doing with students.