Mission:
For 20 years, my mission has been to work to provide access to high quality opportunities for learning in the pathway of choice for every single Ontario student, regardless of geography or genetics.
It doesn’t matter who you are or where you live, you have the right to be able to achieve your best possible, most richly imagined future. You have the right to an education where everyone strives to create innovators who will thrive in this rapidly changing world.
Access: to robust wifi, devices (computer) to connect, and support to do so effectively. Access to teachers who belief everyone can learn, and who understand how to develop the skills and competencies, the intrinsic motivation and love of learning needed to live a fulfilling life in times of exponential change.
Pathways – rich learning in online environments where linear and text-based content delivery are unacceptable substitutes for “relationships first” ownership of learning.
We can now learn from the best teachers in the world.
We just need the teachers to enable it.
Vision:
In the next few years, half of the jobs we know now will disappear – moving offshore and to automation.
This presents an amazing opportunity!
With robots and 3D printers doing the mundane work, how can we leverage this to do great things? What skills will learners need? How do we need to redesign a college education to meet this need?
We do know that test scores favour some learners and disadvantage others. High school marks are not a good indicator of success in real life.
Content delivery models are not sufficient for the needs for success in today’s world.
Organizations need to be aligned with core values, but to be agile, those on the front lines must be empowered to make decisions based on circumstances.
What do I hope to become? I hope to become a leader who can effectively enable a change from outdated and incorrect thinking about the delivery of content, to systems that effectively enable our children, young people and adults to be global citizens who can leverage the resources they need to succeed in the work they deem to be important.
To do this, we must lead an ongoing conversation to co-create the answer to the question: What is school for?
Values: How must we behave on a daily basis to fullful our mission and achieve our vision?
- I will advocate at every opportunity for all rural and remote students to have full access to high quality education pathways, including the support they need to be successful. All children should have equal opportunity for success in life, regardless of genetics or geography.
- I will cultivate my professional learning network in face-to-face and online environments to continue to ensure access to the best ideas, conversations and research in education.
- I will continue to curate high quality resources, and share my thinking in open environments, modelling the digital leadership I seek in others.
- I will work to build intergenerational digital leadership skills at all levels of our education system, from early childhood to adult.
- I will have the courage to take action What we walk by, we permit.
Donna Miller Fry 