What I Learned about Mission

Over the past several years I have had the opportunity to work with schools to refine or redefine their mission. I have learned that people don't usually relish the chance to craft another mission statement - maybe because the one they have took innumerable committee meetings in which every phrase was exhaustively scrutinized. After all that - do we really know what is in our mission statement? Does it guide the kind of schooling we offer?

I learned that effective schools use their mission to guide the teaching and learning process and that they ensure certain things as a result. An instructive exercise is to look at the current document and determine what things the mission obligates the school to do. Is is to simply provide opportunities for learning? Or is it to ensure certain well defined learning takes place?

I learned that in effective schools the mission is determined in collaboration with stakeholders and supported by everyone. I also learned this doesn't take endless committee work and "wordsmithing". Schools need to write the mission with input from everyone - but that doesn't mean everyone gets to write the mission. Remember - a camel was a horse created by a committee. An effective method is to ask all of the stakeholder groups the same question: "What do you want for our kids?" The mission can then be drafted from themes that arise into a genuine document based on everyone's input - not just those on the committee.

I learned that mission matters. I notice a lot of discussion about what kind of education our students need - which seems to include things like critical thinking, problem solving, and communication. If schools really intend to base their operations on 21st Century skills, it would seem the school mission must guide the efforts of the school.

So what is our mission?

Toby