Transcript
Speaker: Hello everyone, and welcome to the latest episode of our podcast.
Speaker: My name is Chris McNutt and I'm part of the Progressive Education nonprofit Human Restoration Project.
Speaker: Before we get started, I want to let you know that this is brought to you by our supporters, three of whom are Leah Kelly, Alexander Gruber, and Nick Rudig.
Speaker: Thank you for your ongoing support.
Speaker: You can learn more about the Human Restoration Project on our website, humanrestorationproject.org, or find us on social media and YouTube.
Speaker: So to kick things off, a solutionary has multiple definitions, one of which
Speaker: one of which reads, quote, a person who identifies inhumane, unjust, and or unsustainable societal systems and then develops solutions to transform them so that way they can do the most good and least harm for people, animals, and the environment.
Speaker: And today we're joined by Zoe Weil, who has dedicated her work to creating and spreading the word of solutionary thinking and teaching what it means to then be a solutionary.
Speaker: She has written eight books, including her most recent book, which we're talking about here today, The Solutionary Way, which is displayed prominently behind me.
Speaker: She's delivered multiple TEDx talks and keynotes around the world on educating to solve the world's most pressing problems.
Speaker: She's also the co-founder and president of the Institute for Humane Education, which has been making some really serious strides in implementing the solutionary framework in schools around the country, as well as in their own graduate program.
Speaker: So welcome back.
Speaker: So it's good to speak with you.
Speaker: Oh, it's so great to be back, Chris.
Speaker: Thank you for having me.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, of course.
Speaker: So, you know, I figure we just kick things off by talking a little bit about what the book is, what you're going for with a little bit of an overview.
Speaker: Before we even jump into this question, I have queued up here about Dr. Jane Goodall, because I'm just so curious about one.
Speaker: how you got her to write the foreword to the book.
Speaker: That's a big name, but also just her interest in the work and what you're doing.
Speaker: Before we get there, can you talk to us a little bit about what it means to be a solutionary for folks that just aren't familiar at all?
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: Well, you just gave the definition.
Speaker: And embedded in that definition is this ethical component of doing the most good and the least harm to people, animals, and the environment.
Speaker: So the reason we need this made-up word, solutionary, is because a solutionary is not synonymous with problem solver.
Speaker: So an engineer can solve the problem of damming a river or blowing up a mountaintop for coal removal, but they're not a solutionary because they're not taking into consideration the impacts on other species and the environment.
Speaker: So that's part of what it means to be a solutionary.
Speaker: Solutionary is also not synonymous with a humanitarian.
Speaker: So humanitarians seek to relieve suffering and mitigate the effects of destruction and harm, but they're not in the business of addressing the causes of that suffering and harm.
Speaker: So solutionaries have this ethical component, and they are also driven to address the
Speaker: the root and systemic causes of problems.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And something that I know is super key to your work is that concept of including animals explicitly as part of the solutionary framework that we're not just looking out for ourselves, but also the entire ecosystem explicitly, the well-being of animals, birds, et cetera.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And even further than that, Chris, is that we're not just talking about protecting species.
Speaker: We're talking about individual animals, too.
Speaker: So any being that is capable of suffering and feeling pain, their interests should be considered when we are endeavoring to solve problems.
Speaker: And so that also makes solutionary different from many other sort of change-making focuses, which may be very explicitly only focused on human rights or only focused on environment or maybe focused on people and the environment, but not other species.
Speaker: And we think that all are worthy of consideration.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I really appreciate the work that you're doing with both the book, but also the work at large of the Institute for Humane Education, because it's very applicable.
Speaker: It's not just a framework or a mindset where it's just like, oh, we can make the world a better place.
Speaker: It has actionable steps to making the world a better place.
Speaker: It's not hypothetical.
Speaker: And that's what really stood out to me about the foreword of the book with Jane Goodall, because she has this little story that she includes about how she was working with a group of young people talking about changing the world.
Speaker: And they say something like, together we can.
Speaker: And Goodall responds, yes, absolutely we can.
Speaker: But will we?
Speaker: And therefore the students reply, together we can, together we will, together we must.
Speaker: And I found that to be both inspiring, but also kind of ominous because it has like this tone of like, yeah, but are we going to do it?
Speaker: So I'm curious about how that frames the work that you're doing with the solutionary mindset, this idea of doing things together and actually taking action.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And it was an incredible honor to have Jane Goodall write the forward to my book, as you can imagine.
Speaker: So there's a lot of anxiety and depression, particularly among young people and among everyone, but we're seeing a rise in depression and anxiety among youth.
Speaker: Hmm.
Speaker: And I think it's really important that young people understand that a better world is possible and that actually much has changed for the better.
Speaker: So in my own lifetime, I'm 63 years old, so much has shifted for the better.
Speaker: I mean, when I was born, there were states in the U.S. where black and white people could not get married.
Speaker: I grew up in New York City, smog and soot coated the city and many, many other cities in the United States.
Speaker: There were, I mean, you're in Ohio, there were rivers and lakes catching on fire.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: You know, half of people around the globe when I was born lived in extreme poverty.
Speaker: That's now below 10%, still way too high, of course, and still a huge number of people.
Speaker: But there's been a shift, a positive shift.
Speaker: And even half of the people in the world didn't have electricity, and now more than 90% do.
Speaker: I don't want to be Pollyanna-ish about this.
Speaker: There is much that is bad, but things can be bad and better at the same time.
Speaker: Some things are worse, right?
Speaker: So we have created a less polluted environment.
Speaker: air system in the United States.
Speaker: We don't have as much smog and pollution here, but in other countries, it's horrific.
Speaker: So we know these things aren't static.
Speaker: And I want to just, I want to state that a better world is possible because we need that premise in order to work for change.
Speaker: And I think when Jane Goodall says, but will we, it's because a combination of factors
Speaker: keeps us from trying to change systems.
Speaker: And some of those factors are just our mindsets, our apathy, but sometimes our anxiety and depression keep us from thinking like, why bother?
Speaker: And then of course, there are these integrations
Speaker: interconnected systems that are very difficult to change.
Speaker: And so becoming a solutionary to address them in ways that will, where we find good leverage points for real systemic positive change.
Speaker: It's not easy work.
Speaker: The reason I wrote a whole book, The Solutionary Way, is because it isn't as simple as just saying, I want to be a change maker.
Speaker: I mean, solutionary is like a next level change maker.
Speaker: It's a process and it takes work.
Speaker: So that will we is really a question of do we have the motivation, the sense of agency and empowerment, the desire to do this work?
Speaker: And
Speaker: I hope that in our conversation, people will hear that it's not just work.
Speaker: It's meaningful.
Speaker: It's joyful.
Speaker: It builds community.
Speaker: It builds friendships.
Speaker: I mean, I just think about like your podcast and the work you do.
Speaker: I'm sure you feel as I do, like,
Speaker: You met the most amazing people.
Speaker: It's incredibly exciting and energizing to do positive work with good people.
Speaker: And it is an antidote to despair.
Speaker: And or as as David Orr said, hope is a verb with its sleeves rolled up.
Speaker: So we got to roll up our sleeves and the hope comes and the joy comes and the world gets better.
Speaker: I mean, and I'm sure you notice this in your own work with youth.
Speaker: It seems like many young people are more aware of the problems that are going around around the world more than ever, which is a great thing.
Speaker: People are very much into critical dialogue.
Speaker: They're aware about our world's pressing issues, climate change, war, all the various problems going on in the world.
Speaker: But we also know that hopelessness is at an all time high.
Speaker: Anxiety rates are at an all time high.
Speaker: Depression's at an all time high.
Speaker: And a lot of folks do feel very disenfranchised from their ability to act as an individual to change those things.
Speaker: Could you walk us through briefly what it literally looks like to be a solutionary at a classroom level?
Speaker: Like, what would you actually be doing?
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: And can I tell a quick story before I go through that?
Speaker: So, and I probably, on our last podcast, I probably shared this, but it just reinforces what you said.
Speaker: And so 12 years ago, so before the pandemic, before wildfires were all around the globe, before these rates of anxiety and depression among youth were so high, I was invited to speak at a middle school in Connecticut.
Speaker: And first I spoke to the fifth and sixth graders and I
Speaker: asked them what they thought were the biggest problems in the world, and their answers filled up a whiteboard.
Speaker: And they had not been learning about those problems in school.
Speaker: One boy even said sex trafficking.
Speaker: You know, he was in fifth or sixth grade.
Speaker: So these kids knew about these problems, even though they weren't learning them in school, just like you were saying.
Speaker: And then I asked them to raise their hands if they could imagine us solving the problems they listed.
Speaker: And of the 45 children in the class, only five raised their hands.
Speaker: Only five of 45 could imagine us solving the problems they listed.
Speaker: That was a very sobering moment to me.
Speaker: So I shifted things around.
Speaker: I did a guided visualization with them.
Speaker: By the end of that guided visualization, I said,
Speaker: Now, you know, raise your hands if now you can imagine us solving the problems that you just listed and 40 hands went up in the air.
Speaker: What it took to restore their hope was imagining that a better world existed in their future and knowing they played a part in it.
Speaker: So what is this step that you just asked?
Speaker: What is this solutionary framework?
Speaker: Well, we've identified four phases of the framework, and they all start with the letter I so that I can remember them.
Speaker: So the first one is identify.
Speaker: The next phase is investigate.
Speaker: The third phase is innovate.
Speaker: And the fourth phase is implement.
Speaker: So what do those mean?
Speaker: So each phase has another couple of processes that you do in them.
Speaker: So
Speaker: It's really important to identify an actual problem and one that is feasible for you working collaboratively to solve.
Speaker: So we don't want kids in classrooms saying my problem is climate change or my problem is global poverty.
Speaker: It's too big a problem.
Speaker: for a kid to solve in what could be a couple weeks of a unit to do the solutionary framework.
Speaker: One thing that was really interesting, yesterday I was at the kickoff for the new cohort of teachers in Maine who are going through our solutionary micro-credential program to be solutionaries in Maine.
Speaker: And one of them was describing
Speaker: how one of her students selected a problem and then through the next phase of investigation, realized it wasn't actually a problem.
Speaker: So sometimes we think we know what the problem is, but until we actually get into the second phase of investigation, we may find, oh, that wasn't really a problem.
Speaker: This is a bigger problem, or this is a different aspect to the problem.
Speaker: So that was pretty fascinating to hear that
Speaker: Problem identification is critical to the process.
Speaker: What is the problem you're trying to solve?
Speaker: Is it an actual problem?
Speaker: The next phase, again, is investigation.
Speaker: This is where we are talking to stakeholders, ones who agree with us, ones who don't agree with us, to people who are working on solving the problem, to people who are benefiting from the systems that perpetuate the problem,
Speaker: In addition to obviously the people who are being harmed and the animals in the environment, obviously we can't talk to animals, we can't talk to the environment, but we can talk to representatives who are working on their behalf.
Speaker: So we investigate it thoroughly to understand its interconnected systemic and root causes.
Speaker: That's phase two.
Speaker: Phase three, then we're going to innovate a solution.
Speaker: And by innovate a solution, I don't mean that it has to be a solution nobody has ever thought of, that it has to be like a stroke of genius for some fourth grader.
Speaker: No, it could be that they actually find some solution that's being implemented somewhere else.
Speaker: and could be spread and could be expanded upon.
Speaker: Or it could be that they find some solution, they read about it, but nobody's implementing it, and they're giving voice to that solution.
Speaker: Of course, they may come up with their own really great solutions.
Speaker: But the idea is that we're innovating a solutionary solution.
Speaker: And by that, I mean, one that addresses the root and systemic causes and
Speaker: and doesn't have unintended negative consequences, or has as few as possible.
Speaker: That really does the most good and the least harm.
Speaker: And then finally, and this is so important, students get to implement some aspect, if not their whole solution.
Speaker: And this is what's often left out.
Speaker: And it's important because until we implement the
Speaker: We're not going to experience really the meaning and the purpose and the joy of putting into practice our good ideas.
Speaker: But also if we don't implement, we can't evaluate and iterate and improve.
Speaker: So that implementation process is really an important part of the solutionary framework.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, it sounds like in many ways what you're doing is you're combining together a lot of
Speaker: frameworks into something that is uniquely positive.
Speaker: So like project-based learning, place-based learning, liberatory design.
Speaker: I mean, there's a million of them that you could toss into the pot.
Speaker: But at the end of the day, it just comes out to be authentic work that does good things and makes people better people.
Speaker: And I consider the fact that if you have a generation of folks who are raised up through a framework like this, what would that mean for society at large?
Speaker: And I would assume that you, like myself, like that's the reason why we do this work is that we want to build a better world.
Speaker: It's not about the paycheck.
Speaker: It's not about like the recognition of making some cool framework.
Speaker: It's about the fact that
Speaker: If enough people went through programs like this, we would have social justice.
Speaker: We would have cleaner environments.
Speaker: We could change these things in a very short period of time, which I think is often left out of the discussion.
Speaker: You know, as a history major, a big part of the things that we study were social movements.
Speaker: It's amazing how quickly when people come together, something can change from even a few weeks to a few years.
Speaker: This is not something that has to be imagined as something that's not happening within our lifetimes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: A critique I often have of like a lot of like social justice movements when it's taught is like, this will sound great and we'll fix it for the next generation.
Speaker: Like, well, no, I want to fix it for my generation, too.
Speaker: I have a stake in this game.
Speaker: I want the world to be a better place now.
Speaker: I don't want to wait.
Speaker: And if you have students that are able to implement those solutions in real time, perhaps that will cause them to behave differently once they're out of school.
Speaker: So that's just really, really cool stuff.
Speaker: And something I wanted to talk a little bit about is how do you get students to solve things within those wicked problems, those systemic problems, and get them to understand how their individual actions can work.
Speaker: work to solve those things.
Speaker: You bring up this concept of, I think it's MOGO, more good.
Speaker: Could you explain a little bit about what it means to tackle a systemic problem and use that MOGO principle?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So MOGO is short for most good, least harm, and then even shortened to most good.
Speaker: So MOGO is just an easy way for us to think about doing the most good and the least harm to people, animals, and the environment, that whole package.
Speaker: And so
Speaker: We're really clear when we are working with students that it's really important to narrow down the problem, like I mentioned before, so that it's actually solvable within their sphere of influence.
Speaker: And that's just important because otherwise they're not going to feel successful.
Speaker: They're not going to actually...
Speaker: really learn the process if they can't go through all of the phases.
Speaker: And you really can't go through all of the phases if you've picked a problem that is really beyond your capacity and your timeframe to solve.
Speaker: That doesn't mean that you can't pick a problem like climate change.
Speaker: You're just going to narrow the problem down.
Speaker: It might be that our school has a high carbon footprint that
Speaker: That could be reduced.
Speaker: So now the students are working on reducing their own school's carbon footprint.
Speaker: Absolutely feasible to address.
Speaker: Or our school's cafeteria is serving food that is harmful to the environment and cruel to animals.
Speaker: And that is something that students could address and they could shift some of what served in their school cafeteria.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: We always focus on that.
Speaker: I do want to loop back to what you sort of were saying before.
Speaker: So the reason why I wrote the solutionary way is
Speaker: is because my work has been dedicated for quite a long time to educate a generation of solutionaries.
Speaker: That's the subtitle of this book, The World Becomes What We Teach, which we talked about last time I was on your show.
Speaker: And that's been my life's work.
Speaker: At the same time, I know that we can't wait for a generation of solutionaries to solve the problems that we face right now.
Speaker: I mean, students can do incredible work right now, but as you were just saying, you know,
Speaker: We can solve problems quickly when we come together, and particularly for those whose spheres of influence are bigger and greater and whose expertise is more extensive.
Speaker: They can solve problems faster now, and we don't have to wait.
Speaker: And we don't have to rely on a generation coming up to solve our problems.
Speaker: So I wrote the Solutionary Way because this framework is so effective with students,
Speaker: We need adults and people who are in all different professions to be adopting it.
Speaker: And the book only came out at the end of June.
Speaker: And it's been really exciting to see some of the responses from people in different areas.
Speaker: professions.
Speaker: So a doctor who runs a couple of health clinics is using the book with his entire staff in both clinics so that they can be solutionaries in healthcare.
Speaker: And I sent the book to Jared Fishman, who runs the Justice Innovation Lab, which is something that I mentioned in the section of the book on criminal justice solutions.
Speaker: And he just contacted me.
Speaker: He loved the book and he wants to use it with his law students.
Speaker: And a brilliant biochemist read the book.
Speaker: And he's now said, like, I used to just suggest that everybody read these two books.
Speaker: Now I have a third book everybody should read.
Speaker: And it's the solutionary way.
Speaker: He's a biochemist.
Speaker: We had a free webinar on bringing the solutionary framework to solving issues using public policy.
Speaker: And you can find that webinar on our website, humaneeducation.org.
Speaker: And now we're going to take a quick break for a sponsored message.
Speaker: What if we started by listening?
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Speaker: A science teacher at the school I used to work at implemented a recycling program alongside students.
Speaker: Students were the ones that came up with the idea.
Speaker: And because they actually implemented it, they own the process.
Speaker: So there was way more buy in from other students to actually participate in the recycling program and keep it going.
Speaker: This thing can be said, though, at the college level.
Speaker: Here in Columbus, Ohio State University architecture students have put in these really cool, it's like a stimming device that are put in place on these benches that they install that allow you to use your fingers to like cause sound on these wind chimes, like these really interesting displays and they're designed for
Speaker: young people, especially young people with disabilities to kind of use and concentrate their energy on these spaces.
Speaker: But also they look really cool.
Speaker: They're like a net benefit in terms of aesthetics.
Speaker: And it's a seating area for folks that want to sit down.
Speaker: And those were all inspired by projects that students were doing at the college level.
Speaker: Imagine if you did that with 100 college classrooms instead of 99 of them lecturing and one of them actually doing something.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: And what that would then mean.
Speaker: And that really gets into that dreaming piece that I'd love to talk to you about.
Speaker: There was a quote that stood out.
Speaker: in your work that I just really thought was well written.
Speaker: Not that the rest of it wasn't.
Speaker: I just really like this part.
Speaker: You said, there's a beautiful regenerative future ahead of us where conflicts are resolved peacefully and where we live harmoniously with the ecosystems that support life.
Speaker: And this gave me a very solar punk vibe.
Speaker: I don't know how familiar you are with the speculative fiction movement, but folks like NK Jemisin are writing these really interesting stories about futures that actually have solved problems.
Speaker: What role does dreaming and hope drive you to creating that better future along young people?
Speaker: Like what gives you hope in the world to keep doing this work?
Speaker: So I don't read a lot of speculative fiction these days, but I'm a huge Star Trek fan.
Speaker: And that's the original solar punk.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: And I mean, I even asked William Shatner to kiss me in front of 5,000 people at a Star Trek convention when I was 15 years old.
Speaker: He actually said he had trench mouth.
Speaker: He said, sorry, I have trench mouth.
Speaker: just like Shatner would say it.
Speaker: And I yelled down from the balcony because this was in front of 5,000 people.
Speaker: I said, I don't care.
Speaker: But I didn't get the kiss.
Speaker: But I did get a good story out of it, which I can, you know, tell to this day.
Speaker: But, you know, I do ask myself,
Speaker: why I was willing to publicly humiliate myself as a teenager, because it's not something that most teenagers strive to do.
Speaker: And I think that it's, it's because Star Trek, the, the series, the stories, the characters just provided a vision of the future in which we had solved so many of our problems.
Speaker: And,
Speaker: I feel like that vision keeps me going.
Speaker: Knowing if you can dream it, you can work toward it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So yes, I
Speaker: That kind of vision does keep me going.
Speaker: Other things that keep me going are honestly what I said before, hope is a verb with its sleeves rolled up.
Speaker: Like you roll up your sleeves and you do the work and great things happen and you're surrounded by great people doing great things and it builds hope.
Speaker: And I'm also pretty good at restoring myself in nature with my dogs, going out on walks.
Speaker: I meditate.
Speaker: I exercise every day.
Speaker: Like those things keep me balanced so that I'm able to take in the real...
Speaker: horrors and atrocities that are still happening in the world that I want to change.
Speaker: And so it's really this finding this balance of maintaining one's equanimity in the face of everything that we are facing.
Speaker: And I am not a particularly equanimous person by nature.
Speaker: I'm more of a fiery person by nature.
Speaker: So I have to do a lot in order to stay
Speaker: joyful and happy and kind and bridge building and non-divisive.
Speaker: Like these are things I work at all the time because the more you learn about terrible things in the world, the angrier it makes you and the more sorrow you feel and
Speaker: And you cannot project that into the world.
Speaker: You need to find outlets for it, but you cannot go around with rage and sorrow and expect people to want to join your club.
Speaker: Because why would you want to?
Speaker: Yeah, that's a great point.
Speaker: And I think it is worth reiterating what that looks like at a classroom level, because I think a lot of folks might
Speaker: at a curricular level or at a teaching level want to avoid talking about issues because they don't want students to become cynical.
Speaker: However, first off, they already know, as you mentioned before in that story and through my own experience as well, kids are very aware of what's going on in the world.
Speaker: Honestly, probably through social media, which I would consider actually be a net positive, even though it has a lot of negative impacts on young people as well.
Speaker: But
Speaker: There's no way to restore humanity or give hope to young people unless you tackle those problems head on and give them the tools to work with it or else they're just along for the ride.
Speaker: And we're going to have a generation of folks that think education is simply learning about all the bad things that might be going on.
Speaker: And then that's the end of it.
Speaker: That's just like, we're just here.
Speaker: And it's inspiring to know that you can change the world and people are doing it.
Speaker: constantly.
Speaker: Can I take that on to that?
Speaker: Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker: So, so beautifully put, Chris.
Speaker: And that I told that story about those kids in Connecticut.
Speaker: Well, a few years later, I was speaking at a conference, a teacher's conference in Guadalajara, Mexico.
Speaker: And the day before the conference began, I visited the host school.
Speaker: And when I got there, they said, hey, we talked to our fifth graders.
Speaker: And so I was remembering those kids in Connecticut.
Speaker: And so I asked those fifth graders if they thought we could solve the problems in the world.
Speaker: And every hand flew up in the air immediately.
Speaker: And what was different was that their teacher was teaching them about those problems in age-appropriate ways, specifically environmental problems, and was engaging them and solving them.
Speaker: Those kids knew problems could be solved because they were learning to be solutionaries.
Speaker: So this is just driving home the point that you made, that when you learn, but you are invited and mentored to take good action, and you do so collaboratively, and you see those positive impacts, then as Greta Thunberg said, hope is everywhere.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And something I really wanted to make sure that we got to is the fact that you are doing the work.
Speaker: And we alluded to this earlier in regards to Maine.
Speaker: And I know that you've implemented this program around the country.
Speaker: But I was reading through the announcement that you made about the Institute of Humane Education, the micro-tentrallying work happening in Maine at a variety of different schools.
Speaker: It's not just like three schools.
Speaker: It's seemingly the entire state of Maine.
Speaker: Could you dive a little bit more into what that program looks like and what that means for the future of the work that you're doing?
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: So we've partnered with the Department of Education in the state of Maine.
Speaker: And by the end of this calendar year, we...
Speaker: will have trained a couple hundred Maine teachers.
Speaker: And those Maine teachers are working in every county in our state.
Speaker: So that's really exciting.
Speaker: And Maine is our home state, but we're also on six continents.
Speaker: And
Speaker: in more than two dozen countries.
Speaker: So we have trained about 40 teachers so far in Kenya, and we will probably have trained about 120 by the end of the school year in Africa.
Speaker: And we have a huge program that we're implementing in Mexico and in Central and South America.
Speaker: We just started offering our solutionary micro-credential in Spanish.
Speaker: We, you know, we're in Europe, we're in Asia, and we're across the United States.
Speaker: So I think the reason why we are expanding so much and so much since we last talked is because this kind of education works and it is non-polarizing.
Speaker: So I think that's really important.
Speaker: You know, the solutionary...
Speaker: framework and a solutionary mindset asks us to avoid either or thinking and us versus them thinking.
Speaker: So rather than the debate format where you're given one side or the other that you're supposed to argue about and win the debate, the solutionary framework is saying, what's the underlying problem within that debate topic?
Speaker: And
Speaker: How can we identify that problem together?
Speaker: And how can we learn from a variety of different perspectives and find a place where we can agree and solve this problem?
Speaker: And so it's really like an antidote to polarization in addition to being good education.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: I mean, it's really wonderful to see that work in action.
Speaker: And it's honestly just incredible that you've been able to gain traction so quickly and be adopted, especially in public education, which has historically been a little slow to adopt curriculums or changes.
Speaker: Something that has always been a big pet peeve of mine as a social studies educator was always that idea of framing things that we know to be true in an argumentative format in order to make an education of it.
Speaker: So like a really common would be like, is climate change real?
Speaker: Yes or no?
Speaker: Or is it impacting our environment?
Speaker: Yes or no?
Speaker: It's like, well, no, we know it's real.
Speaker: Like, this is not a scientific hypothetical.
Speaker: It is a real concept.
Speaker: So instead, let's make the action item.
Speaker: Well, what steps can we take right now to fix that as you're mentioning?
Speaker: And
Speaker: There's something to be said about how this framework leans into other elements of what we would call like a progressive education.
Speaker: It leans into project-based learning.
Speaker: It leans into place-based learning, being involved in that space.
Speaker: It leans into restorative justice.
Speaker: Even the process of like figuring out who the folks are and like having people name their harms, all that kind of stuff is the exact same thing you would also do from a quote unquote discipline standpoint and restorative justice.
Speaker: Where do you see the solutionary framework moving toward when it comes to pedagogy?
Speaker: So it's a framework when it comes to curriculum, but I also would imagine it would shift the pedagogical components of how the classroom operates.
Speaker: What does that look like?
Speaker: So it depends on the teacher.
Speaker: It depends on the school.
Speaker: It depends on how much flexibility the teacher has, the age of the students.
Speaker: So in my ideal world, students would be able to choose the problem that they want to address.
Speaker: And there would be a variety of different groups in a classroom with different problems.
Speaker: That can be really hard for a teacher to manage and also for a teacher to fit into, let's say they're a science teacher, but the students want to address a social justice issue or they want to address an animal protection issue.
Speaker: Like maybe it doesn't fit.
Speaker: Same thing can happen if it's a social studies teacher and the students want to address a science question.
Speaker: So sometimes what happens is that it has to morph to fit the classroom.
Speaker: But in the ideal scenario, the teacher is the mentor to the students.
Speaker: They're alongside the students in the process of the students going through those phases.
Speaker: So the students identifying the problem, the teacher's helping them, the teacher's asking them questions, you know, are you sure it's a problem?
Speaker: How can we tell if it's a problem?
Speaker: You know, the
Speaker: And I brought that up earlier.
Speaker: And the example that this one student in Maine discovered was his problem was that immigrants were taking jobs away from Mainers.
Speaker: And what he realized through his investigation is that wasn't actually happening.
Speaker: That what he thought was a problem wasn't a problem in Maine.
Speaker: You know, it might be a problem somewhere else, but it wasn't happening in Maine where he was addressing this.
Speaker: And so he was like,
Speaker: it was a really important thing for him to learn.
Speaker: Oh, what is the actual problem?
Speaker: So at any rate, the teachers alongside the student, the students doing that work, then the students are doing the investigative work.
Speaker: So they're cultivating critical thinking, systems thinking, strategic thinking, and creative thinking in this solutionary framework.
Speaker: And that requires...
Speaker: learning how to be a really careful investigator, learning to be able to discern fact from opinion, what's a reliable source, what's not a reliable source, all those important critical thinking activities happen.
Speaker: And
Speaker: So again, the teacher is guiding that process and mentoring that process, not even guiding, mentoring that process for the students.
Speaker: And then the leverage points, the students are really deeply working with systems thinking.
Speaker: And then implementation is action, which doesn't happen all that much in schools.
Speaker: And what's different, I mean, solutionary
Speaker: The solutionary framework overlays beautifully on project and problem-based learning.
Speaker: It's different from them because you don't start with a project.
Speaker: You start with this problem that you're seeing in the world.
Speaker: So I think, have I answered that question?
Speaker: I think so.
Speaker: I think it kind of gets to the heart of the idea of
Speaker: like design thinking, liberatory design thinking, et cetera, in many ways, from my view, you are offering the content and curriculum apparatus to actually do those pedagogical concepts.
Speaker: Because the number one issue we run into, because we're a progressive education organization, and what we tend to do is we tend to work with schools to promote design thinking, as well as a variety of different systemic changes in order to support that change to it happening.
Speaker: But that's very difficult to do if you don't have the curriculum or the content or the ideas to support it.
Speaker: Otherwise, you have all of this really crappy curriculum.
Speaker: And you're like, well, how can I make the Pythagorean theorem into a really interesting project with kids?
Speaker: It's like, well, the answer is you don't.
Speaker: You actually find something really interesting and hope that it fits in later because that's just the only way it's going to work.
Speaker: So I just appreciate the fact that the book has
Speaker: loads of examples in it by itself, let alone all of the resources on your website, et cetera.
Speaker: And we're actually designing curriculum right now.
Speaker: We just piloted a curriculum on food waste, but it's a choose your own adventure curriculum.
Speaker: So we're looking to do that on a variety of different topics.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And let's talk then about folks that want to get involved.
Speaker: So there's folks that are listening.
Speaker: Earlier, you mentioned there's a recorded webinar, but I know that you have a bunch of stuff going on.
Speaker: Could you walk us through how folks can get involved?
Speaker: Is it free?
Speaker: What if they want their school to get involved?
Speaker: Go ahead.
Speaker: So lots of things are free on our website, humaneeducation.org.
Speaker: We have free downloadable resources.
Speaker: We have our circle community.
Speaker: So if you sign up, you can also be part of circle.
Speaker: And we have a variety of different gatherings.
Speaker: webinars, talks, people can come together, they can create their own circle conversation and bring people together on the platform.
Speaker: So all of that is free.
Speaker: We have a solution sharing micro credential program.
Speaker: It's not free.
Speaker: And we
Speaker: We don't exclude anybody from it.
Speaker: So for those who can't afford it, it's free.
Speaker: But a school that has professional development funds, we ask them to pay for it.
Speaker: So that's how we're offering it in Africa is because we're charging those who can afford it and we're providing it free for those who can't.
Speaker: And we also have an online graduate program with Antioch University.
Speaker: We have an MED program.
Speaker: We have an EDD, specializing in humane education.
Speaker: And I haven't really defined humane education, but it's education that explores the interconnections of human rights, environmental sustainability, and animal protection with the goal of educating others to be solutionaries.
Speaker: So we have these graduate programs.
Speaker: We also have a graduate certificate, again, online through Antioch University.
Speaker: So it's really soup to nuts, right?
Speaker: You can enter, get what you need free, but you can also
Speaker: get a doctorate in education focusing on this.
Speaker: Thank you again for listening to our podcast at Human Restoration Project.
Speaker: I hope this conversation leaves you inspired and ready to start making change.
Speaker: If you enjoyed listening, please consider leaving us a review on your favorite podcast player.
Speaker: Plus, find a whole host of free resources, writings, and other podcasts all for free on our website, humanrestorationproject.org.
Speaker: Thank you.
