a need for chutzpah

 break through the shells

the pandemic forces us into technological fixes

to find some way to be distanced and still connected,

some way for education to happen

with teacher and students in different rooms

separated by mile upon mile,

separated by needing an interface to connect:

the computer, the Internet, Zoom,

helpful, essential, limiting,

I imagine learning and growing

as the student being inside an egg

and needing to find a way out,

to break through restricting shells

that both protect them and hold them back,

it takes chutzpah to assert now,

for the shell adds layer upon layer

that make it harder and harder to break through:

anxiety about health, about the country,

about self-worth,

about the sheer difficulty of the technology:

the audio can be challenging,

the video can reveal you at your most vulnerable,

the video an option you can choose to not allow,

the hesitancy all can feel

augmented by how much harder

assertion and connection is now,

some look to technological fixes: 

a new way to give assignments, tests,

a new way to enable work,

a new fix that might help,

I keep returning to the primacy

of the relationship of learner and educator,

that what is most important

is that I see the person,

hear the person,

know the person,

support the person so that they can find

an opening back into success,

what we need to do is to help what is inside the shells

develop the gumption and skill

to break free into the power

that calls to them to come out, and soar,

may we find a way even through Zoom and the layered shells

to nurture the power each craves to live and to release.

by Henry H. Walker

January 29, ‘21