more on activity systems

From: Mike Cole (mcole@weber.ucsd.edu)
Date: Sun Dec 26 1999 - 09:27:02 PST


Bill wrote, in part (regarding boundaries and stability):

 A particular example of this is what happened when state testing
influenced how one district's leadership decided to
investigate/make-changes in the bussing program for inner-city kids (they
scored low on the test), that caused an uproar over racial diversity (with
national broadcasts), that (1) caused leadership in Lesley college (with
its initiative this year on diversity) to question the project and (2)
rippled through changes in the school district. With web-like percolation
of influences several changes in project activities resulted, as all of us
wanted to address issues of diversity -- apart from changes in the school
systems, the existence of the project was also threatened. This example
can be further unpacked in a separate email.

We have experienced a similar phenomenon. When we began building
5thD collaborative systems, afterschool was not on the educational
radar screen of the educational policy doers. But this past year, as
a result of the push against social promotion, it got onto the daily
schedules of a lot of school principles, including the one in my town
because it meant that if the kids could not get over the higher bars,
the schools had to retain them, but plenty more kids are piling into the
system, which runs up class sizes and diversity (and a lot more which
spells trouble the way things are currently run, which can be translated,
crudely into $$$$$$$.

So, all of a sudden, the entire context for our local efforts changed and
her my use of context includes a variety of inter-institutional arrangements
at several levels of aggregation so boundaries and levels get very
confusing to think about.

One very proximal result is that the structure of activities at the 5thD
in the boys and girls club is suddenly partially appropriated into the
SCHOOL's agenda, even though until now, coopeation among the school and
afterschool institutions was minimal and distrustful.

Another result is that a lot of neglected kids are getting some very badly
needed attention. But nearly enough-- kids or attention.

It is a big challenge just to get description of what is going on in various
parts of the overall set of events, let alone a way of quantifying the
individual streams of activty and their interadctions.

Why aren't Yrjo's change lab workshops activity systems?
mike



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