Robinson and Punahou: Two Sides of Youth Purpose

On the final day of the NAIS Conference in 2017, speakers addressed two sides of a crisis in education: youth purpose. Sir Ken Robinson, who passed away in 2020, blasted today’s schools for failing to feed and nurture children’s souls, while school leaders showed innovative programs that are succeeding in creating soulful student citizens.

“If you create a system to do something, don’t be surprised if it does,” said Sir Ken Robinson. Like industrial farms that churn out mile after mile of perfect carrots, Robinson said today’s schools are built around principles of manufacturing to churn out a single type of standardized student — and the soul of the child gets crushed in the process. “Many students go through schools without finding out what they are good at,” said Robinson. “They lead lives that lack a sense of purpose or direction.”

An idea that I had not heard Robinson talk about before, which I found fascinating, was that we all live in two worlds. “The world outside and the world inside that only exists because you exist — the world inside your skin, and between your heartbeats.” We have to help children explore and understand this inside world, Robinson said, because it’s through the inner world that a child can understand and connect with the outer world.

Robinson’s ideas, meanwhile, were mirrored and put into action by two young school administrators who described K-12 global citizenship programs that foster youth purpose.

Chai Reddy of Punahou School explained how his school helps students develop a sense of self, and an appreciation for local Hawai’i culture, before students attempt to connect with different cultural realities on the islands and beyond. “Let’s not learn about the other, until we learn about who we are and where we come from,” he said.

Sophie Halliday of The St. Andrew’s Schools, an all-girls school network in Hawai’i, described how her school has created a system designed to help kids explore their talents and apply them to the world. After exploring and discovering their unique gifts or “spark,” each student builds a project around that spark, finds an outside organization to further develop that spark, and follows through on an action plan to bring that budding purpose to life.

As bleak as American education seems today with its huge focus on standardized exams, it’s refreshing to also think about the hope underneath Robinson’s idea that “If you create a system to do something, don’t be surprised if it does.” If we build schools that are designed to foster youth purpose, let’s not be surprised by the amazing young leaders that are produced as a result.