Well I thought if we are going to keep a learning blog we might as well start that now, before we even know whether we have been successful in our application to Creative Leaders Partnership. Why? Well because I have learnt so much in the process of the shared process of making/writing this funding application.
The journey started somewhere, and I suppose looking back, it was a few years ago, when I met like minded individuals, creative thinkers, people who cared about learning, shared learning and the absolute knowledge that by sharing we change processes, the way we work and eventually the shape of all our participation. Ownership or individual empire building was, and is, for these individuals something that never matters. That’s where I get my buzz, that’s why I’m excited. That’s why I feel excited, not just for my learning, but our shared learning. There are no egos; it fits with the new ‘new age’ of learning and sharing that we have learnt from the Internet.
So the e-mails, the conference calls, the phone calls, the threaded documents, the revising, the editing, the staying up till 4 in the morning, wanting things just right for the planned investment in our future, were all such a pleasure.
No longer in isolation, no longer playing the “funding game’ of secrets, individual empire building and back stabbing competition - just a real shared interest in developing something we all hold dear.
Vic Finkelstein, a now grandfather of the disability movement, once said to me that the problem that was happening with the disability movement, was the self appointed disabled people who just recreated the “Administrative Model” (some may know this as the Medical Model) and put themselves in positions of power. We try to fit in to the existing system, enjoy the good salaries and positions of power, and we appoint ourselves as the spokes people of all disabled people, as though we are some homogeneous mass.
Well, all good learning has a sort of anarchy about it, maybe an organised anarchy (if that’s not a contradiction), but it’s not a democracy, it’s the early days of the Internet – all opinions, personal histories, and learning, experiential or academic, are valid. What matters to me is the freedom of sharing and the ability to be liberated in a non-judgemental environment.
The possibilities of a new way of working and learning could be infinite, maybe not, but nevertheless, transforming, have a possibility of inclusion, for us all, in a new way. I suppose really, it’s the bigger picture, and, what’s really exciting when you think about it, is we don’t need to pass an exam, or even get anyone’s permission. We can just share and learn. And who knows as a friend of mine Tony say’s “Now we change the world”.
I wrote this just after midnight – so early morning of Wednesday 6 December 2006.
Chris
