Am currently reading The Lonely Century by Noreena Hertx and managed to get a good few chapters read while on the train from Bristol up to Leeds for the EduFuturists Uprising event.    It was in reading it, and on thinking of AI in education, the efficiency narrative and concerns in relation to mental health and wellbeing, that I thought I would scribble this blog post together.   And I apologise in advance for what will likely be a series of rambling and loosely connected thoughts, but hopefully you will find some value in them and be able to draw some semblance of sense from them.

Now I have written on the efficiency narrative before, that we are forever looking to be more efficient.   This is about getting more done with less so taking less time, or using less resources, or reducing errors.    The issue though is that this isn’t sustainable as ever time we save time, or save resources, we simply identify further things to do which will make use of the saved time, or saved resources.    Often under the guise of “continual improvement” we end up doing more, but we cannot continue this approach indefinitely.     One look at the teacher wellbeing index and we can see the resulting stress and workload issues brought about by a culture of “efficiency” and “do more”.   So individually we are all being challenged to do more, and our organisational structures, our teams, our leadership structures, etc, are all being challenged also to do more, but also to oversee continual improvement, which in turn means doing yet more things.

I have also written in the past on the subject of social media and the false sense of connectedness that it provides.    I have found myself surrounded by virtual friends and colleagues, sharing thoughts and ideas, but still finding myself isolated and alone.     This presents another challenge as we seek to be connected, to get involved and contribute, but all without the benefits of face to face get togethers and proper, real life socialisation.

Loneliness, or as Hertx describes it, that lack of connection not just from friends, family and colleagues but from our wider communities, our political parties and society as a whole is another concern.   Now Hertx points towards this as being a contributory factor in the fracturing of current society, including the growth in extreme views particularly as related to far right politics.     Now for me this links to social media where such ideals can be easily shared and garner favour or even see their way to going viral.    And for the students currently in our schools this is quite significant given that all they will have lived through is a world of social media, of extremist views, the breakdown of social cohesions, covid and its related lock downs and isolation, and similar other challenges.

Maybe we now live in a world where more than ever we need to reconnect with what it means to be human and in particular being the human, social, animals we are.   Maybe we need to spend time rebuilding our communities and rebuilding the social cohesion which I feel, on reflection, was an important part of my childhood.   A time where we knew who our neighbours were, and we worked, or as kids, collectively looking after each other, our kids and our families.    Technology can do so much for us but I do wonder if too much of our lives are now experienced or moderated through technology, rather than being “properly” experienced.   As I sit typing this on the train, I can see some irony in that.   I note I did enjoy some momentary chit chat with my fellow travellers, given the crammed nature of the train.   I could have been getting on with work and being efficient, but instead I sparked up a conversation with the strangers around me and felt, in myself, a little better for it.

Maybe it is these conversations which we need to have much more, putting down our technology, putting aside our “get more done” culture and just being human social animals a little more!