If you set a goal -- to start business, lose weight, build a relationship, etc. you are accountable. If you run a department at a company, you are accountable for that department's performance. If you are a parent raising children, you are accountable for the well-being of your children.
In traditional organizations, accountability meant blame. Instead of being established at the beginning, it was placed at the end. Something goes wrong. Something fails. We looked to see whose fault it was. The only learning that took place was in how to defend yourself, or cover mistakes, or blame someone else.
In the new accountability you own it. Sometimes you share that ownership with others. For example, a teacher is accountable for her class, but she shares accountability for the whole school with her colleagues. Accountability is what is missing today in government and in many organizations. You and I can begin to change that simply by being accountable ourselves. No excuses. No blaming. Accountable!
William Frank Diedrich, author of Beyond Blaming.
Ebook at Amazon.com at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008S2A6TW
The students are also accountable for the classroom. That accountability is taught in the home. One of those ethical lessons for which the parent is accountable. So, the classroom accountability really belongs to the parents, the students, the teacher, the rest of the faculty, and the administration all working together to EDUCATE. I know this is a flashback to the morals of the 50s and early 60s, but we did learn to read and could add and subtract.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you. Accountability is shared, or should be, in education.
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