The Odds Are Always in Our Favor

While I'm not a huge Hunger Games fan, I did see it twice at the theaters in less than a week.  Once with my Dad during our Thanksgiving trip and once on a romantic date with Angie to Southpoint.

"Control" is lesson we must learn as parents, people managers at work, and church leaders.  No one likes to be coersed and I continually learn this lesson as a father when I choose to physically pick up my kids and force them to brush their teeth or whatever task we need to do at the time.  It's a short term fix and taking time to teach them to fish is the better choice.  As Peeta said, "...our lives aren't just measured in years. The measure in our lives are the people we touch around us."     

Coersion is not the way of the Lord.  Obviously there's a stark contrast between President Snow in the Capital and the way our Our Father in Heaven operates.  Here on earth we have agency to choose and God's hand is continually "stretched out still" (Isaiah 9) when we need him.

With the help of heaven, the odds are always in our favor.

"We teach computer science here..."

Lately I've been involved in discussions with educational leaders about the upcoming 1,000,000 jobs gap in computer science careers.

Why we have this gap became clearer on Friday.  I was visiting a high school and asked a teacher if they taught computer science classes in the high school.  He said, "Yes, we teach computer science here.  Mr. Smith he teaches Microsoft Word.  Mrs. Lee she teaches Excel."

We need your help.  This is a boots on the ground effort with Superintendents, Principals, Counselors, CTE coordinators, and Parents all getting pumped to produce more students with "SuperPowers." 

If you are involved in a high school in any way, will you watch the video above starring Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerburg, Will.i.am, and Chris Bosh and bring up the discussion with your school administrators?

Why Education?

It's taken me 15 years to realize my professional purpose in life is to solve problems in education.  Why education?  This quote about Jean Valjean from Les Miserables sums it up best.  It's about providing

sustainability for people.  May we all play a role in this great cause.

"He makes the entire region prosperous. There is no pocket so obscure that it didn’t have a little money in it. No dwelling so low that there wasn’t a little joy within it.

Father Madellan made his fortune but a singular thing and a simple man of business did not seem as though that was his chief care. He seemed to thinking much of others, and little of himself."