May (2014)
5/16/2014
Invested
5/12/2014
What We Meant
April (2014)
4/22/2014
Earth In Mind
February (2014)
2/17/2014
Looking Ahead
January (2014)
November (2013)
October (2013)
September (2013)
May (2013)
April (2013)
4/24/2013
Advancement!
March (2013)
February (2013)
Weirdos
12/5/2011
If I shill his new book, We Are All Weird, I'm sure marketing guru Seth Godin won't mind me picking gems of his wisdom to illuminate this page. Reading any of his thirteen best-sellers always makes me dream that he's on our Board, because he'd love this school. Seth sees the near future with uncommon clarity, and utterly common sense. The past century featured a kind of mass marketing that not only made average products; it created average consumers; it told them what they wanted. 

Today, it's a different game. Technology creates a level playing field on which customized service flourishes. Schools offering meat-and-potatoes "excellence" and "close student-faculty relationships" won't cut it. Those qualities simply earn you admission into the game.

 DSC_0022


DSC_0015

T
he drive to meet the needs of some average population dooms creativity. From a business model, this was OK until consumers took control by networking and offering product/service reviews and feedback on-line. The new model demands customization: building services around the the unique needs and demands of the consumer. Eight years ago, the mother of a Proctor student wrote, "Most schools ask the student to conform and jump over some hurdles to get a diploma. Proctor meets each student where she is, and asks, where do you want to go?"

 DSC_0024-2

G
odin refers to the capitulation to the peak of the bell curve as serving "the mass," and says, "The defining idea of the twentieth century, more than any other, was mass.

Mass gave us efficiency and productivity, making us (some people) rich. Mass gave us huge nations, giving us (some people) power. Mass allowed powerful people to influence millions, giving us (some people) control. 

And now mass is dying.

We see it fighting back, clawing to control conversations and commerce and politics. But it will fail; it must. The tide has turned, and mass as the engine of our culture is gone forever."

 DSC_0113



DSC_0052

P
roctor is not the only school that is well positioned for the world that Godin envisions, (by which I mean the real world.) But getting there requires taking the risk of being truly unique. "The winners have turned initiative into passion and a practice."

 DSC_0130


DSC_0119

L
akota activist Emily White Hat '94, P'13 addressed several classes today.

 DSC_0001

Let's Look at Godin's customization for the individual. Elias (Hamburg, Germany, with broken wrist) in wood shop.

DSC_0005

Nat Mullen, today, with Berklee College's internationally renowned jazz trumpeter Tiger Okoshi.

DSC_0030

A
dam learns to fly cast, as part of an English project on a Saturday morning at the pond.

 DSC_0146
DSC_0011
Dave stuns the audience by cleaving a laptop on a stump in assembly. That's not a part of a curriculum, if you know what I'm sayin'.
DSC_0009-2
Daniel works on his elegant boat.
DSC_0067
Weird is good.
DSC_0173
I'm serious!
DSC_0101
This can't be serious....
DSC_0084
Orange, in focus.
DSC_0048
.
DSC_0009
Lakota activist Emily White Hat '94 speaking in class this morning.
DSC_0091
Reaching for mitochondria....
DSC_0168
How many teenagers spend time on a Saturday morning recycling campus wastes?
DSC_0122
Algebra 2. Can this be real?