Big Picture in Australia – A warrior (and worrier) in action
by Michael Traill AM, CEO, Social Ventures Australia
Some of the SVA team recently had the opportunity to be part of the first major Big Picture forum in Hobart. It connected and collected teachers and students from 17 schools around the country who have embraced the Big Picture approach. For more information on Big Picture, take a look at their Graduating Impact Report here.
While they are not part of the current SVA portfolio there has been enormous two way engagement and learning between our organisations. Viv White, the founder of Big Picture Australia, has expressed strong appreciation and recognition of the SVA support, network and access in their critical first steps. In a toast to Viv at the forum dinner, Big Picture Australia team member Bruce Kiloh described Viv as a true entrepreneur, a warrior and a worrier, and I thought the description an apt one of the energy, drive and passion Viv has brought to the task.
She and the team should be proud of how far they have come in bringing this inspiring and motivating program to this country. I first saw it five years ago in Providence, Rhode Island, when I had an unforgettable day with Elliot Washor (Big Picture co-founder) looking at the first school they founded, called The Met. The Met had literally transformed a ghetto community and produced astonishing outcomes. All the first graduating class, from a demographic with little precedent for continuing education, went to College. The model of engaged, small group education had wrought magic with the simple formula of connecting the kids to those things for which they had a passion as a vehicle for practical educational and vocational learning. An explicit and powerful part of the model was bringing the community and parents into the equation. Big Picture is now in over 100 schools in the US, is funded by the Gates Foundation and has attracted the public support of President Obama. It is changing and challenging the way people think about the delivery of education.
In Hobart, sitting at tables where passionate teachers swapped notes about their journeys of implementing this program, it was clear how much it meant that they could connect to each other and the broader network that had brought Big Picture to their schools. Elliot was an engaged and inspiring presence at the forum and in his typical self effacing way, commented on the learnings that the Australian network had brought to what is now a global vision for Big Picture.
I took the opportunity over the forum dinner to share how much we appreciated being involved. For me, seeing their energy and commitment was renewing and compelling. My father, who spent a life in the Victorian state education system, always reckoned there were two sorts of people: those who had a crack at things, and those that didn’t. This was a room full of people having a crack. It’s early days, but in listening to their conversations and hearing the early but extremely positive signs of improved engagement and performance from Big Picture students and communities, there is real momentum for Big Picture Australia.
I think we all sometimes wonder about that bridge between an SVA that aims to bring strategic thinking and networks to this country’s real and on the ground social issues and whether it makes the difference we’d like to think. I received a great email from Maureen Hartung who is Executive Director of the Blue Gum Community School which has embraced Big Picture that was a reassuring reminder of what that bridge can mean.
“Just wanted to say that I think the work you’re doing is FANTASTIC!!! It’s moving the community sector beyond the do-gooder volunteer sector, to a genuine alternative to the ‘private’ sector – nurturing ‘on-the-ground’ real responses by real people to real people! Just love the new status and professionalism you are helping to bring to the community sector. The government sector is often too large and unwieldy to be a service provider. The community sector should be the pointy end of government policy! Don’t get me started!!!
Just attended the Big Picture Conference in Hobart with our students – it offers such exciting rich potential for education/learning across-the-board – so glad SVA is a partner.
And as a provider of long day care and outside school hours programs, I was in awe of your intervention in the ABC Learning Centres fiasco – what a coup!
Thought we were a lonely voice in the wilderness banging on about “social entrepreneurship”. But we’re so busy being a ‘do-er’, it’s hard to find time for the bigger picture. So, it’s wonderful to see you fill that void, as an ‘enabler’.
Now must get back to the ‘do-ing’. But more power to you!
Warm regards”
Maureen
Executive Director Blue Gum Community School
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