Growth as a goal, or at least as a measure of success was something I had to fight almost continuously during my time at the school. Whether it was in a board meeting or interacting with educational consultants and other school leaders, there would be a suggestion that more students meant more tuition and that, in turn, would provide for a bigger facility and more services. This would allow us to afford all kinds of neat things and attract even more students. The key to arguing against this successfully was to be really clear about the mission and vision of the school. These seem like kind or vague terms to most people but in the non-profit world, they are the backbone on which the whole structure is built. I don't want to overdo the analogy but I think the roadblock we face at the national level is that we really haven't talked very seriously about mission and vision, they tend to get reduced to campaign slogans. The closest thing I can find to a mission statement for the USA is the Preamble to the Constitution. It lists 6 reasons or goals for having a US government and not one of them is tied to the idea of perpetual growth. If the way we measured our success was directly tied to these 6 goals, we would stand a better chance. As a Democrat, I'd love to make the argument that the US government has become too big in the sense we have strayed from our mission, to take a more originalist point of view and get back to the basics as outlined in our founding document.
Hello Jason,
Growth as a goal, or at least as a measure of success was something I had to fight almost continuously during my time at the school. Whether it was in a board meeting or interacting with educational consultants and other school leaders, there would be a suggestion that more students meant more tuition and that, in turn, would provide for a bigger facility and more services. This would allow us to afford all kinds of neat things and attract even more students. The key to arguing against this successfully was to be really clear about the mission and vision of the school. These seem like kind or vague terms to most people but in the non-profit world, they are the backbone on which the whole structure is built. I don't want to overdo the analogy but I think the roadblock we face at the national level is that we really haven't talked very seriously about mission and vision, they tend to get reduced to campaign slogans. The closest thing I can find to a mission statement for the USA is the Preamble to the Constitution. It lists 6 reasons or goals for having a US government and not one of them is tied to the idea of perpetual growth. If the way we measured our success was directly tied to these 6 goals, we would stand a better chance. As a Democrat, I'd love to make the argument that the US government has become too big in the sense we have strayed from our mission, to take a more originalist point of view and get back to the basics as outlined in our founding document.