Available October 15, 2024
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Navigating polarities and fostering respectful dialogue are responsibilities that weigh heavily on many school leaders right now. How, in the current social and political climate, can we build bridges of cooperation rather than perpetuating barriers that divide us? How can we create space for ideas and opinions while balancing our obligations to nurture student safety and well-being? Eboo Patel, author and director of Interfaith America, sits down with NAIS President Debra P. Wilson to talk about his work on the role of pluralism in schools.
Outlining his personal journey from what he calls an “angry identity activist” to the head of the largest diversity organization in America, Eboo says he had to move from viewing the world through the lens of oppressor vs. oppressed to a place of understanding identity as a source of pride and cooperation as a source of strength. Diversity is a fact, he says, but pluralism is an achievement. Pluralism, as Eboo defines it, results from people of diverse identities working positively together.
He outlines the three types of pluralism that underpin his work: identity pluralism, intellectual pluralism, and values pluralism. Taken together, they are people of different backgrounds, with different explanations for why people believe certain things or behave in certain ways, and with differing beliefs about the most fundamental values in any given situation. But Eboo’s work focuses on ensuring those differences are embraced as potential contributions to working together. And schools, he says, can nurture the three types of pluralism. Giving the example of an independent school he visited during a contentious election season, he recalls the head’s observations about the different bumper stickers on the cars of the faculty vs. the cars of the parents: That the political differences on display were a strength of the school, because the kids all knew caring adults who openly held different worldviews. They could understand that disagreement didn’t have to mean division.
Eboo says schools need to become immune to simplistic ideologies that control narratives, quoting Jesuit philosopher John Courtney Murray to illustrate his point: “Civilization is living and talking together … and the definition of the barbarian is the person who shuts down the conversation.” He says schools must help students practice navigating tricky ethical problems, holding difficult debates that wrestle with different values and worldviews, and not shutting down conversations with ideological buzzwords.
To achieve that, Eboo says, we need to make sure we’re not leading with the conclusion. Ask questions, even challenging ones. Let students express half-baked opinions and ideas and then learn to expand and clarify their thinking in the process. Create an environment where it’s safe to be wrong and it’s OK to challenge the dominant thinking. And ensure you’re practicing education, rather than ideology. Pluralism is hard but important work, and learning to navigate it is a lifelong skill we can instill in our students.
Key Questions
Some of the key questions Eboo and Debra explore in this episode include:
- What is pluralism? What definition or definitions can we use to help us understand this work, and how does it relate to schools?
- What are the signals that a school is doing well in incorporating pluralism into its approach?
- In our current polarized climate, where can leaders begin working with pluralism frameworks and encouraging more diversity of thought in schools?
- How can we understand and practice pluralism while also accounting for structural and systemic biases?
Episode Highlights
- “Diversity is a treasure. Identity is a source of pride, not a status of victimization. Cooperation is better than division. Faith is a bridge. Everybody's a contributor.” (4:49)
- “It is an exercise of citizenship in a diverse democracy to come to know something about your fellow citizens who are from different identities, including different political parties, including different regions of the world, and from different intellectual frameworks and maybe of different values. I mean, you know, did I think diversity was just the differences I liked?” (16:00)
- “If there's anything that a school should be, it should be a place that is immune to the kind of ideologies that shut down the conversation. I want to quote John Courtney Murray again. I think it's so powerful. He says, civilization is living and talking together. That is the definition of civilization. And the definition of the barbarian is the person who shuts down the conversation. And the introduction of ideologies that shut down conversations about, for example, how people from different identities should relate to one another.” (21:41)
- “If you're United Airlines, and you're hiring a graduate from Embry Riddle aeronautical university, you are pretty sure that person can fly a plane. If I hire a graduate from The Lab School or Latin School or Parker, these are elite independent schools in my city of Chicago, what should I be confident that graduate can do? And I think a head of school should say, my graduate can navigate pluralism.” (25:12)
Resource List
- Learn more about the work of Interfaith America.
- Read the Washington Post article Eboo refers to in this episode.
- Get copies of Eboo’s books.
- Watch Eboo discuss his work and his inspirations in this Greater Good video.
- Check out Eboo’s TED Talk on Building Bridges.
- Read Eboo’s “Act Like an Olympian” article for young leaders.
- Read Eboo's article with co-author Rebecca Russo for Times Higher Education, "Pluralism Practices for Educational Institutions."
Full Transcript
- Read the full transcript here.
Related Episodes
- Episode 37: The Dignity Lens in Education Episode
- Episode 30: How Equity and Well-Being Work Together in Our Schools
- Episode 29: The Future of Higher Ed
- Episode 22: The Purpose and Nature of Higher Education
- Episode 17: The Opportunities and Obligations of Citizenship in K-12 Education
- Episode 7: Schools for Diversity and Designing Inclusive Futures
- Episode 4: Schools for Growing Citizens
About Our Guest
Eboo Patel is a civic leader who believes that religious diversity is an essential and inspiring dimension of American democracy. Named “one of America’s best leaders” by U.S. News and World Report, Eboo is founder and president of Interfaith America, the leading interfaith organization in the United States. Under his leadership, Interfaith America has worked with governments, universities, private companies, and civic organizations to make faith a bridge of cooperation rather than a barrier of division.
Eboo served on President Obama’s Inaugural Faith Council, has given hundreds of keynote addresses, and has written five books, including We Need to Build: Field Notes for Diverse Democracy. He is an Ashoka Fellow and holds a doctorate in the sociology of religion from Oxford University, where he studied on a Rhodes scholarship. Eboo lives in Chicago with his wife, Shehnaz, and their two sons.