As CEO, Great Blue Heron, LLC (stevejonesgbh.com), I am a founding Advisory Council Member, Edu-Alliance North America. Edu-Alliance Co-Founder Dean Hoke posted that the “Council just completed our first Member Retreat in Orlando. Thanks to Kenneth Salomon, Judyth Wier, Jay Noren, Steve Jones, Roger Brown, Allen Meadors, and Nancy Kathryn Hoke. Outstanding ideas & participation from everyone. We have a strong commitment to improving international education in the United States.”
What a pleasure to meet with like-minded professionals, experienced in international education. And what a joy to slip south more deeply into spring’s inexorable advance.
I am so pleased that Great Blue Heron can participate in this venture to improve international education in the western hemisphere. You might wonder about the connection between Nature-Inspired Learning & Leading and international education. The explanation is simple – allow me.
Our Earth is an isolated mote of dust in the vast darkness of space. We orbit an insignificant star on a spiral arm of the Milky Way, one of some 100 billion stars in our home galaxy. At the speed of light (186,000 miles per second), travel to the center of the Milky Way would take 25-30,000 years! Astronomers now estimate that ours is among two trillion such galaxies in the universe. Every single aspect of life and living on Earth is intimately interconnected; nothing is truly isolated on our tiny planet. Nature and Human Nature intersect in all dimensions of our fragile global community. So, whether education, politics, economic development, trade, health, or social issues, all is global. Edu-Alliance recognizes our planetary reality and is committed to improving our social, economic, and environmental well-being and human sustainability through education. We believe we are fulfilling a fundamental imperative for the common future good.
Edu-Alliance has a three-year performance track record, improving international education in the Middle-East and Northern Africa. What better time than now, with a new US Administration in-place, for introducing Edu-Alliance to North America. Our intent as a core Advisory Council is to help education administrators, governmental entities, industry, and the NGO community navigate the international education arena during this period of absolute need and transition.
Nature handles transitions from the basis of a few billion years of evolved wisdom, a little ongoing trial and error, and the basic laws of physics. Nature instructs that perturbations constitute the norm. Nature and Human Nature have handled far more serious “disturbances” than this election emplacing a new Administration unfamiliar with the ways of “doing things in Washington.” I view the situation as more an opportunity than a threat to higher education. Let’s advantage the moment to make things better – it is Nature’s way to seize opportunity. Our country, as has Nature across the vast sweep of time, optimizes in response to change. We in the US have invested 250 years in improving America by attracting and welcoming the world’s best and brightest, those entrants seeking asylum, opportunity, and an education in our Homeland. Likewise, our American students are strengthened by access to opportunities abroad to learn, work, and visit.
I am convinced that the new Administration seeks that as well. Edu-Alliance (and Great Blue Heron, LLC) can assist achieving those ends through initiatives in furtherance of international education. It is only Natural that we help find advantage in the moment. An informed, educated global citizenry is part of our collective solution to Earth Stewardship and global sustainability!
Dr. Stephen Jones is a member of the Edu Alliance North America Advisory Council. He is President/CEO of Great Blue Heron in Madison, Alabama, which is a consulting firm dedicated to applying nature’s wisdom to living, learning, serving, and leading. Steve is also well known as a university administrator and has worked in senior higher education positions for over 30 years.
Edu Alliance Journal 