Partnership education in the 21st century

At the core of every child is an intact human. Children have an enormous capacity for love, joy, creativity, and caring. Children have a voracious curiosity, a hunger for understanding and meaning. Children also have an acute inborn sense of fairness. Above all, children yearn for love and validation and, given half a chance, are able to give them bountifully in return. In today’s world of rapid technological, economic, and social flux, the development of these capacities is more crucial than ever before. One of the greatest and most urgent challenges facing today’s children is how they will nurture and educate tomorrow’s children. Therein lies the hope for the world. I believe that if we give enough of today’s children the nurturance and education that help them live in the equitable, nonviolent, gender-fair, caring, and creative ways that characterize partnership relations, they will be able to make enough changes in beliefs and institutions to support this way of relating in all spheres of life. They will also be able to give their children the nurturance and education that make the difference between realizing, or stunting, our grea