Rogues’ Blog: A Memo on the Ear Shield

Satire. This is a spoof, written in character by Leadership, The Laminator’s dad. Leadership is fictional. The frustration is not. For the facts, read the Blog by Elaine Walsh.

MEMORANDUM

From: Leadership

To: All Staff, All Services, All Families, and All Persons Who Have Raised an Issue

Re: The Ear Shield (Revised Listening Framework, v14)

Status: Approved. Laminated.

Colleagues, I hear you. I want to begin there, because hearing you is the cornerstone of everything we do, and because it has now been ten seconds.

Following extensive consultation, I am pleased to announce the rollout of the Ear Shield across the school, the clinic, the council office, the workplace and the Department. The Ear Shield is our most advanced listening technology to date. It is large, it is shiny, and it is shaped like an ear, so that everyone can see how much listening is taking place.

How the Ear Shield works

When a concern is raised, it travels towards Leadership at speed. On contact with the Ear Shield, it is fully heard, acknowledged and returned to the person who raised it, usually with a light PING. This is called a feedback loop. The concern goes out. The concern comes back. Nothing is lost. Nothing, crucially, is changed.

Some have asked whether the Ear Shield is simply a way of not listening. I hear you. PING.

A note on vocabulary

To support a shared understanding, the following terms are now in use across all settings:

• A waiting list is a pathway.

• A refusal is a deferral of provision.

• A complaint is valued feedback, filed.

• A parent who asks twice is a highly engaged stakeholder.

• A teacher who asks for time to plan is demonstrating a growth mindset, which we will support with a webinar.

• An autistic employee who asks for a quieter desk has raised an interesting point about the future of work, which I have heard.

Our three principles

INCLUSION IS COMPLIANCE.

CONSULTATION IS CONSENT.

THE POLICY IS THE PROVISION.

These principles have been laminated by my son, The Laminator, who has been a tremendous support during this difficult period in everyone else’s life.

Next steps

A working group will be formed to consider whether a working group is needed. Its terms of reference will be laminated in advance. Minutes will be taken, heard and returned.

In the meantime, please continue to raise issues through the usual channels. Every channel leads to the Ear Shield. That is what makes it a system.

I hear you. I hear all of you. I have always heard you. It is, if I may say so, the thing I am best at.

Signed,

Leadership

Presiding Officer of Everything. Vintage model. Never redesigned.

From me, out of character

Hearing is not listening, and listening is not changing anything. If you have been pinged off an Ear Shield this week, at the school gate, in a clinic waiting room or at your desk, you are not imagining it. Keep asking. Write it down. Ask what will change, who will change it, and by when.

Advocacy is the one pressure Leadership cannot laminate.

Remember this lady… how could we forget? Vicky Phelan:

“Keep asking questions until you have answers.”

Read this week’s strip: The Laminator, issue 9: I Hear You.

Elaine Walsh is the founder of Autism & Me (autismandme.ie), a Waterford-based neuroinclusive education consultancy. She writes here on Universal Design, inclusion and Irish education, from the twin vantage points of the classroom and the kitchen table.