Wednesday, April 06, 2011

Sean Ritchey: Grown Unschooler

I had this shift two years ago where I stopped thinking about my life in terms of success and started thinking of my life in terms of contribution. 
I started thinking of myself as a contribution rather than as successful or not. Sean Ritchey.

 Download our most recent interview with grown unschooler, Sean Ritchey.

An activist, entrepreneur and self described 'project architect,' Ritchey explains what he does as,"designing vehicles and platforms for people to work on things together in a different model than what has come before."

How does he best define himself? "A passionate and curious human first and foremost; grounded in pieces of gratitude."

To the comment, "unschooling is often criticized for being too idealistic and does not prepare kids for the real world," Ritchey responds that he agrees since generally speaking, unschooling does not prepare one to "work for the world of corporate America."

Unschooling prepares you to follow "what is in line with your passions and values."
He notices that "the more security you have the less freedom you have."

"Our culture generally tends to put more emphasis on security rather than freedom," observes Ritchey. "Unschoolers tend to swing their lives more on the side of freedom than security-generally speaking."

Check out Sean Ritchey's work here:
http://www.seanritchey.com/

7 comments:

Dave H said...

Speaking as a Brit with peripheral experience of Corporate America, I can agree. School generally teaches conformity and teamwork, however much you get kicked. Being educated outside school, you get to miss the indoctrination and the peer pressure and are capable of thinking outside the box.

For all that British society supposedly has a class system and the US doesn't - Corporate America is very class (or status) conscious and if you step out of line then things can go downhill very quickly.

Unknown said...

@Davey-thanks for the comment. I think that what is happening in the world is the rise of another type of 'class' of people -the creative class. The 'contributer' class. The 'get of your arse and do something' class. Many have written on this. Cheers!

Anonymous said...

Unschoolers might not develop the competitive edge that is required to succeed in business. Maybe that is why they are bleeding hearts and activist artsy types.

Unknown said...

@Anon-I wonder how many unschoolers you know?

Lisa Nielsen said...

@anonymous, I wish I knew better, but unfortunately, I went to school. I am a bleeding heart, activist and artsy wanna be type. Are you saying there is something wrong with that? I think we need more of it.

I agree that unschoolers might not develop the competitive edge that is required to succeed in mainstream business. Instead, they can often be found living entrepreneurial lives filled with happiness and freedom where the boss they answer to is themselves.

I love my friend and career adviser, Penelope Trunk's take on this. Check it out here http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2011/03/30/generation-z-will-revolutionize-education/

Unknown said...

@Innovative Educator-great link!Thanks for this.

Anonymous said...

Unfortunately too many young people in our country (Canada) are in it for the $$ and don't care about anything else.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...