Expanding our family through an international adoption has
shaped the last four years. The journey began in December 2009 and
in March of 2012 we brought two sisters, Meskerem (Remy) and Tarikua (Tara), to
Austin from Ethiopia and into our home. The adventure continues and
the expedition has provided emotional lessons; some of them even apply to
leadership.
Leaders Love Equal Opportunity: On January 3rd, 2013 my wife and I were
in the car with the girls and had ‘one of
those moments’. ‘One of those moments’ are the flip-side
on the 45 rpm called
adoption with an A-side titled ‘what the
heck did we do?’. The first time I
spun that vinyl was on March 9th, 2012 getting on Ethiopia
Airlines flight 702, the same flight that was just hijacked about a week
ago. I looked across the airplane aisle
as my wife and I book-ended our two new daughters and mouthed the words, ‘what the heck did we do?’ If you knew ahead of time the cost to adopt
you might not do it. I don’t mean the
financial cost, I just mean the emotional cost.
The A-side gets more playing time, but much like You
Can't Always Get What You Want – by the Stones or God
Only Knows by the Beach Boys, the B-side can surprise and bring great joy. Last January we got an amazing B-side. The type of tune that makes every difficult
moment worth it; the song that wipes away the cost. The girls were in the back of the car
chatting in Eng-haric…they were losing their Amharic but were not yet fluent in
English. They were talking about “what they want to be when they grow up”
Remy announced loudly, “I will be Doctor”
and Tara murmured softly, “I will be
Teacher” Brettne (my wife) and I looked at
each other, her eyes shining and we exchanged thoughts with no words….are you
kidding me? From the streets of Awassa to Doctor and
Teacher? Yes they can. As Remy once told me, “Dod, I can do anything except become the President of the United States”.
As an adoptive parent you consume all the information you
can get about the world of your new children.
Our girls come from a part of the globe were it is tough to become
Doctor and Teacher. The regions that
started the decade with the largest challenges in education, the Arab States,
South and West Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, have all made progress. But there is still work to be done, more
than half of the world’s out-of-school children live in sub-Saharan Africa. Even though it is fourth on the list, Ethiopia has made dramatic
progress. From 1999 to 2008, Ethiopia
reduced the number of children out of school by about 4 million, and it now has
a real prospect of achieving Universal Primary
Education by 2015.
The challenges for girl’s education are more complex; fifty-two
countries have a ratio of girls to boys in primary school of 0.95 or less, and
in twenty-six it is 0.90 or less. In
Afghanistan there are 66 girls enrolled for every 100 boys and in Somalia only
55 girls are enrolled for every 100 boys. Had
the world achieved gender parity at the primary school level in 2008, another
3.6 million girls would have been in school. 3.6 million Doctor and Teacher…
Equal treatment in education for girls and boys is a source
of economic growth, job creation and increased living standards. But it also saves lives. Evidence from
household surveys points to maternal education as one of the strongest factors
influencing children’s prospects for survival. If the average child mortality
rate for sub-Saharan Africa were to fall to the level for children born to
women with some secondary education, there
would be 1.8 million fewer deaths – a 41% reduction. Equal opportunity equals growth and life. Equal opportunity equals hope.
What does girl’s education in sub-Saharan Africa have to do
with leadership? Napoleon said, “A
leader is a dealer in hope” Hope is confidence that tomorrow will be
better even if we are not quite sure of how it will happen. Hope is the glue of every great organization…to
create the future you have to believe it can happen. As the leader, why would you risk it all by denying
someone on your team equal access to hope?
Winning requires the best from everyone; the highest use of their talent. Winning requires that all believe they can be
Doctor and Teacher.
“All of us do not have
equal talents, but all of us should have an equal opportunity to develop our
talents” – John F. Kennedy
No comments:
Post a Comment