ACEL Newsletter

 

ISSUE 14 AUG 18 2020

It Is Time

I became CEO of ACEL at a time when the organisation was at the cross-roads. Nine years later, I feel a sense of great professional satisfaction at ACEL’s metamorphosis into a highly respected organisation with a redoubtable reputation for excellence within the education sector it serves. ACEL’s achievements are built on a robust platform of principles, programs, processes, and people. Farsighted strategising and exemplary execution have underwritten its resilience and sustainability throughout these years.

A well-known Australian superannuation fund harks back to a “life unchanging,” even as John Lennon’s (Allen Saunders’?) croons the antithesis that “life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” Regardless of the adage that organisations and/or people subscribe to, when life begins turning on a dime, wisdom lies in embracing change as it manifests. As Eastern philosophy counsels, everything in the material world is impermanent – successful organisations and their service models included!

The COVID-19 crisis has given all of us time for pause and a willingness to try new things. I will be departing ACEL on the 19th of August, firm in my belief that I leave behind an organisation and a management team that is skilled and willing to deliver results, notwithstanding. I am confident that given ACEL’s strengths it is ready, willing and able to respond to any new challenges that these uncertain times may bring.

It would be remiss of me if I did not acknowledge the many remarkable people from ACEL’s board, branches, members, partner organisations, and our global thought-leader community that have shared some parts of this nine-year long journey with me and enriched my life with their association. It also behoves me to thank the team at ACEL’s National Office that made it all possible. As an old Urdu couplet goes, “each one of us starts out alone, but some journeys have good kismet, and people join-in to form a joyous caravan.” I am truly blessed that in the years I spent in ACEL, I had the great good fortune to work with Jane Lowman, Kara Vassallo, Jonathon Parker, Heather Porter, David Clark, Nalaka Perera, James Reynolds, Peggy Reevell, Chris Newcombe, Alex Fitzgerald, Theresa Tran, Suman Patel, and Nerisha Harilal. They brought unique perspectives, great skills and willing ways to bear on everything – a very special band of men and women.

I would like to end this missive with some final thoughts that I know will resonate with many of you. It was in 1597 that Sir Francis Bacon proclaimed that “knowledge itself is power” in his Meditationes Sacrae. Four centuries later the eternal wisdom of his words is underscored by movements like the Arab Spring, Me Too, and Black Lives Matter. Knowledge is indeed power, and education is the fundamental precondition for political development, democracy and social justice. Education empowers by creating knowledge, building confidence, underwriting access, promoting participation, and unlocking opportunity. Education shapes dreams, crystallises goals and untethers potential. As Nelson Mandela once said, “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

The essence of ACEL’s social covenant and organisational purpose are rooted in this inalienable and humbling truth of education’s transformative power. If we are to contribute in any meaningful way to education’s magical potency, we must endeavour to build and nurture Australian educational leadership’s capacity by bringing it up close and personal to all that is new (and different), all that works (and doesn’t), all that is made here (and not), and all that affirms (and challenges). Inspiration, motivation, reflection, inquiry, must never be the handmaidens of narrow worldviews, or constrained by exclusionary categories if it is to serve the soaring aspirations of future generations. Let us all solemnly commit to rise to education’s pure calling by summoning our better angels. Nothing less will do.

We live in interesting times but rest easy that all our bests are yet to come.

Cheers,


Aasha Murthy
ACEL CEO

 

                    

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August 18, 2020

 

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Higher Logic