Developing a view

Perspective is related to our backgrounds - our upbringing, our education, our fields of interest, our motivations.  Together they are the ingredients of our value systems.  Values are formed from the different inputs as mentioned above, which is why the saying, "One's judgment is only as good as her/his information," is so very true.

The other day I was in a conversation with my mother.  She brought up the subject of a news story recounting that various school districts were complaining to the Texas Education Agency that the state tests were not scored correctly since a good number of students who usually made top grades in their schools were not showing as high scorers on the state test.  My mother is adamantly against state testing.  So, she jumped on this news story as support for her opinion.

I said that while that conclusion could be true, there were other factors that might show up that would not support the complaints at all.  I mentioned that teachers inflate grades in the classroom, so the more statistically accurate state tests might just be showing a faulty grading system used by many school districts.  I started to launch into a more detailed response about the statistical nature of scoring the state tests when she interrupted me.  "You're always on the other side of whatever people talk about."

I stopped short of my launch, considering she has had a considerable history with me.  It's true that in both politics and religion, we differ greatly on our perspectives.  Many times in education, we see the source and causes of problems differently, typically in handling of curriculum.  Other areas over the years have shown differences, too.

But, I will say this.  If I had her set of facts, maybe I would reach her same conclusions.  If she had my set of facts, maybe she would reach my conclusions.  We bring our experiences and our backgrounds to any decision we reach, any philosophy we might have developed.  I ended my comments with "The school districts could be right, but there might be more to it than they think.

Recently I was called contentious by someone.  In my mind, I was merely "showing my work" for a a conclusion I had drawn.  The other person wasn't using the same logic that I was using, so she cut me short and called me contentious.

Perspective is all we have to express our thoughts.  I try to be respectful both of others' opinions or of their wishes not to hear the logic of how my conclusions are drawn.   People must coexist, so respect is an important value to have alongside of the perspectives we also hold.