I recently sold my parents’ house. They built it, and it had sheltered the Scott family (and only the Scott family) for over 60 years. A friend of mine referred to that house as a sacred space, and it got me thinking about sacred spaces.
What are your sacred spaces? Is it a house? A mountaintop? A yoga studio, or a ballpark, or a church sanctuary, or a boat on the lake, or a backyard, or a golf course, or something else? I am a lifelong piano player, and one of my sacred spaces is sitting at my Steinway in my living room. I am a lifelong reader, and another one of my sacred spaces is my “reading chair” in my living room.
“Sacred” can mean “regarded with reverence”, or “reverently dedicated to some person, purpose, or object”, or “secured against violation, infringement, etc.” or “properly immune from violence”. (Thank you Dictionary.com for these definitions.)
For me, one of the most sacred spaces is the classroom.
Picture credit: Gabriel Bertram Bellinghausen, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Classrooms are where we honor the act of learning. Classrooms should be protected from violation or infringement. Classrooms should be regarded with reverence. It is in a classroom that we challenge, contradict, debate, discuss, adapt, ponder, grow, laugh, question, pause, connect, listen, participate, interact, respond, contribute, present, experiment, succeed, and fail. It is in classrooms where I have grown as a student, as a faculty member, and as a person.
I have deep reverence for the classroom and all that takes place there. I love the community college classroom in particular – it is a sacred place of diversity of age, race, ethnicity, backgrounds, lived experiences, points of view, skills, interests, and knowledge. What is more fun than a community college classroom? What has more promise than a community college classroom?
Let us take a moment to pause and reflect on the sacredness of our classrooms. Let us continue to honor our mission and our sacred duty to support learning for all who walk through our doors. Let us treat the classroom with reverence and respect and remember that it is a sacred space.