Prior to 2024, any time I cut a green, yellow, or red pepper, I would inevitably litter my cutting board, knife, counter, and floor with seeds. I would try countless techniques, but always walked away with similar results.
Then, I came across this hack:
https://youtube.com/shorts/eh8znunrYSc?si=DwOeBqMYF6-LZERT.
I have experienced pepper cutting bliss ever since.
Before discovering this hack - or way - to cut peppers, my approaches varied but my results stayed the same. I would expend time and energy thinking about how I would cut the pepper followed by time and energy cleaning up those silly and sticky seeds after my messy attempt.
This way of cutting has become habit for me. Now I no longer waste time thinking of new methods or cleaning wayward seeds. While insignificant in the grand scheme of life, every time I cut a pepper I remember what it used to be like.
Similarly, my son's travel soccer team recently participated in "Silent Sunday" during which coaches and parents have to refrain from any sort of coaching. We can cheer and encourage effort, but not offer any advice on tactic or technique. While the educator-coach in me found this exercise excruciating, it provided a powerful look at how many systems the team had successfully implemented and those that remain unestablished - who should take a throw-in, where he should throw it, where players line up for a corner kick, where a goalie should distribute the ball, how to maintain spacing, etc.
While our Catholic schools contain so much more complexity than kitchen hacks or travel soccer strategies, our communities would benefit from the creation and implementation of more systems to help us advance our missions. For example, instead of having to put time and energy into which reports to generate for every finance committee meeting, we can lean on the system in place to produce the right reports at the right time. Similarly, we can rely on systems to identify and provide supports to students struggling academically and/or behaviorally. While the specific strategies deployed may differ, the approach to catch and assist a floundering student can remain consistent - sticking to consistent checkpoints and criteria to identify and intervene accordingly.
As we continue to develop systems for reporting information, partnering with various diocesan personnel, and doing the work of academics, finances, advancement, enrollment, and faith, may we provide our communities with hacks, ways, and approaches that will ensure our success now and for many years to come.
As stewards invited to toil in the vineyard of the Lord, let us leave our respective portions - through the creation and execution of systems - even better than we found it.
