It’s been almost 15 years since my nearly blind eyesight was corrected through Lasik eye surgery. Although I had been told to keep my eyes closed after the surgery, I couldn’t help but sneak a peek in the recovery room. What happened next made me believe in actual miracles. I could see. I could see words on the wall, clearly defined lines where blurry had always been, and best of all: the details of my husband’s face. The ability to see is something I will never take for granted.
Being able to see things easily overlooked is a skill I continue to work toward building every day that I am consulting or coaching in a school community.
Coaching Is Not a Luxury, It’s a Lifeline
There’s one small school that has shaped me more than any other.
Tucked away on the Navajo Nation, it serves just around 25 students, kindergarten through eighth grade , and is led by three teachers who each wear about seven different hats. Some students live at the school during the week. Many come from long distances. All of them, in some way, have become part of my story.
I’ve worked alongside this community for five years now. It’s the only school that has stayed constant throughout my coaching career. I’ve watched students grow from shy kindergartners, some nonverbal or struggling with big emotions, into curious, confident middle schoolers. I’ve watched teachers build systems out of thin air, create lessons across multiple grade levels, and keep joy alive despite the isolation and challenges that come with teaching in a small rural setting.
But what’s most important isn’t what I’ve given them — it’s what they’ve given me.
What Coaching Looks Like When You Listen
When I first started visiting this school, I thought I understood what coaching meant: goal setting, modeling, reflection, planning. But this school taught me that real coaching begins with listening and paying attention.
It taught me that progress doesn’t always look like a new strategy or a new framework; sometimes it looks like teachers laughing again. Sometimes it looks like a student leading their peers. Sometimes it looks like a staff of three saying, “Let’s try it this way,” and doing it because its what they believe is best for their kids, not because its a district initiative.
The work I have done with this school community has helped me realize that coaching isn’t about bringing the answers into a school, but more about holding a mirror to what they are already doing that is working and amplifying those things. Coaching is learning beside people who are doing the hardest, most human work imaginable.
And because of that, my own practice has changed. I don’t walk into schools trying to fix them. I walk in trying to see them.
The Blindness Schools Don’t Know They Have
Over the past five years, I’ve had the privilege of visiting hundreds of classrooms across many districts. Populations could be small, large, rural, urban, and everything in between. What I’ve noticed is that schools, as caring and dedicated as they are, often develop a kind of unintentional blindness.
We all know that developing a rhythm of teaching and building systems that work is important. In doing so, its easy to lose sight of the world beyond the walls of the classroom, the one our students are actually stepping into.
And that world is changing faster than ever.
Too often, I see students who are compliant but not curious. They’re consumers of information, not creators of meaning. Technology, which could open endless doors, is mostly used for testing. And teachers, who entered this profession to inspire, often feel like they’re just trying to keep up.
That’s why coaching matters.
Not because it evaluates, but because it illuminates.
Coaching as Connection and as a Lifeline
When coaching is done well, it becomes the bridge between what’s happening inside classrooms and what’s happening in the world beyond them. It gives teachers a chance to step back and ask:
“What are our students learning that will help them live — not just pass the next test?”
In a system that’s changing too slowly for the times we live in, coaching is not a luxury. It’s a lifeline. It gives teachers time and space to think again, to reimagine, to remember why they started. It helps schools see what they can’t always see on their own.
The schools I visit don’t need rescuing , they need reflection, validation, and partners willing to walk beside them, ask the hard questions, and hold the mirror steady while they rediscover their purpose.
Reimagining Learning Together
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from the Navajo school I wrote about above, it’s that we get better together.
While our systems continue to build the future of education on programs and policies, we have to believe it will be built through people who are brave enough to reimagine learning together. People who can look at the uncertainty of the world and still choose to believe that joy and curiosity are worth fighting for.
My word for 2026 is capacity. I hope we can all be brave enough to really look at what we are doing every day and determine if its a checklist or a compass. Are we providing a model of presence and connection over compliance and perfection?
Education doesn’t need more programs it needs more perspective.
If your school or district is ready to reimagine learning and rediscover joy in the classroom, I’d love to be part of that conversation.
💡 Let’s learn together. Reach out at rachelwhatif@gmail.com, on Instagram @rachel3296 or connect with me on LinkedIn.