Brian Allain

The push for a meritocracy in a world structurally designed to disadvantage certain groups

From “Dropout to Doctorate: Breaking the Chains of Educational Injustice” By Terrence Lester, PhD Fast-forward, I am writing this during the second presidential term of Donald Trump, and we are witnessing a rapid erosion of constitutional protections meant to safeguard historically marginalized communities – especially Black and Brown ones. Through executive orders, DEI (Diversity, Equity, […]

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The AI Enigma

From “How AI Changes Your Customers: The Marketing Guide to Humanity’s Next Chapter” by Mark Schaefer This isn’t a book about technology. It’s a book about people – your customers, your colleagues, maybe even you. I’m not here to dazzle you with the latest jargon or paint a sci-fi nightmare. Yes, there are risks –

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The power of books

From “World of Wonders: A Spirituality of Reading” by Jeff Crosby I believe in the power of books to transform lives, to open windows on the world, to fire our imaginations, and to help us be more faithful Christ followers. I believe in the power of books to bridge differences, foster understanding, and offer hope

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moral debasement

From “We Become What We Normalize: What We Owe Each Other in Worlds That Demand Our Silence” by David Dark Given what we’ve seen and experienced over the last decades, the alliances that have held despite every betrayal of the public good, this grimly candid conclusion concerning the moral debasement most career Republicans would undergo

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It comes from listening

From “Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation” by Parker J. Palmer Vocation, the way I was seeking it, becomes an act of will, a grim determination that one’s life will go this way or that whether it wants to or not. If the self is sin-ridden and will bow to truth

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Only gradually did I discover

From “Discernment: Reading the Signs of Daily Life” by Henri Nouwen with Michael J. Christensen and Rebecca J. Laird In Lima, Peru, I discerned God’s preferential concern for the poor and grew in the conviction that I, too, had to choose that option. It was there that I heard the clear call to dedicate my

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The growth mindset

From “Mindset: The New Psychology of Success” by Carol S. Dweck, PhD There’s another mindset in which these traits are not simply a hand you’re dealt and have to live with, always trying to convince yourself and others that you have a royal flush when you’re secretly worried it’s a pair of tens.  In this

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cultivating serendipity

From “Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation” by Steven Johnson While the creative walk can produce new serendipitous combinations of existing ideas in our heads, we can also cultivate serendipity in the way that we absorb new ideas from the outside world. Reading remains an unsurpassed vehicle for the transmission of

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