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September 9, 2026
This document presents a proposed educational framework that addresses the ethical limitations of one-size-fits-all education by balancing inclusive and exclusive educational environments. Big “E” Education represents the total system of all educational offerings across global, national, local, or individual scopes, which must remain inclusive and accessible. Small “e” education refers to specific institutions, programs, or classes, which are inherently targeted or exclusive. By categorizing learner development across psychological levels (from survival and community belonging to self-directed exploration and systemic design), this framework outlines structured pathways for individual growth and educational access.
BIG “E” Education VS small “e” education.
A guide for inclusion and exclusion education.
Version 1
By Nicole Trapp
I come into this project with the bias, that one-size-fits-all education programs are ethically wrong and should be replaced with programs that fit the needs of the specific people in the class. The problem is we cannot do this today because there is no system in place to do so. This is my first attempt at creating a system for determining where education should be inclusive or exclusive. The Goal for this system is to create a natural system that allows learners to explore educational possibilities and find the educational opportunities that are correct for them. As this system is a work in process it is subject to change as I receive feedback.
In the book Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire defines the oppressed as a person that “have adapted to the structure of domination in which they are immersed, and have become resigned to it, are inhibited from waging the struggle for freedom so long as they feel incapable of running the risks it requires”, and the oppressor as a person the inhibited others from fighting against the structures that domination their ability to make choices for themselves. (Freire) When I read this, I understand that an oppressive educational system is an educational system without choice.
The education system we have today is one without choice. The school districts tell the students which school they must go to which class they must attend in that school and who their teacher is. The students have no voice in the rules and no voice in their learning process. The teachers too, are oppressed. They have a choice in which school to teach at where they might be hired. However, all the schools follow the same rules set up by the government school boards. The teachers have no say in which types of students they want to teach or how they want to teach their subject area. They too, are oppressed.
Attempts at inclusion and integration may have had very good intent but they too have been oppressive because they have not been about choice they have been about force. Political ideologies have been put before the needs of the students. When we opened up schools to no longer be segregated by race, but to be open to all races. It was done by force, and not by the will of the people involved. I’ve heard this from many people of the older generation, it was damaging psychologically, and had the opposite effect as it was meant to. It increased racism instead of decreasing it. In Teaching to Transgress by b. hooks (does not use capitalization because she does not), she covers her experience with forced racial integration. In the paper, she describes how she went from a loving all-black school, where she was treated as a whole person and an individual to a white school with forced integration of some blacks where she was treated as a political pawn in use by teachers and staff members to reinforce stereotypes. She started to hate education going to school, where she previously loved it. However, she kept that love for education from what she learned from the all-black school of education is about freedom. But the more she advanced in education the more she saw, it as a prison where freedom was taken away, and she was taught to obey authority. (b. hooks)
In the case of b. hooks, the forced integration was on the lines of race, however, integration may be on another identifying factor. As I write this today, that identifying factor that we need to start integrating people on is political ideologies. As we move into the future at different points of time, what the identifying factor is will change, but the system should work for whatever that identifying factor is.
Big “E” Education is the summation of all education programs and offerings. “E” Education can be looked at through several lenses; Global (all education programs and offerings that exist in the world), National (all education programs and offerings that exist within a country), local (all education programs and offerings that exist within a geographical area), individual (all educational programs and offerings that a specific learner has access to).
Little “e” education is offered at an individual institution, program, or class.
Disclaimer: These definitions reflect the author’s proposed model.
Inclusive education is an educational approach designed to meet the diverse needs of all individual learners. In an inclusive educational setting, all individuals are welcomed, supported, and given equal opportunity to participate and learn without barriers to entry.
Exclusive education is a specialized learning format targeted toward meeting the specific needs, capabilities, or qualifications of a targeted group of learners. Entry into exclusive education relies on specific prerequisites, alignment with a particular school of thought, or demonstrated merit.
Inclusive levels are the levels that must have a place for everyone. When designing Big E-education for each subject area or school of thought, we must consider how we will include everybody with these levels.
Everyone starts in Beige for all subjects. This is the point in the learners’ education where they do not know anything about the subject. Basic instinct is used to navigate through tasks that require knowledge or skill from the subject area, as an understanding of the subject area has not been developed yet and no community support has been developed.
Moving from beige to Purple is the most important change in one’s growth. During this time the learners need to find a group in which they feel a sense of belonging.
When learning something new for the first time community is very important, as we are confronting something that is unfamiliar and new to us, and there may be fear involved. Community gives us a sense of belonging and a support system as we move into something that is new and unfamiliar to us.
When someone is in the purple phase of learning, the focus should be on how they interact with the community and not on the speed or accuracy of what they are learning.
In the purple level, there should be an emphasis on having many small groups, so that people have the ability to find a group in which they can feel included.
That being said, it is not important that everyone be included in every group but they have a group to be included in.
“Every kid should have the opportunity to do something they are really interested in and get recognized for within a community of practice they feel a sense of belonging with. That is an essential learning experience. … It should just be something from a social, emotional, and developmental perspective that we
recognize as essential for kids.”
Mizuko Ito, Director of the Connected Learning Lab at UC Irvine (Connected Learning Lab)
This is what happened to b. hooks during the forced racial integration. At the time there was the false idea that all black schools gave black students a bad education and to give black students a good education they must be integrated into white schools (b. Hooks). Taking a student in the purple learning level away from a learning community where they feel belonging should be avoided at all costs. If it cannot be avoided focus should be on finding a new community the learner can feel a part of.
For clarity purposes only, in this example, we talked about race, but in purple, the sense of the community is not about race. It is about a sense of belonging.
All communities have rules that we must follow to be part of them. No matter what community it is. In purple, we must follow those rules. When those rules become too overwhelming and restrictive for learners they are ready to move into red.
Learners in red had enough of community rules. They are going to do it their way and they do not care if they are wrong. These learners will come in and out of learning environments, taking from them whatever they want and leaving what they don’t. Even though red only wants to do what Red wants to do, Red still has the desire to win, to succeed or have power. Some will gain it on their own terms, and others will not. The ones that do not will push their way into it and having no concern for others in their way.
In Red, learners should be focused on understanding their feelings and emotions towards the subject area and school of thought.
There are healthy and unhealthy versions of every level. When people are in unhealthy levels of red they may be pushed into a blue training system, such as military school to force them out of the unhealthy red that they’re in. Others who are in a healthy version of red will have explored different schools of thought, gaining enough knowledge about them to choose which one they want for their one right way.
In either case, whether they are choosing their one right way, or being forced into it. The rules should be strictly applied. Once learners enter the blue level of learning, it needs to be made clear that it is no longer about them and what they want and desire. It is about what is acceptable and unacceptable, what is right or what is wrong within that school of thought. In blue being individual is not what is important. What is important is learning the correct way of doing things.
Exclusive levels are those levels that are exclusive to people who have made the commitment to learning the correct way of doing things within a School of Thought.
When I say one-right-way, I do not mean that it is the only way or the absolute, correct way. What is meant here by one-right-way is the ways, rules, history, standards, and methodologies of the school of thought,
In the Blue level, the learner is expected to learn the right way of doing things. They should be tested and graded on doing things correctly and their accuracy within the knowledge base.
Things can always be done better. Once we learn the correct way of doing things, sometimes that isn’t good enough. A model’s purpose is to help us understand the world and get the job done until a new model is created that is better than the old. Like every model, our schools of thought are limited to where they work, and where they don’t work. Sometimes we meet those limitations, and we need to go on to find new ways. This is when learners move into Orange.
When the learner hits the orange level, they know the right way of doing things. They can get the job done. However, they’re not satisfied with the right way. The right way may not match their specific needs or they feel it can be done better. Orange seeks to improve the current state to stand out from the crowd to do something different.
They combine ideas from different schools of thought to gain success over others. They experiment, start new organizations, and become successful.
In Orange, there, is this feeling that they do not deserve the success they have more than others who have not been successful. This leaves them with guilt. This guilt pushes them in to green.
Learners in green, have learned that there are many right ways of doing things, and not just the one that they have learned. Green learners want to flatten in the hierarchy as they over, generalized many right ways of doing things to mean any way can be right.
Green learners are loving and caring of others. They try their best to understand where others are coming from and helping them in any way that they can. This tendency makes them very strong at building communities that help Beige move into Purple.
Green learners tend to shelter Red learners from the pain of failure. they do this with the most love in their heart. They don’t want others to feel pain or suffer. It is the same loving nature that is helpful in bringing people from Beige into Purple that blocks Red from having the opportunity to move into Blue after the pain of failure.
After experiencing all six levels Beige through Green, the learners starts to see that there are differences in people and that they are all important. Why they make this recognition is unknown. However, it is suspected that it is the roadblock that Green put on the system, preventing Red from moving into Blue that wakes up Green moving them into Yellow.
Yellow is a time for quiet, self-pay studies of how the previous six levels work. These learners will map out systems, study laws and regulations, and try to understand why things are the way they are. Then mapping out ideas for how to solve issues within the system to make the system healthy.
Yellow forms groups with other Yellows, moving them into Turquoise.
Yellow is a lonely state of studying on one’s own. But to build something to create something new others are needed to work on the problem. Yellow has a hard road to find others to work on creating solutions with. But when they do find each other they can all make the move into turquoise together.
Turquoise job is to build healthy systems or heal unhealthy systems. They work to make sure that all of the levels can have their voices heard, and their needs met. Creating a more inclusive system, then existed before.
When reading about the levels and how people move through them. You may have noticed something a little strange. the higher learners get into the exclusive levels the more they work towards creating an inclusive educational program.
The learners that are in the inclusive levels are not in inclusive educational programs. The learners at the inclusive levels are being given programs that are designed for their needs by the learners at the higher levels of the exclusive learning levels.
Let’s do a little breakdown of who designed learning programs for whom.
Programs designed for learners at the Blue level are best designed and taught by other learners at th
e Blue level and learners at the Orange level.
Programs designed for learners from Beige to Red are designed and taught by learners at the Green level.
Yellow and Turquoise built systems to restrict Green in their empowerment of Red and allows Blue to pull Red into Blue.
This program seeks to create new ways of designing educational systems that allows for movement through the different levels. Once I get the system map developed a bit more. I will develop personas to place in different scenarios and apply the system to see how it works. This will allow me to make adjustments to the system in order to create a more anti-fragile educational system.