This Is Our Chance! Film Festival is live

COVID has upended so many elements of the education system we never thought were negotiable. This is our chance to re-think the very purpose of education. But we can’t reimagine school without addressing the history, beliefs and policies that have brought us here. I’m excited to join friends and colleagues to host This Is Our […]

RethinkingEDU – Episode 22

Thanks so much to Mike Dunn, Julie Cook and Matt Downing from RethinkingEDU for a thought-provoking series on school networks and the future of education. What a great line-up of guests over 22 episodes. I was so excited to be able to learn from them and wrap up the series with you! http://www.rethinkingedu.co/

Genius, power and magic

It has been a whirlwind month! Shout out to Miguel Gonzalez, Great Work Inc. and The Iterative Space, where a small group of educators got to spend an exhilarating 6 weeks learning, iterating and imagining ways to transform education with liberatory design and the needs of communities and young human beings in mind. Here’s a […]

Young people become what they do

We often hear people lament the fact that young people are not civically engaged. Is that really true? And what can we do about it? https://thriveglobal.com/stories/how-we-let-our-young-people-become-strong-leaders/

Purpose as foundational

Why is it that we feel fine about this idea of a “mid-life crisis” where adults wake up to realize that they have spent half their lives doing things that don’t feel meaningful and tied to an authentic sense of self?  It’s totally backwards. We need to transform our schools so that they engage students in […]

Learner-centered education and equity

We talk so much about educational equity. But our efforts to achieve this through reform have been far too narrow and short-sighted. A human-centered, learner-centered approach to education is the only way we can truly ensure children get what they need to be whole and well.   https://www.edsurge.com/news/2019-07-27-whole-child-and-equity-are-just-band-aids-without-a-learner-centered-approach

Moving beyond school choice to what matters

For too long, school choice policies have focused on the governance model of schools and inadequate rating systems that rely on shallow measures of “quality.” We need to focus on the orientation schools take to their work so that parents can actually choose between schools that are more conventional in their approach and those that […]

The 2018 LEGO Ideas Conference

It was such a pleasure to attend the LEGO Ideas Conference in Billund, Denmark! How inspiring it was to meet educators, advocates, policymakers and researchers from around the world who are united in their commitment to ensuring that kids have opportunities to learn in the way that the science of human development and learning tells […]

Learning together at SxSW

It was such fun having a chance to speak with Emily Liebtag a few months back for the Getting Smart podcast from SxSW 2017.  I’m glad that we are having the chance to re-think what equity in education entails. At the end of the day test scores are a limited, inadequate measure of only a small […]

Ask WHY? – Letter grades and GPAs

Why do grades drive our kids’ education? Enjoy the last in a series of Ask WHY? videos created in partnership with ATTN: and 180 Studio. We think they mean something, but what if they really don’t? I’m talking about grades and our system’s seeming obsession with grades, GPAs and other ways to rank and sort kids. […]

Ask WHY? – Separating Kids by Age

This video really took off, which says something about how many people agree with the idea that separating kids out by age really makes very little sense. Thanks to ATTN: and 180 Studio for continuing to create engaging and powerful conversation starters!

Ask WHY? – Why Classrooms?

Check out the Second in the series of Ask WHY? videos being created in partnership with ATTN: and 180 Studio. Let’s ask ourselves why we buy into the idea that learning only happens (or at least counts for kids) when it happens in a classroom.

My second TEDx talk: Re-thinking the 3Rs

It was a lot of fun to go back to Drew where so much of my interest in education and human development started and give my second TEDx talk, “Re-thinking the 3Rs.” Following on from “The Future of Smart” I was really trying to dig a bit more into what schools that take this kind […]

Ask WHY? – Why Memorization?

In partnership with ATTN: and 180 Studio, Education Reimagined has been working on a series of videos designed to challenge some of the sacred cows in education. Check out the first in the series: Why Memorization? where we take on the difference between Memorizing and deeper learning. Why Does Memorization Reign Supreme in Traditional Learning?

My journey to learner-centered education

I’ve had the opportunity this fall to visit some amazing schools and connect with folks who have been thinking about and working in the field of learner-centered education for decades. It is always interesting to hear about how people come around to the idea of being more human-centered in our approach to education and young […]

NPR Interview: Why Learning Is So Much Bigger Than School

For someone who listens incessantly to public radio today was a total treat! I’ve never been interviewed live on radio so to get to do that for the first time representing Education Reimagined and Convergence at the National Public Radio offices in DC was awesome! Thanks to Frank Stasio, host of The State of Things at […]

The Future of Smart: TEDx video is live

It was such an honor and pleasure to be part of the TEDx Crestmoor Park Women’s event in November. Thanks to Dafna Michaelson-Jenet and Michael Jenet for their leadership and amazing support through the process! The video is now live so please enjoy and pass along!

Flossing and Why “Evidence-Based” is Such a Tricky Thing

This article makes such an important point and the flossing example is a perfect example to use because it is less politically and ideologically triggering than topics like education.  Flossing and the Art of Scientific Investigation One of the key ideas is captured in the following: “… the kind of long-term randomized controlled trial needed to […]

The Oppressive Schools Letter – Take 2

I’ve had some hard conversations about my original post on the Oppressive Schools letter. A colleague posted a comment that captures a lot of the details of these conversations and it’s worth reading. I thought about editing my first post but I actually think the distinction in how I would communicate about these ideas in […]

High school that works for all students

I just got back from a series of school visits for my book research. It is always re-invigorating to get back into schools, and these visits were particularly interesting because they were to schools that have instructional approaches which are fairly new to me. I was particularly struck by my visit to the MET Schools […]

The real insanity of reform

I was excited when I opened the Denver Post op-ed page last week. There was an op-ed written by William Moloney, former Colorado Commissioner of Education, that was titled “Standards and assessments: Education reform’s bridge to nowhere.” Sigmund Freud’s classic definition of insanity — doing the same thing over and over yet always expecting different […]

On teaching as a profession

When I started kindergarten in the early 1980s, the “face” of the average teacher was Caucasian, female and in her mid-50s. When I walk into my old schools today, the faces that fill the classrooms remain consistently female (with some exceptions) and Caucasian, but they undeniably skew towards young individuals. While there is nothing to […]

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