Innovating to Meet Standards and Also Include 21C Skills at Brecknock Elementary
September 29, 2012The existential issue in education of our time, particularly in the public sector, is the tension between teaching to the test and teaching for the skills that students will actually need in their futures. It is unlikely that I will see that issue playing out any more clearly on my journey, and with a good…
Learning, Process, Culture, Structure: A Model of the Possible at Science Leadership Academy
September 28, 2012The good news is that thousands of American Educators know the story of Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, and are working to incorporate much of what Principal Chris Lehman and his talented team are building there. The bad news is that leaves about a million great educators who don’t know this story and either don’t…
Big Dreams and Skunk Works Model of Innovation Re-frame Learning at Hathaway Brown
September 27, 2012As schools think, discuss, and plan what they want to look like in an uncertain future, my sense is that how we get there is at least as important as what a school decides. Hathaway Brown in Cleveland has developed a well-deserved national reputation as a model of intentional innovation, due in large part to…
Innovation On the Front Lines: Design Lab School Must Reframe the Meaning of School
September 26, 2012On this journey I wanted to visit a wide range of schools to find out what innovation means across the board. This post will be different from all the rest in many ways. At the start you will be depressed that education can still look like this in America. Don’t dare stop reading. The definition…
Time and Place Lead Passion for Innovation at Hawken School
September 25, 2012The only resources that schools have are money, time, people, space, and knowledge. Schools are constructed around the units of time, subject, age, and achievement. It is critical to understand that the one common element of what we need to function and how we are organized is time. This post is about a lot of…
Building Solid Foundations for Innovation Sustainability: Park Tudor, Indianapolis
September 24, 2012School innovation is exciting. Passionate teachers work together on creative new ideas, imagine, test pilots, fail, tweak, and connect with each other and their students in new ways. It creates a buzz and energy at the school, infectious to colleagues, students, and outward to parents and the community. Many of the schools I have visited…
Journey Reflections After Two Full Weeks
September 23, 2012Reflections and Questions From the Second Week So many miles of stunted, brown corn across the upper Midwest. Sad, but global climate change is not a myth and it has real implications. Many great lessons we can share from both public and private schools. It is not about the name on the school but what…
Tradition and Innovation Merge; Entrepreneurship, Leadership, Research, and More: Culver Academies
September 22, 2012One of the precepts for my journey is that both private and public education have much to offer in terms of innovation for the future. They face different challenges in terms of funding, politics, value proposition, and demographics, but learning is not public or private, it is learning. Already in the last two weeks we…
Back to the Future of Progressive Ideals at Francis W. Parker, Chicago
September 22, 2012My great-great aunt and uncle founded Francis Parker School in San Diego in 1912, and in the last 14 years I have been proud to give my time and expertise, along with some blood and sweat, to help transform that great school. So it was a bit like returning to the Mother Ship when I…
New City School in St. Louis: Old School Values
September 21, 2012Around my house, “old school” is one of the great compliments we can give. We are a volleyball family, and the best player in the history of the game (and new coach of the USA women’s team) is Karch Kiraly, who defines “old school” volleyball: good at every position, great at the basics, and willing…
Diversity Means Erasing Many Lines That Divide Us at Crossroads Prep, St. Louis
September 20, 2012Great schools have a clear mission that is known and shared by faculty, students, and administration. I have visited schools with a variety of missions, but I may never have been at a school with a more pervasive sense of mission than at Crossroads Prep in St. Louis. At Crossroads, from the Head down to…
On the Front Lines of Our Learning Future: Maplewood Richmond Heights
September 20, 2012Normally, good neighborhoods mean good public schools, and the opposite is also the norm, especially in a state like Missouri where public education is funded through local taxes, and not redistributed by the state. So it takes something heroic to run this process in reverse, for a school to help raise up a struggling community. …
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