New View EDU: Recent Episodes

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Episode 60: Student Voices on Learning Self-Reliance

Most schools envision helping students grow in their agency, independence, and self-reliance. How to do that is a hotly contested topic with no easy answers. But while the majority of students are trying to build those skills within settings that are also grappling with issues like technology use and the difficulties of providing meaningful opportunities outside the classroom, there are some schools where learning self-reliance happens in a wholly different way. Two students from Midland School in California join New View EDU to share their experiences with a no-tech, nature-based campus where growing your own food and heating your own living quarters are just part of a normal school day.

Guests: Ayanna Hopkins-Zelada and River Peace

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “I think that everyone is taking care of each other and you get to decide what the environment you live in looks like. And you really get to know what a person, who that person truly is when you see how they take care of the people around them. And there's that deeper level of connection…with someone when you see who they truly are when they're taking care of, not only themselves, but the people around them.” (8:41)
• “And my ability to navigate conflict with my peers and also with faculty, or with other peers and faculty in whatever situation, has been really solidified because Midland, from your freshman year, is very intentional about making sure that you develop the skills to maintain relationships with people and how to navigate all aspects of having a relationship with someone or a group of people, and maintaining the responsibilities that you have as an individual in a community. Which also extends to, you know, your ability to know when to ask for help and know when you are overworked or need a minute and to be able to advocate for yourself.” (18:06)
• “Something that I notice the most at Midland is historical passion. Since Midland was founded, everyone that's gone to Midland and worked at Midland has had passion for it and cared about the place that they are stepping foot on. So having that passion from the very first construction of the place, of the school, I think that's key to having somewhere as magical as Midland.” (23:23)
• “I think it's one of the most special things about how students and faculty interact at Midland, is that you have a relationship in and out of the classroom. Our faculty know you very well outside of the classroom, and that translates really well into them becoming a teacher for you academically and not, outside of the classroom. And I think it's an advantage that Midland students have that a lot of other students don't have, where our teachers are able to see us as whole people outside of the classroom rather than just students in a classroom.” (34:58)

Related Episodes: 53, 51, 50, 40,15, 11, 8

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Episode 59: Schools and the Emotional Lives of Teenagers

Now more than ever, schools are focused on supporting student mental health. With rates of anxiety and depression on the rise among teens, we know we need to design environments that help foster adolescent wellbeing. But are wellbeing programs working as intended? What are we getting right – and getting wrong – about the emotional lives of teenagers? Dr. Lisa Damour has the answers.

Guest: Dr. Lisa Damour

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Schools are working against this broad cultural discourse that holds at the center the idea that discomfort is bad. And so as long as we're not challenging that idea, we're gonna be dealing with a lot of one-on-one conversations trying to convince people that this is really all okay. So I would both have schools get out on their front foot about reframing this appropriately. Mental health is not about feeling good and school is supposed to be stressful, and we are built to help your kid handle that.” (13:39)
• “There are a lot of people who age without actually working themselves through the maturity that is required for a healthy adulthood, right? Who aren't thinking about risk in very smart ways. They're thinking about whether they're going to get caught, not whether they're going to get hurt or hurt somebody else. They are not taking responsibility for their actions. They don't actually have a particularly good work ethic, right? So you can age into adulthood, but not really be as mature as you should be.” (31:09)
• “When I have seen adults really harm their relationship with a kid, and usually this is parent-child, but it can happen in a school, it's when the teenager says, you know what, you assigned this to us last week, or you said you were gonna pick me up and you forgot, and the adult denies or defends, right? When the adult flexes, we have all the authority, we will flex our authority if we want to. If the teenager is right and the adult is wrong and the adult doesn't own it, that relationship has hit a really rough patch.” (37:02)

Related Episodes: 54, 51, 48, 35, 32,15, 8, 3

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Episode 58: Transforming Teaching and Learning

What would it look like if a school went “all in” on training teachers to become experts in the neuroscience behind learning? Saint Andrews Episcopal School did just that, and in the process, created the Center for Transformative Teaching and Learning, dedicated to helping educators everywhere unlock the power of Mind Brain Education.

Guest: Glenn Whitman

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Look, we have vocabulary quizzes for kids in every discipline. Why can't we sort of have that for the adult learners in our school? And the fact is, we went after this research around collective teacher efficacy. The idea is that if we have some common language, common frameworks, common North stars, or mountaintops, or drivers that we're all moving towards, then that might make us collectively more effective for all our student population.” (16:45)
• “I'll get on my horse for one second about homework. You know, we have our kids, we are privileged to have our kids for eight or more hours a day in all our schools, especially when they get to high school, right? I once had an AP history student ask if we were violating child labor laws because then they still had to go home and do two more hours of homework. I thought that was interesting.” (26:43)
• “I can ask the AI for an early draft. I can edit it around. And look, every kid can get immediate feedback too, using these tools, right? Now, you're right though. Learning happens when you think hard. And generationally, I think our kids don't want to think as hard as we, maybe we were willing, and maybe we were foolish, but we know learning doesn't stick unless you think hard about things you're either intaking or doing or building or pondering. And again, I think that's going to be a little, a healthy tension point to figure out.” (34:21)
• “The teacher of the future has to do a better job working the room and working among the students. I still see too many times, when I'm in schools, students working independently, and teachers retreating to their laptop and missing– This is the best time to ask deeper questions, to see what kid, is it sticking or working. So I think more and more, you know, working the room and moving amongst kids, as opposed to being in the front of the room. So I think teachers, I'm just going to say heads of school, a new line item budget should be better shoes for teachers.” (39:01)

Related Episodes: 53, 49, 47, 45, 35, 31, 18

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Episode 57: Jobs to Be Done in Schools

What’s the difference between the job to be done by a Milky Way bar, and the job to be done by a Snickers bar? And what does that have to do with schools? As it turns out, a lot, according to Bob Moesta. The author, professor, innovator, and founder of the Re-Wired Group comes to New View EDU to outline how reframing our thinking about the jobs to be done by our schools can transform everything about the way we approach hiring, retention, admissions, and student engagement.

Guest: Bob Moesta

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “What we don't realize is people have natural abilities that they're really, really good at, and they actually have things they suck at. And nine times out of 10, they tell people, oh, you got to get better at this thing because you suck at it. But when you make somebody better at creativity, you actually ruin them for the structure, which they're really good at. They're actually interdependent.” (8:21)
• “Nobody randomly shows up at a school and says, oh yeah, I want to join. I want to be part of your school. There's a set of causes behind it. But what happens is we ask them at a very pablum level, a very, oh, it's because of the facilities you have, your facilities are great. Or Oh my gosh, the teachers are so pedigree. It's like, but that's not why they're doing it. They're doing it because their child is falling behind. They're doing it because their child is literally not ready for the next level. They're doing it because they want their kids to have broader experiences. And so you start to realize, it's about their child and their relationship with their child that they're actually buying your school for.” (13:55)
• “The thing is, we can't predict the future without actually understanding the past. And so what happens is, we're literally asking them questions like, so what would you like in a new school? And it's like, they're just making it up. They don't know. And so part of this is why we talk, we start by talking to parents who already came, because they had to have the push, they had to have the pull, they had the anxieties, they made the trade-offs. Now I have a frame to understand, because for every one parent who made it, there's 10, 100, 1000 behind them who want to make it, but haven't figured it out.” (34:33)

Related Episodes: 36, 25, 24, 20, 18, 5, 1

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Episode 56: Helping Students Shape Dynamic Futures

How many of us have taken a history class? What about a class on the future? Or a class on how to navigate ambiguity? These are the kinds of educational experiences Lisa Kay Solomon urges us to design for our students, as we prepare them for an increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous world.

Guest: Lisa Kay Solomon

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “I'll start off and talk about futures thinking and I'll say, so how many people here have taken a class in history? And everybody raises their hand. There's probably some historians, probably teachers of history. Everyone's like, yes, of course I did. And then I'll say, well, how many people here have taken a class in futures? Zero, zero hands, zero. And maybe one person that took like a workshop or something. And then I say, well, which one of those can you influence? And it's like, oh, mic drop.” (8:54)
• “You gotta practice the stuff that you're gonna need in life. And unfortunately, so much of our K-12 system is based on rewarding things that are knowable, that are performable, that are easily measurable. You know, show me the scale on ambiguity. Show me the person that's like, oh, you got an A in ambiguity, crushed it. We don't have a great vocabulary for it. We don't have a great practice ground for it. So I think about this a lot, because you don't want the first time someone comes head to head with a high stakes, high uncertainty, highly ambiguous situation to be when it matters most. You want them to have done the practice steps along the way, the scaffolding in the safe environment.” (14:11)
• “You have a really important meeting and you've cleared it on everyone's schedule. People have flown in. They know it's important. And so because it's an important meeting, you go to the important board room that has the big oak table and the leather chairs and no windows and you got the PowerPoint set up. And yes, it's structured, but we have to remember there are human beings walking into that room, and our brains take a look at those signals: big oak table, leather chairs, no windows. And they think status, power, be right, be smart. They're not thinking, be open, be imaginative, be generative, right?” (29:15)

Related Episodes: 47, 38, 31, 26, 17, 12, 9, 7, 4

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Episode 55: Creating Bravely

Create Bravely. That’s the mantra of dynamic twin brothers Peter and Paul Reynolds. Together, they have built a life of service to others through creativity, as authors, illustrators, designers, educators, bookstore owners, and digital media executives. They share their passion for inspiring others and helping people of all ages find their path in life through creativity, kindness, and what they call “hard fun.”

Guests: Paul and Peter Reynolds

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “We're big believers that yes, school, learning does happen in school a lot of times, and sometimes it doesn't. And sometimes things happen in schools that are sort of counter to the mission. You may have the most important question in your mind, but I think that number one on the list is a really powerful question. It's only three words. Who are you?” (7:04)
• “We've seen, sadly, tragic results where kids just think, I don't measure up. I don't even measure up to my own version of who I think I'm supposed to be. So actually, you're not supposed to be anything other than who you're meant to be. And our job is to make sure that you get there no matter what...I think that learning is self-design. We're creating ourselves every single day.” (18:47)
• “You know, kind kids are our kind of kids. And kind adults are our kind of adults. And, you know, sadly, that's something that, that fabric, that civic fabric has been fraying, you know, in the last, you know, almost decade. And we have to, that's one of the things we have to all work on collectively. If we can do that with our kids in schools and our colleagues, then, you know, that will move the world to a better place, for sure.” (28:29)
• “So, you know, our first answer may be right. Yes, the sky can be blue. But your second answer is going to be more interesting. Your third, your fourth, your fifth. And you can even have, you know, wrong answers. And we, of course, we always say wrong-ish, because it always leads to finding a new discovery…When we do that deep dive, the answers get more and more interesting. And so that is with life. You know, if you only give something just a cursory think, you may even get sort of a correct answer, but if you really do that deep dive, it's going to get really, really interesting.” (38:12)

Related Episodes: 51, 50, 44, 42,17,11, 6, 4

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Episode 54: Creating Climates of Care

Wellbeing. Engagement. Belonging. These three values are the “trifecta” of attributes for healthy and productive learning, according to Denise Pope. But how do we design learning environments that put the focus on that trifecta, without diminishing the educational achievement, challenge, and rigor we believe our students deserve? Denise, the co-founder of Challenge Success, returns to New View EDU to help host Tim Fish unravel the tricky issues around creating climates of care in our classrooms while also upholding academic standards.

Guest: Dr. Denise Pope

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “When you throw kids into groups for group learning, I think there's an assumption that they know how to do that well, and they don't. And, you know, even my kids will say, Oh my gosh, don't tell people to do more group work! I get stuck with the slackers, or I hate that because, you know, this person's not pulling their weight and I have to do all the work, or whatever. Right. We have to actively teach how to work in community.” (8:54)
• “And here's the thing, we undervalue students, we underestimate students, and we infantilize them. And then we're surprised when they get out that they can't do things, right? That's on us. That is on us.” (21:14)
• “Grades are heavily related to cheating, right? You don't cheat when you're doing a project that you're really excited about. When you're putting on a play, when you're putting out a yearbook edition, when you are studying a new move in a dance class or on a football team, you're not thinking about a grade. That’s not why people do things.” (24:57)

Related Episodes: 52, 48, 43, 40, 35, 31, 19, 16, 8

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Episode 53: Transforming the Future of School

“Knowing what we now know, we can no longer do what we now do. To do so is educational malpractice.” That provocative statement is one of the principles that guides Sam Chaltain through his work redesigning education for the modern era. In this episode of New View EDU, Sam asks listeners to consider how the world has changed since our school system was designed, and what educational “sacred cows” we need to dispense with to help school keep pace with the rapid evolution of society.

Guest: Sam Chaltain

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “The focus needs to be rendered down to the essence of who. Who is this unique individual? What are their unique interests, passions, and potential contributions to the world and to the people they come in contact with? And how can we set conditions that help that person answer the only question that matters, right? Which is: Of all the things I can do with my one precious life, what must I do?” (10:27)
• “The goal and the primary measure of health of a living system is disequilibrium, not equilibrium, right? The moment a pond establishes equilibrium, it gets covered in kind of green mushy muck. It's that constant delicate balance, the dance of all of these different, you know, contributing factors that allows for its ultimate and optimal health. And so too is it with us. Therefore, we have a different way and a different frame for how we can think about this thing that for the last 100 years we've called school.” (18:06)
• “All of our design work is in service of the answers to those questions. How do we, how do we unleash even more powerfully the things that are already powerful here? And how do we make possible the things that are not yet possible? And usually what that leads to is a space that is, that is flexible, that is adaptable, that is permeable, that has the ability…that doesn't look like the way that schools have looked.” (34:36)

Related Episodes: 47, 45, 44, 32, 21, 15, 2

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Episode 52: Designing Education for Transfer

We know we need to work at redesigning our schools to reflect the future our students will inhabit. Issues of mental health, well-being, mattering, and social-emotional growth are emerging as vitally important challenges to solve – to say nothing of the continued need to provide a high-quality, rigorous, and academically sound educational environment. But while we may understand why an overhaul of our practices is essential to success, the big question remains: How? Globally renowned educational thought leader Jay McTighe returns to New View EDU to help provide some of the answers.

Guest: Jay McTighe

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “We need to be preparing today's students to be able to navigate a world in which knowledge continues to expand, lifelong learning will be a requirement for success. We have to be able to deal with change, including unpredictable changes, and rote learning of factual information is an insufficient preparation. To summarize, a modern education should prepare students to be able to apply their learning effectively and appropriately, not only to the known, but to the unknown.” (3:50)
• “I've often wondered how many kids, let's say football players, would go out, work out in the weight room off season and punish themselves with a blocking play if they weren't trying to improve for the Saturday, Friday night, Saturday's game, or how many swimmers would endure grueling interval workouts if they weren't trying to improve their times. Too often, I think, teachers, as you noted, and often students don't know what the game is. And teachers, to be a little harsh, sometimes act as if their job is to cover the playbook play-by-play, as opposed to preparing players for the game.” (16:11)
• “Those skills of self-assessment, reflection, and goal-setting, are to me underpinning skills of self-directed learners. But if the student is the passive recipient waiting for the teacher to tell them how they did or what they need to do, you're never developing self-directedness. It has to be done by design, and it can be.” (36:21)

Related Episodes: 49, 45, 38, 31, 23, Bonus Episode

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Episode 51: What Schools Can Do About Achievement Culture

We all want our students to excel. In many ways, schools are set up to foster achievement – to help students reach their potential, strive for great things, and move on to successful next steps after graduation. But as Jennifer Wallace shares in her book Never Enough, focusing on achievement can create a culture that quickly becomes toxic to kids. Where do we cross the line, and what can we do about it?

Guests: Jennifer Wallace and Debra Wilson

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Unfortunately, in our modern society, we get a lot of false alarms. You know, we get the threat when our kid doesn't make the team or doesn't get the invite to the Friday night party that there is something, you know, an alarm going off in our head, but it's really just a bagel burning. The whole house isn't going down.” (9:54)
• “When I asked the young students how much they agreed or disagreed with the statement, ‘I feel like I matter for who I am at my core, not by what I achieve’ a surprising 25% of students either agreed a little or not at all, meaning that one in four students thought that it was their performance, not who they were as a person, that mattered most to their parents.” (19:56)
• “I was listening to a speaker at a conference a bit ago…he was actually talking about successful teams, basically, what makes an extraordinary team. And he was talking about competitiveness, but not competitive with each other, but for each other for a common purpose….When you start building in project-based learning, and particularly if you can harness and teach kids how to harness that power of being collectively competitive for a common cause, for a common purpose, and to start mapping that with what we want them to learn, I just think that's an incredibly powerful piece of the equation.” (40:23)

Related Episodes: 48, 43, 40, 35, 29, 22, 13

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Episode 50: Learning from Sabbatical Journeys

If you had the opportunity to step away from your day-to-day life for six weeks, what would you do with that time? Where would you go? And what lessons would you bring back with you, when the time came to return to your daily routine? School leader Briel Schmitz reflects on her sabbatical journey along the Camino de Santiago, and how taking that time away from work has influenced her whole school community.

Guest: Briel Schmitz

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “I think you have to say what you need and want. And if you don't say what you need and want, then you're not going to get that back. So that's the first thing. And the next thing is that when a person like myself, who has a big personality in an organization, has been here for a long time, leaves, it allows everyone else the opportunity to grow into a space that they couldn't before.” (14:36)
• “I was thinking about what it felt like to be a beginner. What it felt like to be doing something that was difficult, what it felt like to maybe not be the best person at this, because I'm at a point in my career where I've had some success and I know what it feels like to be good at things, and I know the things I'm good at. And to really put myself in a position where I wasn't the best at this. What do I do in that moment? How do I respond to that?” (24:32)
• “I think it takes a lot of energy to say no. It's fun to say yes, in the sense of you're building something, you're creating something, it's something new, and saying yes is important, but I think our schools may benefit from some clarity that allows it to be more possible to say no. Like that's not actually a part of what we do, and that it gives you more time and space to do the things that you're saying yes to.” (35:01)

Related Episodes: 42, 38, 25, 20, 13

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Episode 49: The View From the Classroom

In an age of educator burnout and high turnover rates, what keeps veteran teachers motivated to stay in the classroom? This episode of New View EDU explores how rapidly changing technologies have provided a constant source of inspiration and innovation for two educators. Howard Levin and Stacey Roshan have both transformed their practice through exploration of the opportunities technology provides to both teachers and learners, and used that spark as fuel for careers defined by both longevity and creativity.

Guests: Howard Levin and Stacey Roshan

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “But to me, the preparation is really about ensuring that they have skills and confidence to navigate life with resilience and empathy, that they're critical thinkers, that they're effective communicators and active contributors to their communities. And as a math teacher, I always say that teaching math is the easy part. My most important role is helping students learn how to learn, embrace a growth mindset, take ownership of their learning, and just encouraging a love for the process of learning, I think is so critical.” (11:04)
• “I really believe that these are very new categories in today's world. In the world that I grew up in, the focus was, and in many places still today, the focus is on really good teaching, really good absorption, all kinds of techniques and tricks to get information to stick with students. And we're living in a completely different world right now. We're at our fingertips with a quick breath of our own speech, that information is just everywhere. And so I think it's a huge challenge for independent schools to really embrace and really look at how different the world is for our students and the future students.” (14:53)

Related Episodes: 45, 40, 35, 31, 28,18,13

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Episode 48: What We Can Learn From Anxiety

We’re accustomed to thinking of anxiety as something undesirable. But what if anxiety could actually be an effective tool, teaching us how to take appropriate risks, manage setbacks, and build resilience? That’s the premise of Dr. Tracy Dennis Tiwary’s book Future Tense: Why Anxiety is Good for You Even Though it Feels Bad.

Guest: Dr. Tracy Dennis-Tiwary

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Anxiety is apprehension about the uncertain future. So what that means is that when we're anxious, we're not actually in the moment. We're actually becoming mental time travelers into the future. And what anxiety both signals and helps us do really effectively, is picture that future. There is potential threat or peril. That is, you know, that's why it feels bad. We're kind of sitting up and paying attention. But at the same time, when we're anxious, there is also still positive possibility.” (6:22)
• “You don't go from zero to a hundred.You start with little 10 pound weights. And it's the same for this emotional endurance. We have to think of not psychological or mental health so much as mental fitness. I just think it sets us up, when it comes especially to anxiety and major anxiety disorders, major depressive disorder, substance use disorders or these kinds of struggles. Let's think about fitness, because we can build these skills for people, we can help them. But you don't do it by going from zero to 100.” (17:57)
• “Part of, I think, the gift and the problem of the parenting space right now, if I may say, is that we have this sort of parenting advice industrial complex, right? Where I feel that, as wonderful as the advice out there is, it's created this culture in which we feel like we have to check off 100 out of 100 boxes on the good parenting checklist. And if we don't, we're a bad parent, we're letting down our kid.” (29:06)

Related Episodes: 47, 35, 19, 18, 16, 11, 5, 3

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Episode 47: Designing Schools for Future-Ready Minds

We all want to help prepare students for the future. In an unpredictable and fast-changing world, does designing school for future-ready minds mean embracing every technological innovation and new idea that comes our way? Or are there lessons from the past that may still be relevant in a technological revolution? Dr. Shimi Kang has the neuroscientific evidence to help us decide.

Guest: Dr. Shimi Kang

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “You know, people talk all about how do we motivate kids? Well, first of all, there's no such thing as an unmotivated kid. But if you're sleep deprived, stressed, over burnt out from over scheduling, you're not going to be motivated. If you're disconnected on social media, or not, or hyper competitive and don't have a sense of meaningful connection, you're not going to be motivated because the biggest motivation comes from a sense of contribution and being needed.” (12:00)
• “Neuroplasticity is a complex word, six syllables, but I believe it's the word for hope because what it means is we can always change, we can always learn, we can always grow, we can always do better. Humans are gifted with this idea, this concept of neuroplasticity, till the moment we die. And that's really important.” (33:32)
• “Where focus goes, neurons grow. Let's say you want to change your classroom to a more future ready classroom…There might be resistance, you know, from kids or parents or admin. And that's normal, because if I back up a bit, the psychology of change, in any given moment, there's only about 20, 30% of people in what's called action state of change. They are ready. The rest of the population is in pre-contemplation or contemplation. Because change, by definition, is a change, it's different!” (34:33)

Related Episodes: 40, 35, 31, 28, 18, 16, 11, 3

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Episode 46: Educating for a Globally Networked Society

We have more opportunities to learn and grow as part of a global network than ever before. But in a sea of technological solutions, what stands out most as the core of building those networks? Humanity. That’s what Michael Nachbar leans into every day with his work at Global Online Academy.

Guest: Michael Nachbar

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Imagine that you are competing, but to support that person so that they can shine and do the best that they can and what that says about the other people in the room.” (8:08)
• “We've seen an explosion over the past few years in competency-based learning, right? Thinking about mindsets and skills for students. I think we're hearing and seeing schools doing that for faculty now…Thinking about what are the mindsets and skill sets that teachers need to be practicing, demonstrating and learning while they're employees at a particular school…Imagine the conversation that you're interviewing for a job at a school, and the school is saying, you know, teachers here practice these skills all the time, and we will help you develop those while you're employed here.” (12:09)
• “That drives so much for me of what I hope for kids, that like, getting kids to be passionate about something. And there's so many things that they feel like they have to do that it's part of a puzzle that they need to solve rather than, you know, taking classes and having access to courses and topics that, like, light them up and excite them and get them interested in learning and curious.” (22:57)

Related Episodes: 42, 38, 36, 31, 25, 24, 20, 14

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Episode 45: Designing Schools for Blended Learning

When you think of the term “blended learning,” do you think of a hybrid or remote learning plan, perhaps in a format that became familiar during the COVID pandemic? That’s the impression many educators and school leaders have of blended learning, but as Catlin Tucker’s work demonstrates, blended learning is so much more than just splitting education into “onscreen” and “in person.” It may, in fact, be the solution we need to prepare our classrooms for the future.

Guest: Dr. Catlin Tucker

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Reserve that teacher-led instructional time for small differentiated group experiences, where we can be much more targeted and thoughtful about the vocabulary we use, the text we choose, the problems and prompts we present, the scaffolds we supply…If teachers are still trapped at the front of the room, feeling like my job is to transfer information, there's no time and space to really position students at the center, give them more responsibility and let them engage in the messy work that is learning.” (13:32)
• “ I try to put myself now as an adult in the seat of some of these students, where they spend seven hours a day at school, and they don't get to make a single decision about how they learn, what they learn, what they create to demonstrate their learning. Like that is not a space that most kids wanna be in. And it shouldn't surprise anybody that a huge, I wanna say it's over 70% of students were, report like negative feelings with school. And it's things like anxiety, being tired and bored, like that's where we're keeping them all day. It's heartbreaking.” (30:50)
• “I want teachers to rediscover, if they're not feeling it right now, their joy in this work, and there's so many, it's a, it's a challenging profession. It is complex and multifaceted. And for me, I want teachers to realize that now that we have literally limitless access to information and resources in our classroom, that we are allowed to reimagine our role.” (41:55)

Related Episodes: 40, 31, 28, 26, 23, 20, 3, Bonus

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Episode 44: Bringing Creative Hustle into Schools

“Hustle culture” has become synonymous with trying to cram more into a day, emphasizing productivity over humanity, and valuing achievement over wellbeing. But what if there was a kind of hustle that upended all of those values, and instead, focused on becoming the most centered and fulfilled version of yourself? A kind of hustle that prioritizes inner work, understanding who you are as a person and a community member, and asks how you can bring your greatest gifts to bear on the world? That, according to sam seidel and Olatunde Sobomehin, is Creative Hustle.

Guests: sam seidel and Olatunde Sobomehin

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “I think that one of the things that Tunde and I connected on very early in our, our friendship, colleagueship, was how much better we, we believe our own lives are, how much richer they are, and how much more we've been able to do in the world by being able to move between parts of our society that are often really segregated…And how can we open that up for more people? Because too often folks are, are, are just kept really separate by some of those boundaries and the walls. So how do we make those boundaries, those borders more permeable?” (6:15)
• “Capture the biggest way that you could think, right? What are my principles? What moves me? What grounds me? What am I gonna hold onto in the moments of transition, in the, in the difficult moments, the challenging moments, and the moments that are really tempting for me to kind of steer left or right, what's gonna really be my anchor?” (23:11)
• “We've just been sent from one period, to the next, to the next, year after year. And then all of a sudden we're supposed to have a framework for making these big decisions. And we're out in the world and we need to have a network. We need to know what principles are guiding our decisions. We need to have built these resilient practices. But that hasn't been asked of us up to that point really, or invited.” (30:54)

Related Episodes: 40, 37, 23,19,15, 8, 2

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Episode 43: Building School 2.0

Chris Lehmann worked in a school that matched his vision of education by about 75% – and that other 25%, he says, was what gave him “license to dream.” What would you dream of if you had the opportunity to design a school from scratch? The founder of Educon, the Science Leadership Academy, and Inquiry Schools talks with host Tim Fish about his quest to create a fully inquiry-driven, human-centered learning model where citizenship and science shape the direction of the school.

Guest: Chris Lehmann

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “I want their heads full of thought. I want them to have the wisdom to apply those thoughts in meaningful ways. I want them to have the passion to push through when the world tells 'em it cannot be done. And I want them to be kind because I think we need more of that in the world.” (15:49)
• “We don't give anyone else agency, right? We as human beings, you have agency because you are a human, because you are alive, as do I. Now lots of institutions in our society, school being primary among them, take away agency. But what actually we try to do is not give students agency, but help them unlock their own.” (23:10)
• “If a high school science education does not help students understand fundamentally that the way in which they live their lives, the products they buy, the kind of house they build or live in, you know, the way they use power, the car they drive, that all of these things have a profound impact on our world, right? Then you have failed children. Because the ability to apply a scientific lens to the choices we make every day as human beings is a fundamental part of being a citizen.” (26:51)

Related Episodes: 35, 32, 31, 28, 16,17, 4

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Episode 42: Seven Lessons for School Leadership

Human relationships first. Academic study and arts training are co-curricular. Environment matters. Relentlessly make space for the things that matter most. Compliance is not the same thing as magic. Process matters and so does product. These are just a few of the ideas Jason Patera is obsessed with, which he brings daily to his work as the head of the Chicago Academy for the Arts.

Guest: Jason Patera

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Pretty much all you need to do at any time to change someone's life is decide to do it. That's it, right? It's not the facilities that changes someone's life. It's not the mission statement that changes someone's life. It's not the curriculum, it's the people. Right. And most of the time, all we have to do, especially with young people, you meet them where they're at, and, and you have this power to, to help transform their entire life.” (7:02)
• “What I promise to them is that I'm never going to be some random jerk in a suit who you've only met the day you've done something bad. And you're a teenager, so you're going to do something dumb. When that happens and we have to have a conversation about it, I endeavor for that to be our 40th conversation. So as we have to navigate this thing, we're doing it based on a human relationship and not one of the title that I have or the role that you play in the school.” (19:54)
• “Most of what we think are our limits are, are illusions, for ourselves personally, and for our communities. And a habit we can get into as school leaders is to fall into the trap that school is somehow already defined, and learning is somehow already defined, and procedures are somehow already defined. And we need to figure those out and do them, when in fact we have tremendous power to just decide what it's going to be.” (41:26)

Related Episodes: 40, 36, 34, 32, 27,15, 6

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Episode 41: Welcoming New Leadership to NAIS

During the summer of 2023, longtime NAIS President Donna Orem retired, and new President Debra Wilson stepped into the role. In this first school year of Debra’s tenure, she sits down with Tim Fish to introduce herself to the NAIS community and share her personal journey with independent schools.

Guest: Debra Wilson

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Context really matters. There is that…do people feel known and seen? And when I, when I say that, it's not just the kids, but it's the individual staff members, it's the parents. Like, what message are they receiving all of the time? And that really leads to greater connectivity. And it tends to lead to happier encounters.” (20:18)
• “One of the things I talk about with education, we adults can mess around with us all we want. Every kid's only got one shot at it. So, you know, if they have a bad teacher placement three years in a row, they're 50% behind their peers. Like that's, I mean, that's, that's just research. Like that's, there's just numbers. And so we don't really have time to play around with this, so like, how do we hold those things really sacred?” (25:34)
• “You want good, smart, thoughtful, solid people doing good, smart, solid, thoughtful work. Bright shiny objects, like, they can, they can jump you right off the tracks...that kind of traditional, basic, not so sexy, like, we just, we're gonna do really good work day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, is what you're going for most of the time.” (36:23)

Related Episodes: 39, 31, 25, 14, 13

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Season 4 Bonus Episode:Noni Thomas López, Head of School, The Gordon School This episode is a re-broadcast of an archival episode from our friends at the NAIS Member Voices podcast. The original episode and show notes can be found on the Member Voices Season 5 page.In the second episode of our three-part miniseries on Cultivating Diverse and Inclusive Communities, our guest is Noni Thomas López, head of the Gordon School (RI). She talks about how becoming a more diverse and inclusive school is like peeling an onion, the importance of finding opportunity in discomfort, and why battling misinformation keeps her up at night.Relevant Resources: Independent School magazine: Independent Spirit: Noni Thomas López * NAIS New View EDU Podcast: Episode 7: Schools for Diversity and Designing Inclusive Futures * NAIS Legal Tip: Consider Anti-Bias Handbook Policies * Video: Equity and Inclusion: Bringing About Systemic Change from the Inside Out * Independent Ideas* Blog: The Pandemic of Misinformation * Learn more about this episode’s sponsor, Carney, Sandoe & Associates, by visiting its website.

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Episode 40: Student Voice and Agency in Education

In four seasons of New View EDU, we’ve talked a lot about what students need to thrive. In this episode, we’re going straight to the source. Host Tim Fish sits down with Ella Cornett and Mackenzie Link, high school students from One Stone School in Boise, Idaho, to get their real world perspectives on everything from classes and schedules to life lessons on failure, accountability, passion, purpose, and more.

Guests: Ella Cornett and Mackenzie Link

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “To go back to the question of what should school be, I feel like learners and students should come out of school with that sense of purpose. And that's, that really resonates with me because I feel like that's what I want out of school. I wanna leave school and kind of know what I wanna do and who I wanna be in the world.” (21:39)
• “I would describe my stress...less so stress. I would call it ambition. Like, I think the weight of ambition sits heavy on my shoulders because I strive for the, like, the next best thing I wanna keep doing. I wanna keep going, I wanna keep pushing. And One Stone really allows me to do that and empowers me to do that.” (26:24)
• “It's that pushing students, the healthy balance of pushing students. And this is where great coaching comes in. And great mentorship is, you do have to find the thing that students care about and relate it, everything that you're doing, to that. And then we're in the home stretch.” (29:57)
• “It's easy if you let it be easy, in the sense that if you don't want to grow, if you don't try to grow, you won't. Just like a student in public school that doesn't try, they won't get a good GPA. But that's not the motivation here. The motivation here for us is to grow. So if a student doesn't want to grow, how can they?” (39:44)

Related Episodes: 36, 34, 27, 23, 18

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Episode 39: Lessons Learned While Leading NAIS

After a long and distinguished tenure as the President of NAIS, Donna Orem is retiring in the Spring of 2023. Throughout her career, she’s seen the independent school landscape, and education in general, change dramatically. As Donna prepares to depart NAIS, what lessons has she learned? How has her career in education changed her? What wisdom can she pass along to her successor and to everyone working in schools right now?

Guest: Donna Orem

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “I think another thing that I've learned from this is that there is a role that we each have to play in a learning community, and that is assuming good intent. Because it's very easy, particularly when you get into these conversations around highly charged issues, to assume that there are two sides or three sides to the issues. And people get pitted against one another. And I have learned to step back and to say, you know what? Chances are we wanna get to the same place, but we have a different way to get there.” (7:03)
• “But I remember at some point a family writing a letter to the head of school saying, you know, we've had two children at this school and they have thrived, but we've come to the point where we can no longer afford the tuition…That was the most painful letter. And it was just so symptomatic, I think, of what families were feeling. So I hope we can get beyond that one day so that, you know, when a family has that experience, they are not forced to make that impossibly hard decision.” (19:57)
• “I think balancing all those relationships has become our biggest challenge as an organization. And, you know, how do you ensure that you see that diversity, you recognize that diversity, and you develop programs and services to meet leaders where they are? Because you know, that one size fits all just does not work anymore. I don't know that it ever did.” (35:53)

Related Episodes: 25, 20, 14, 10, 1

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Episode 38: Strategic Accountability in Education

Planning for the future of our schools isn’t easy. In recent years, we’ve seen firsthand how even the best-laid plans can go badly awry, and schools have been left grappling with issues that no one could have predicted. So how can we continue to embrace strategy and future thinking in a way that allows us to not only make plans, but execute on them, in the midst of an ever-changing landscape?

Guest: Dr. Jim Honan

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “As we move forward, it's that sense of connection among team members, among various people in various roles, be it teachers or staff members, et cetera. And then creating that sense of connectivity and belonging to show people there's some common purpose in the work. So sure. Call it what you will, playing well with others or understanding what the people in your organization need to do their best work and you being attuned to that. That's a team sport.” (7:27)
• “I'm not a big fan of chasing bright shiny objects. I think the caveat in the innovation space is we're not, I told my teams this, we're not just gonna do this cuz it looks cool. That, wouldn't it be neat if we did this? It probably would be, and that would be awesome. We haven't done it before. It would be cool and neat, but on the other hand, it's not driven by some educational purpose.” (11:10)
• “Occasionally someone will say, you know, have you ever seen a mission like this? Isn't this unique? And with deep respect, the answer is, there's like ten other places who say they're doing that. So that can't be the uniqueness. I think there's this added expectation and burden, if you will, in independent schools, on the point you made, to really be crisp and clear about that. This is what's distinctive about us, and this is how we're gonna execute on it. And we have data to show that we execute on that unique, call it what you will, mission or value proposition.” (24:51)

Related Episodes: 36, 29, 25, 14, 9

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Episode 37: The Dignity Lens in Education

Schools are first and foremost communities of people. When we plan for the future of those communities, how can we do so in a way that takes into account the dignity of every human being? How does strategy intersect with who we are and who we aspire to be? Dr. Beth-Sarah Wright’s Dignity Lens challenges schools to look at themselves with clear eyes and identify the gap between who we say we are, and who we truly want to become.

Guest: Dr. Beth-Sarah Wright

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “People make up these communities, people do. And people have emotions. People have these gut feelings, especially around some sort of challenge they might be having as a community. You know, we have these things. That's the explosive part. It's a very sensitive part. So the adaptive challenges are, they reside in that very messy, emotional, that part of us where we are gonna experience some loss.” (6:35)
• “What is in our founding DNA? Who are we? And that is just information… We can look back on our history and we can surface all sorts of things about who we are, when we were founded, why we were founded, or what we've come to be or all of that. But all of that is important. It's nothing to be, to throw away. It's nothing to discard. It's something. All of it is important and we need to be able to parse through that.” (11:27)
• “Caught up in all of that is some sort of fear. And really at the root of that is dignity. One might feel, you know, violated. A dignity violation. But hold on. But my voice is not being heard here. Or I, I just don't understand. I don't get it. I, whatever it may be, I don't, you know. I think at the root of that is loss. And we can look at that even at a national scale. We can look at that all over. We can see it in our communities. That's part of progress, making progress.” (19:33)
• “We have lots of stories that can be told, and that's very important too. We have this level of experiences, people sharing their experiences…and then there is the sort of raw data that we can actually gather from our community. And sometimes just depending on what community we're talking with, some people might be very intimidated by getting data. Data can be overwhelming and, and scary, and sometimes what I try to say to people is, well, you know that stories are the currency for dignity.” (27:36)

Related Episodes: 32, 30, 15, 7

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Episode 36: Reinventing Education Beyond 2020

No one can deny that the events of 2020 changed education in America, and arguably, worldwide. But three years after COVID closed schools, what is the actual state of our educational system? What lessons did we really learn, and what mistakes have we made? What opportunity lies ahead for transformation? Michael Horn returns to New View EDU to share the findings from his new book about education after the pandemic, From Reopen to Reinvent.

Guest: Michael Horn

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “And I did not want this to be a book that just says, oh yeah, we poorly serve low income kids, but you know Michael's mom in Montgomery County, you're okay, right? I want Michael's mom in Montgomery County to be like, oh. You mean what I thought is rigorous is not in fact rigorous? You mean what I thought is unleashing his potential is actually hurting his sense of growth mindset and not preparing him for the executive function skills that he's gonna need in the world of work, and is just causing him to sit there trying to compete on a very narrow metric of success and not figure out his purpose in life? Oh, I don't want that. And I hope everyone walks away from it and says, Wow. This is not like a ‘some’ problem. This is everyone. We can be doing better.” (14:46)
• “And then the part that I would require then comes back to where you started, which is to me the habits of success. Curiosity, executive function, agency, growth mindset, grit, perseverance, a sense of self-efficacy and self-esteem. A sense of attachment. Like those things I would say are the baseline. And I wouldn't call them social emotional learning, although that's a common phrase for them…I think some of the fights that we have in communities right now are, they're like, you know, there's truly some like weird stuff being pedaled under each of those monikers, but I don't know any parent that doesn't want their kids to be curious about the world.” (25:09)
• “We framed schools for kids as this zero sum experience. I win. I get the seat in the precious college, you lose. You don't. Or I, you know, you get the A, I got the C. We're doling out scarcity. And I want us to shift to a positive sum system where the goal is not for you to beat me on some narrow yardstick, but instead for you to be the best version of Tim Fish that there is, to be the most unique version of you that has a place to contribute in the world.” (39:58)

Related Episodes: 29, 27, 14, 10, 8, 1

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Episode 35: The Relationship Between Emotions and Learning

Social-emotional learning and student wellbeing are increasingly showing up as priorities for schools. But what if research could prove that looking out for the emotional components of teaching and learning aren’t just important for mental health, but actually essential for academic growth? That’s the central premise of Dr. Mary Helen Immordino-Yang’s research, and she’s ready to make the case that emotions are vitally linked to our ability to learn.

Guest: Dr. Mary Helen Immordino-Yang

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “The whole rest of the brain, the deeper thinking, the emotion regulation, the engaging with other people, the social meaning making, the sense of self. All of these kinds of very basic systems that are fundamental to being a good human are not predicted by, or even associated with, IQ. They are predicted by this, this what we're calling transcendent thinking… So how do we get kids to think that way?” (9:50)
• “It's literally neurobiologically impossible to think deeply about information for which you have no emotional reason or context to engage.” (12:09)
• “We're not installing information into a person like a squirrel, like, stashing away its nuts, right? What we're doing is inviting a person to engage actively with an orchestrated set of materials and content in a way that will help facilitate them naturally coming to realize what matters there, and the power of those tools for understanding something important about ideas and the world.” (21:12)

Related Episodes: 32, 18, 16, 5, 3

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Episode 34: Supercharging Project-Based Learning Design

What if offering to work on a few projects with a homeschooled student sparked the idea to partner with a school? And what if then, groups of students started asking to make that project-based learning model their entire high school experience? That’s what happened when Saeed Arida, a PhD student in the Architecture department at MIT, tried running a design studio with a handful of kids. The result was NuVu, a unique studio education model that’s catching on worldwide.

Guest: Saeed Arida

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

“I have not figured out exactly why this happens, but their expectation is that when they are working on this idea, is that you give them only the technical feedback. They don't want you to talk about the conceptual framing of the idea. My explanation for this is that, you know, in our kind of traditional schooling system, the only thing that we give the students is content. We never really talk about ideas and their ideas, and it feels very personal and vulnerable.” (8:47)

• “To assume that they're gonna, like, you know, by the end of the four years that they're gonna learn everything that is, that's being kind of taught in these textbooks, it's not gonna happen..there are a lot of studies about these subjects and like after six months, basically a lot of the kids fail on them anyway. A lot of that info is not sticking anyway. You know, so it's like, why are we committing to this idea that we need to learn all of that stuff in four years? If at the end of the day none of the, like, not, or a big part of it is not sticking.” (31:27)
• “For me, it still does not really address the central question whether this tool is ultimately helping the students or not, which is for me why we are doing-- like there, there is no reason to do any tracking or an assessment unless it becomes a really empowering tool that would help the students kind of grow.” (41:28)

Related Episodes: 31, 29, 27, 26, 21, 6

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Episode 33: Innovating for the Youngest Learners

Orly Friedman was in the fifth grade when she read the book that changed her life. The story, about a child who floundered in traditional school environments but thrived in an unconventional setting, inspired Orly to dream of opening her own non-traditional school one day. In this episode, she shares her successful journey as the founder of Red Bridge School, an innovative educational setting for young learners that centers around student agency and autonomy.

Guest: Orly Friedman

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “If you think about traditional grade levels, they are very passive for the student. So you sit in a seat for 180 days and you move on to the next grade level when you show up in September and there's basically nothing you have to do to make that happen. … And so if you want to flip that and turn it into a system that supports agency, then you need to put the promotion process in the hands of the students.” (11:49)
• “We are really teaching students how to know themselves well enough and develop the habits of self-advocacy to be successful in any environment. … And so I don't worry who their teacher will be in the future or what happens if they go to another school, because they know themselves well enough and they have enough experience going through that learning cycle and setting goals for themselves and making a plan and working through it that they're gonna be successful anywhere. And really I think that is the result of what we're doing, that we're creating more flexible learners.” (28:28)
• “I think the thing that is a bit scary also about this kind of a model is, if you are going to give students agency over their success and ownership over their success, you also have to be willing to do that for their failures. And so sometimes you have to give students enough space for them not to be successful.” (36:24)

Related Episodes: 23, 21,15,13, 3

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Episode 32: Restoring Humanity in Education

Trust Kids. That’s the takeaway from public school educator-turned nonprofit founder Chris McNutt, whose work at the Human Restoration Project aims to revolutionize teacher and student wellbeing. What would schools look like if we designed an educational system around trust? How could student agency and teacher creativity become pillars of a progressive, future-focused education? And how do we get there?

Guest: Chris McNutt

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “So much of teaching the teacher has become seeing teachers as technicians, right. It's become, how can I tell teachers exactly what to do and keep firm control over the sequential pace of the curriculum? And as a result, that's how many teachers see their own classrooms…many teachers and teaching curriculums look at cognitive science and they go, oh, well it says right here that if you give kids X number of questions and talk to them for X amount of time, that is like, the perfect amount of time to talk to them about this concept. Therefore, let's do that over and over again until they improve their test scores.” (14:23)
• “No one's coming to save us. That top down reforms from government organizations or from districts rarely lead to any type of solution. In fact, they often lead to more problems than they attempt to solve. For example, someone might come in and offer a new set of standards for us to look at and analyze and incorporate into our classrooms, which has happened, I felt like when I was teaching, every two years, there was some kind of new initiative to push for. And ultimately nothing changed, and it burnt a lot of people out.” (24:49)
• “If I walk into the room and think that kids are gonna try to get away with something, I'm gonna start pushing toward more carceral practices. I'm gonna ban things. I'm gonna tell kids what they can and can't do. And that's what leads us to schools where kids aren't allowed to talk in the hallway, or they're not allowed to have water bottles in classrooms, and these ridiculous things that I would never wanna subject another person to at all.” (45:08)

Related Episodes: 27, 23, 19, 11, 2022 Bonus Episode, 7

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Episode 31: AI and the Future of Education

The hottest conversation in education right now revolves around ChatGPT. What is it, how is it being used, and what does it mean for our traditional systems of teaching and learning? Season Four of New View EDU begins with a discussion about the rapid evolution of Artificial Intelligence and the impact ChatGPT and other AI innovations will have on the future of schools.

Guests: Christina Lewellen and Paul Turnbull

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Where does ChatGPT show up in this conversation? Where do I show up in the conversation and what's my voice? Because schools should be about voice, right? Especially student voice. So that's the thing I like the most, we're, we're sort of keeping that North star in place, you know, what's best for students and how do we help the helpers.” (18:23)
• “I understand that a lot of schools, as they're dealing with ChatGPT, are making sure that teachers are kind of coming at it and saying, this is a tool. I am not forcing you to use it. I'm not advocating that you use it, but if you do use it, you need to understand the implications of using it. Because at the end of the day, while that account can be deleted, sort of like we all had to teach our students about social media, you know, you can delete your account, but that doesn't mean the content that you put there is gone.” (23:47)
• “This is a big change agent in our schools. it is time to take a brief moment to reflect on what that means, because rather than being afraid of what it means, I think looking at the opportunities that it brings to really weave technology into how we accomplish our missions, there's some cool opportunity, especially for the schools that have been a little hesitant to, to, you know, bring that into their world. It's time. There's not, there's no ostrich situation, head in the sand situation that's gonna let us get out of this. We, we're gonna have to think about it and be proactive.” (41:42)

Related Episodes:#28, #26, #21, #12, #7

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Episode 30: How Equity and Wellbeing Work Together in Our Schools

Schools exist to help prepare students for the future. But in a society that prides itself on equality, how can we create equitable schools that prepare students to enter a world where inclusion is crucial? And how does focusing on the wellbeing of our school communities go hand-in-hand with building inclusive environments? In this episode of New View EDU, two school heads with deep expertise in DEI work join host Tim Fish and special co-host Caroline Blackwell for a conversation about equity, wellbeing, and the future of inclusion efforts in independent schools.

Guests: Kalyan Balaven and Dr. Jessie Barrie

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “We compete in speech and debate, we compete in sports. We can compete in all these different ways, but we can't compete in inclusion cuz when we compete in inclusion, that's exclusion by nature.” (6:29)
• “I think the nature of this work is so foundational to everything we're trying to accomplish, whether it's, you know, student academic outcomes, whether it's, you know, student social-emotional health and wellness throughout the day. That the only way to really effectively do equity work is to ensure that it's embedded in the foundational documents, philosophies, values of your school, and in every element of how you lens everything, from assessment to book selections, to hiring practices, to evaluation practices.” (8:41)
• “Oftentimes you'll find students at schools. You actually find them on the brochure. You'll find 'em on the website, because they represent some sort of visible diversity. And if you really interview some students…who are visual representations of difference at a school and say, Did you take full advantage of it? Did you, did you participate in that outdoor ed program? Did you go on that international trip? Did you go on the college visits and the college tours? And the answers that we get back are not the answers we wanna see. That's not inclusion. Inclusion is all those students thriving and finding a way for themselves, to see themselves in the mission of the school as achieving those things that are the promise of the school in relationship to the world they're entering.” (16:15)
• “The first definition of discriminate is to differentiate, to distinguish, to discern, to see difference between each other. Seeing difference is not a bad thing, inherently. The bad thing is when a school, and I imagine, imagine the school has a view of all the students, and in the view shared of all the students, certain students are getting lost.” (22:16)
• “We can only learn by opening our hearts and opening our ears to the experience of others and to the realization that we never will truly be able to understand the experience of others. All we can do is have the gift of someone's trust to share with us their experience, and to be able to try and listen really intently to that experience and look for the opportunities within our own biases, within our own defensive reactions for growth.” (39:53)

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Episode 29: The Future of Higher Ed

Much of the work of K-12 schools is focused on getting students to the “next step,” which, for many of them, is college readiness. But increasingly, it feels like we’re not working on college readiness so much as we’re working on college admissions. Preparing kids to successfully apply to college, in the hyper-competitive admissions landscape, is almost a full-time job of its own. What should schools be doing to help students with college (and college application) readiness? When we focus on gaining admission to selective schools, what are we missing in the K-12 experience? And what do colleges actually want K-12 educators to know?

Guests: Jeff Selingo and Dr. Adam Weinberg

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “More selective institutions like Denison and others that are really trying to decide between applicants. They're looking for that difference. They're, they cherish what is rare. And increasingly, to be honest with you, what is rare are those students who are not over-curated, over-programmed. I feel like, especially because of social media now, we have to curate our lives to be perfect. And we see this manifest itself in applications.” (11:41)
• “I think there's so much about the college application process that... forces is too strong a word. That shapes the high school experience of too many students, where they're not able to do either one of those, right? They're not able to ask who they want to be because they're too busy asking, What do I need to be to get into the college of my choice? And the second is, we're so worried that if they experience any bit of failure, they won't get into good college, that we're not giving them the space to learn that actually failure's the only way to develop the kind of resiliency you're gonna need to be successful in life.” (17:41)
• “ I think this is where advising comes in and helping students understand-- and maybe this is where there's a role for K through 12, because I think every student should graduate from high school understanding what kind of learner they are. So that when they do go to college, they're making those better choices. You know, am I a better visual learner? You know, how do I read, you know, should I do online? Should I do hybrid, whatever it might be, so that when they get to college, they're making those choices in a better way.” (33:00)
• “I think one thing that we could be and should be doing with students during their junior, senior years, at least level setting expectations so they don't arrive at college assuming that everything's gonna be perfect and they're gonna be happy all the time…And don't make the mistake when you're, have that moment of unhappiness, that moment of not sure you can make it, of looking around and assuming that everybody else is doing great and you're not.” (35:28)
• “This may be our last chance, or one of our last chances, where we have a community of people, similar in age, together in one place. And we should be preparing them, K through 12 and higher ed, for that moment afterwards, where they are going to be in communities, at school board meetings, in in, in community associations, and volunteer organizations. And they're going to have to have these very tough debates and they're gonna have to do it in person using those facts.” (43:35)

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Episode 28: Supporting Healthy Habits for Students in a Digital World

Technology has certainly changed the face of education in recent years. In some ways, it’s even become vital to the way we “do school” – especially in times when virtual classrooms have been the only way for students and teachers to stay connected. But tech also comes with significant downsides. Digital distractions, socializing on screens, and the sneaky costs of 24/7 connectivity are changing our brains. As educators and parents struggle to find the balance between the benefits of technology and the dark side of devices, what does the research show?

Guest: Dr. Shimi Kang

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “The problem though, with the phones and tech, other than other addictions, is this whole idea of abstinence, being away from it is impossible, because tech is embedded. It's like air. We cannot live without it. It's, and in fact, if we teach children that it's a bad thing, I feel they'll be significantly disadvantaged…I say, we are dealing with the fire of our time. There was a moment when our ancestors learned to harness the power of fire. Those who did it well went further and farther than ever before. Those who didn't got burnt and burnt down the village. And that's exactly where we are with tech.” (11:26)
• “I don't know any 12 year old, Tim, or any 14 year old, that can check Snapchat or Instagram in the hallway and then walk into a math or chemistry class and focus. There's just no way that the brain can switch like that. So all these amazing teachers and this great curriculum is gonna be delivered to distracted kids if we don't get the phones out of the hallways, outta the lunch rooms.” (18:10)
• “Sitting is the new smoking. Kids are sitting a really long time. Even this crouched posture that we see all over our schools over a laptop or phone, that's a very stressful posture. That flexion of the spine. Our nervous system is like, why are you crouching in a cave? Is there a hurricane? Is there a predator? And it'll fire cortisol, the stress hormone, just based on that crouched posture that we're seeing everywhere.” (27:06)
• “When you see the idea of scrolling, the attention span is changing in less than a second, right? And the max we're kind of seeing attention being held is like three seconds. So that in itself, our brain is having to reprocess that…Even the YouTube video, if you're watching the same video, it's extremely fast paced. You know, these tubers are talking fast. They have imaging coming in, there's popups happening. So the distraction. And that's where we're seeing poor difficulty with focus, with concentration. Kids can't sustain it.” (32:12)
• “Conspiracy theories and extreme views are actually flight behaviors, right? I'm gonna think about how the world is flat, not what's happening in my household or, or how I'm gonna deal with this stress. So when we're stressed, when our children are sleep deprived because they're in too many activities, or it's, you know, they have to write their SATs or whatever it is, you know, we're stressing them out in whatever way, or they're on their devices too much, they're just cycling through anxiety, irritability, and distraction. And so many kids are cycling through that constantly.” (41:11)

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Episode 27: Developing Mastery in Approaches to Education

As the world continues to rapidly evolve, so do the skills students need to be successful in the future. Educational models that revolve around seat time, content memorization, and age-based pacing are starting to fade into the past. But what should replace them? One idea that’s gaining traction is the concept of mastery. On this episode of New View EDU, Julia Griffin joins host Tim Fish to share how she and a team of innovative educators have launched the Mastery School at Hawken – an alternative learning experience within a well-established independent high school.

Guest: Julia Griffin

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “A system organizes itself around the highest goal. And that highest goal, in what I'll call traditional school, is really that everybody learns the same things at about the same time. And as a Mastery learning School, what we've taken as our goal, our highest goal is maximizing the individual growth of every student. And when you take that as your goal, then the systems that you end up building look really different.” (2:48)
• “What we find is that students, and anyone who's worked with high school students knows this to be true, students know when something is real and when something has been invented by the teacher. They can, like, smell the difference from a mile away.” (8:19)
• “I'm someone who's been in schools for my whole career, for people who come through schools in their whole career, there really is this phenomenon of the traditional school muscle memory that you have to fight against. Because the rhythms of teaching, if you've been teaching for a while, there are things that you mostly subconsciously have very likely learned how to do, that are kind of wrapped around the traditional paradigm that we were talking about before. And so it really does require kind of radical humility and openness and interest in learning how to do something different.” (15:47)
• “Because we weren't just, you know, expanding and adding a campus, but we were really trying to build a new model of school and wanted to say that, part of what's really challenging there is, if you're building a new model, by implication, whether you say it or not, you think that there's something that could be improved about the old model. And that's actually kind of a little bit of a daring thing to say.” (33:49)
• “I think that young people are capable of so much more than school tends to give them credit for. They're ready. You know, high school students are ready to, they're ready to be working on things that are real. They're ready to do things and see them actually get implemented and make an impact. And man, designing a school and figuring out how to build a school that can center that is really hard. And there's a lot that we haven't figured out yet. But that to me is like, the school that young people deserve.” (43:47)

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Episode 26: Bringing Virtual Reality into K-12 Education

After COVID forced schools all over the world to dive headlong into experiments with online learning, most educators are delighted to have the chance to return to in-person classrooms. But what if the answer to a number of challenges in education – equity, access, student agency, efficiency – actually lies in going more deeply into the virtual realm? The founder of the world’s first Virtual Reality Charter School believes that may be the way forward for schools.

Guest: Adam Mangana

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “I really wanna make ambulatory learning great again…Here's my crazy idea. I think two of the greatest teachers that have ever lived on earth, Socrates and Jesus, they neither read nor wrote, right? They didn't know how to read. They didn't know how to write, but yet they are revered as two of our greatest teachers.” (6:40)
• “Alexander would not have been great if it weren't for Aristotle walking alongside him.” (11:34)
• “You can literally enter the avatar of somebody that has a completely different skin complexion, different life story, and be perceived in that simulation as that person. So you're walking a mile in someone else's avatar and you're able to perceive the world from their perspective.” (16:56)
• “The negative externality is, as people are winning in this new web three space, if we don't provide access, you're gonna see, I think, rises in fundamentalism. And you see this in every industrial Revolution. Right? If you look at, we're in a fourth industrial revolution, if you track every industrial revolution, you have people who respond-- for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction-- you have people who respond in the opposite direction. So it's critical to me, as we're thinking about how this is evolving, that access is at the front of our minds.” (21:37)
• “There's gonna be a tri-brid deal where you're gonna start to see schools partnering together and capturing families that are moving around the world and having a world class education. And I think part of that bridge between the physical geography will be this virtual, immersive virtual campus that they can touch while they're in that space.” (30:32)
• “We lost a generation of children. Some, we don't even know where they are. Others, we've seen rises in mental health issues…I mentioned Aristotle and Alexander the Great. The relationship is at the center. And if we can create that relationship and that sense of connection and accountability with our students and with our teacher, I think that will allow for teachers to be valued again in our society.” (41:43)

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Episode 25: Developing Independent School Leaders for the Future

As our schools and communities have undergone swift and often unpredictable transformations in recent years, leadership has also changed. What worked before may not be what schools need now. Our ideas about the characteristics of leadership, who owns the title of “leader,” and how leadership gets distributed are evolving rapidly to keep up with a culture of constant change. What does it mean to be the kind of leader who can adapt and build strong schools now and into the future?

Guests: Nicole Furlonge and Donna Orem

Resources, Transcript, and Expanded Show Notes

In This Episode:

• “Leadership is not necessarily a specific role. It's not specifically a way of being, it's really being authentic about what your purpose is, having a vision that takes you there, and really bringing other people along with you. And I don't think that leadership is positional in the way that historically we've seen it, because in any type of organization or even any kind of community, different people can be leaders at different times, and we need different people to be leaders at different times.” (6:00)
• “I think parents, in engaging in education, are trying to find this polarity between protecting their children and preparing their children. And I think it is creating some difficulties today, because obviously as parents, we wanna protect our children, but we also have to prepare them for a world that is much different than when we were children. Understanding that polarity is not a choice. It's a both and. We have to both protect children, and we have to prepare them at the same time.” (14:29)
• “What I saw COVID do and what I saw COVID call on leaders to do, is to really think about how is that community bigger than the people that walk through your doors every day? How is it bigger, even, than the alumni who still call you their Alma mater, your, their home, their learning, their learning home?” (20:24)
• “I do think that there was a need…for leaders to think about how they could find in their school communities, those spaces that they could rely on, that they could trust to sort of engage in that deep leadership that we were just talking about earlier. That you didn't have to be a solo leader and that other people could lead. So whether it was, you know, the teacher that was getting on zoom and being the face of the school in our students' homes or, you know, when we come back to schools, the ways in which we recognize that everyone at every level of the school is, is a leader and touches the lives of students as they learn.” (27:16)
• “But if they can also then demonstrate and model what it looks like to lead through listening, then that becomes something that the whole community understands they have permission to do. To tune in, to pay attention, to be present, so that we understand both what our strengths are, and I think this is even more important, that we understand where our growth edges are. Cause I do think the propensity is to highlight what our strengths are at the expense of being able to grow in different ways.” (33:03)

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Episode 24: International Perspectives on the Independent School Landscape

In an increasingly connected world, what can school leaders learn from their counterparts across the globe? The events of the past few years have affected schools in every country, not just the U.S., and highlighted the fact that when it comes to our hopes, dreams, and challenges in education, we’re probably more alike than we are different from one another. On this episode of New View EDU, two dynamic leaders from the international independent school community share their perspectives on the past, present, and future of our schools.

Guests: Kelly Borg and Maddy Hewitt

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “We've learned that we can work at pace, and that perfect is the enemy of good. Is that the saying? You know, where, where we go okay, well, it's not quite right, but we've gotta do it by tomorrow. So we're gonna do it like this. And so having the confidence to say, you know what, it's not laminated, it's not framed with a purple border. It's not, it's not beautiful. In fact, it's not even close to pretty, but we are gonna do it. And it will work.” (17:54)
• “You know, repurposing education at this time, ensuring the education is fit for purpose, which is always to ensure human flourishing and human development. It's, that's been forever, but we're no longer living in the industrial age. We're living in the post industrial age where we're no longer building a society for consuming things. We're building a society for preserving and sustaining and regenerating things.” (22:11)
• “We've had such massive interruption to our ways of life and the opportunity to reflect on that move from education as serving a really pragmatic, even economic purpose, to being fundamentally intrinsic, you know, being about human fulfillment. We've only gotta look around the world to see that so many of the issues we're facing right now in this moment, they require international cooperation.” (25:25)
• “We need to weave into a modern learning design, to modern curriculums, we need to weave in those other pieces that are going to allow students to flourish. And that includes social emotional awareness. And that includes inclusion and understanding intercultural realities and working for a culture where there is belonging for all on the planet, because we are interconnected and we all need to flourish in order for the planet to flourish and for, you know, humans to develop well and also to have economies that flourish, and there need to be new regenerative economies.” (32:30)
• “I really hope that education continues to traverse down this path of getting back to its intrinsic purpose around human fulfillment, around wellbeing, and that we continue to move away from this focus on how good is this student, to how is this student good?” (46:14)

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Episode 23: Designing Schools for Self-Directed Learning

What would school look like if we designed education based on the belief that every child is a genius who can change the world? What if we put learning into the hands of the student instead of the teacher? What if our instructional models included less “instruction” and more time guiding kids to finding their own answers and inspirations? These are just some of the starting points for today’s discussion, and for the work that Tyler Thigpen does on a daily basis.

Guest: Tyler Thigpen

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “We believe that there's a connection between developing strong character and, you know, being able to shoulder the responsibility for your own learning. And so, you know, there, the learners are given opportunities to make rules and to learn how to follow those and to hold one another accountable and responsible for those rules and in doing so, you know, practice good, strong character.” (8:25)
• “You know, wherever there's something that teachers or adults have typically done in a school setting that we think learners can do, you know, we'll step back and we'll let them do it. And it will take a while and it will be messy, but it's, you know, what neuroscientists call productive struggle. That's really missing from a lot of teacher-led classrooms in our country today.” (12:16)
• “And of course they have so much choice and they have to experience the natural consequences of those choices. And that's very powerful. I mean, them experiencing the natural consequences, positive or negative, of their choices is maybe the most powerful instructor, you know, in the building. It, you know, the more so than what any caring adult, you know, provides for them.” (15:19)
• “We are sort of agnostic to how fast or slow they're going. That's one of the beautiful things about a self-paced environment. You can go as fast or slow as you want. We typically find learners go faster on average, and most of our learners do, you know, are above grade level, you know, as evidenced by norm referenced tests nationally, but we're okay with 'em going slow too. Cause sometimes that's okay. And, hopefully, that kind of environment that embraces that being behind, being on track, being ahead, whatever, you know, helps them flourish a little bit more. And appreciates the unique differences of every young person.” (20:13)
• “I think a real great critique of self-directed learning, if you don't know anything about it, you just hear the idea. It's like, oh, that's, that's pretty self-centered for kids. It's like, oh, just let them do whatever they want to do…And so we included a definition of self-directed learning that has young people on the hook for the other. For helping others, for finding a calling, you know that will in fact change their communities and change the world.” (37:58)

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Episode 22: The Purpose and Nature of Higher Education

Since the beginning of the New View EDU podcast, we’ve been asking guests to help us answer the question: “What is the purpose of education?” Now we’re expanding our search for answers into the realm of higher education. What’s the purpose of college? Is it just to get a foot in the door of a competitive job market, or is there something greater to be gained from higher ed?

Guest: Wendy Fischman

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “We devised a concept, a new concept, called higher education capital. And as you said, this is what we believe should be the goal of college for students, is to build and amplify higher education capital. Briefly, higher education capital is the ability to attend, analyze, reflect, connect, and communicate on important issues. So it's what you used in planning for and facilitating this podcast. It's what I used in preparing for the questions that I thought you were going to ask me…that’s what we call higher education capital.” (6:47)
• “We hope and expect that students who go to college will have the opportunity to develop and increase their own HED cap. And actually, students and parents should demand it. That's what they should be choosing colleges on. That's what they should be asking about. Rather than tout dining halls and schools' private islands, we wish that schools would promote their ability to increase HED cap.” (10:17)
• “Just a word about mental health on the college campus. While some students did talk about severe issues, including bipolar disorder or suicide or major depression, the majority of students talked about mental health issues as they relate to performing well, doing well, getting A's, and the anxiety about not performing and compiling the best possible profile when they graduate in order to get the job.” (24:26)
• “Today high school has become more of an exercise about preparing students to get into college, rather than preparing them for the college experience…We need to find ways in the high school experience and even maybe earlier, to incorporate these kinds of essential questions in our conversations with students, and also in our college counseling, so that they don't just form this very transactional view about college.” (31:13)
• “I think at early stages, we should be helping students to understand that their goal is not about getting into the most selective college, because sometimes it may not make a difference. It's about finding the college that speaks to the student's goals, what they wanna get out of it.” (34:26)

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Episode 21: How to Create a Generation of Super Collaborators

What if Elon Musk approached you one day and asked you to create a school? How would you approach the design of a radically different educational environment founded in the shadow of SpaceX and intended to provide deeper learning for the children of some of the most innovative thinkers in the world? That was the starting point for Josh Dahn.

Guest: Josh Dahn

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “Kindness is actually the word that we lead with. Like, we are always looking for just kind kids…We really wanna ground it in, in kindness and your ability to work well with others. I mean, the phrase we use in Synthesis is super collaborators. That's really the thing that we've always been looking for. Someone who is, yeah, there's your own individual path, but you make other people better and are, are interested in other people and wanna bring out their voices, not just your own.” (11:03)
• “I have to say, I'm not always disciplined on this message because sometimes I get carried away when you start thinking about, really, a bad time that a lot of kids have in school in the name of things that frankly, I don't think in the light of day, you can justify. Like how we spend time with kids. I think there are some things that are absolutely unacceptable.” (28:43)
• “The north star is how does this help us create a generation or cultivate a generation of super collaborators? Like how can we imbue in these kids something that we ourselves did not get and probably still now do not have, which is the ability to sort of surrender yourself to a team and to be authentic in who you are, and vulnerable, but also strong and in like what you believe? And I think part of that is through reflection and it's a really hard thing to do.” (34:26)
• “When it comes to education, I think a lot of people tend to want the same thing. I, I don't think that many people going, you know, thinking about their education that they went through are like, I want a carbon copy of that thing. What, you know, whether that's the horrors of middle school or the, you know, long days of geometry or whatever that is. I think that we all are, are sort of predisposed to openness, to something a bit different…I mean, we've done a class at Astra Nova over the years in magic. Oh, not because I think this is Hogwarts, but because I think it's interesting to question the assumption that because a class is called, I don't know, chemistry, that therefore, that thing is inherently more valuable than some other experience for the development of a child.” (39:10)

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After a wonderful second season of New View EDU, we are excited to share the first episode of a three-part miniseries on “Fostering Innovation” from our sister NAIS podcast, Member Voices. The series is hosted by NAIS Director of Innovation Programs, Jackie Wolking. Episode 2 was released earlier this month, and the third and final episode drops June 6. We hope you’ll listen and learn from all three episodes!

You can learn more about Member Voices and access related NAIS resources from each episode by visiting nais.org/membervoices. You can also keep an eye on that page for new podcast episodes, or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts to automatically receive a new podcast episode in your feed each month. 

Thanks for listening, and stay tuned for the next season of New View EDU, coming in Fall 2022!

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Episode 20: The Future of Schools as Desirable Workplaces

We often focus on the student experience in our schools, which is a critical issue needing constant attention. But our school communities also include adults—the faculty and staff who work to make the student experience worthwhile. With the post-pandemic workforce shifting dramatically in all sectors, what can school leaders learn about transforming systems and practices to retain excellent teachers? How can we model leadership that supports and centers the well-being of faculty and staff? And how can we ensure that our schools are desirable workplaces where professionals can thrive and feel valued?

Guests: Crissy Caceres, Brett Jacobsen, Doreen Kelly

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “I think it will force our industry to create great clarity around our why. We're not able to be all things to all people. And I think the clearer we are with our missions, we'll have great clarity about who chooses to work in our environment, who chooses to study in our environment.” (10:19)
• “So rather than have an assumptive stance of what we believe to be true, I think that our leadership has to center ourselves with humility, to understand that we haven't had all of the right answers. And that perhaps, by the continuation of existing practices and systems, we have actually enabled a culture that hasn't optimized what healthy and whole existence in our schools look like. But our colleagues know the answers. And so I believe that this is a matter of connectivity. An honest reflection about not just what we've done well, but quite critically, what we have not.” (12:32)
• “We say we honor the worth and integrity of every individual in a variety of phrases in our mission. And so this moment that we're facing now is about going beyond our aspiration and acting upon the very things that cause families to invest resources and time into partnering in the world of parenting with their children and our schools. And so it's time to face the commitment that we have made all along and consider the ways in which we have to rethink the way that we've acted upon those missions.” (27:35)
• “The students are watching. All of the time. What a worthy call as leaders to care deeply about the people who…are truly at mission central, focused in on the kid. It is gifted work to be focused in on the people who are focusing on the kids as well.” (27:41)
• “You don't rise to your goals. You fall to your systems, whether those systems be good or bad, you're going to fall to those systems. And so what systems are we falling to? And that part of that is how healthy is your team and how aligned is your team.” (31:09)
• “Bridges have been essential to the modern world. They have helped define us. Bridges are connectors. They deal with proximity, where we become more proximate to each other because the bridge has been built. … What voices are we not hearing from? Bridges allow us to do that. And yet bridges have guard rails. Because they protect us. They help us make hopefully wiser decisions…we need more bridge builders.” (48:18)

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Episode 19: The Role of Failure and Risk in Designing Deeper Learning

We’re all familiar with the stories of people who became wildly successful after failing dozens of times to reach their goals. But what if those “inspirational” failure stories are the wrong ones to share? What if we’re defining success and failure the wrong way to begin with? And how do our own expectations of how things “should” be influence our perceptions of what learning, growth, and success actually look like?

Guest: Laura McBain

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “And I think the purpose now is actually education … should be the thing that allows every person in this world to not only be a part of the world, but shape the world in which they want to live in, which means designing new career paths, new industries, and really allowing them to see, to be fully, fully realized as an individual, as a human and as a contributor to society.” (3:27)
• “We don't teach them how to learn through failure. Because we're so focused on getting the outcome, the grade, the project right, that we don't just sit with the moments of those, what we call those favorite moments of failure, which are the ones that changed you. They may not be the one that got that next job where they made you become the startup of that big company … but they have changed you. And they changed your DNA, the fabric of who you are and how you approach the world. They show up as an integrated part of your own humanity.” (9:32)
• “Students have textbooks that give them the answers. They can Google the answers. Like there's, nationally, no new content that they're actually trying to learn, essentially, that's not actually already out there. They're expected. This is why we see massive cheating scandals. We see students disengaging in textbooks. We see people looking up the answers in the back of the book, because they're expecting the right answer. And that right answer already exists. The answer's already there. So there's nothing, there's no new learning there, I think.” (17:44)
• “I don't believe you can separate content from emotions. We are emotional human beings. So the idea that feeling and learning are actually quite separate, if I don't feel a lot of how I'm learning, is actually not true. We get excited … we get really passionate. We're laughing. We're alert. That's an emotion. And so how do we have a space in our classrooms to just have students express their emotions, not just from a mental health perspective, which is important, but also how do they feel about the content they're learning?” (23:56)
• “You and I, as adults, if we were asked to do the same thing over and over and over again and persist through it, and it didn't unlock any interest or curiosity in us, you and I would say … no, I'm not doing that. And then we wonder why our young people are disengaged or … act up in classrooms. Their curiosity is being stamped out. And then we get mad at them for actually not doing the thing, but we're asking them to do something that probably could feel like torture, you know?” (38:19)

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Episode 18: Applying Neuroscience to Designing Inclusive Schools

Schools are workplaces – not only for students, but for the faculty and staff who provide the learning environment in a school community. Are we truly designing our schools to be great workplaces for everyone? What does research about neuroscience and the human experience teach us about the qualities of truly productive, inclusive, desirable places to work and learn? And do we truly understand what it means to bring equity to a community through the way we design our environments, systems and policies for the benefit of all?

Guest: Camille Inge

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “Feeling respected, feeling that you're trusted, that you have the ability to make choices, that you can take on creative pursuits, that you can have a voice that you can feel like you matter and have a sense of self in that place. And then that they're flexible. And agile, you know, that we can keep up with the pace of change, that we can listen, learn, adapt in a timely manner. So integrity, diversity, inclusion and empowerment, flexibility.” (10:17)
• “I mean, downtime is something that we're talking about a lot now, as something that we've neglected and that's so core to us being able to regenerate and be able to refuel, is this intentional creation of space where there's no goal. To just be able to mind wander and just be. I mean, it's relatively mindful. And we don't have a lot of space for that and it's negatively stigmatized, but in a place like kindergarten, it seems quite core to it…those things should be maintained throughout the whole human experience.” (13:34)
• “Likely if we're not actively including, we're probably accidentally excluding, cause it's a lot easier to go about our daily lives focused from a first person perspective rather than considering the perspectives of others, that platinum rule.” (38:53)
• “And at least thinking at the highest level of abstraction, do we, do we believe in the same things? Do we want the best for our students? Yes, of course. That's common ground. How do we get there? We might differ on that, but at least we can agree, yes, we want the best for our students, for our community. And starting there can be a really inclusive behavior before assuming that someone has ill intentions. We all probably would say we have the best intentions. So let's give each other the benefit of the doubt as well and work from there.” (40:44)

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Episode 17: The Opportunities and Obligations of Citizenship in K-12 Education

What if each of us believed we had the power to make change happen in civic life—and felt we had the responsibility to try? That’s the premise behind Eric Liu’s Citizen University, and the starting point for this New View EDU discussion on power literacy, changemaking, and civic agency in schools. How did the study of “civics” become a boring, drill-and-kill topic? When and why did we stop treating civic literacy as a relevant, necessary skill for students to learn? And how can we reclaim a sense of civic responsibility, citizenship, and future agency in our school communities?

Guest: Eric Liu

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “And as I've said in many contexts, power is like fire or physics. It just is. It’s there. And though it can be put to bad uses, that fact doesn't absolve us of the responsibility to think of what good uses it could be put to.” (3:22)
• “You know, the purpose of schooling is not just to create good workers or good employees or people who can compete in the global economy as, as has become the dominant refrain of justification for schooling and especially public schooling. But fundamentally it is to create citizens, people capable of self-government. And that was certainly the case for universal compulsory public education.” (7:16)
• “If you want to teach civics, you have to teach the arguments. You have to show young people the ways in which, from the beginning and to this day, we are perpetually contesting several sets of tensions, between Liberty and equality, between a strong national government and local control, between federalism and anti federalism, between the Pluribus part of our national motto and the Unum part of our national motto. Right? And these tensions are never meant to be resolved finally, one direction or the other…The tension that we are always in is the argument. And the point of American civic life isn't right now to have fewer arguments, it's to have less stupid ones.” (20:23)
• “Education is not all critical thinking and SEL. You got to have some raw material about which you are thinking critically. And we have to have some common facts around which we can have emotional intelligence, right? And I think schools, public and private over the last two generations, have failed our country, have failed our democratic experiment, in providing that core knowledge.” (34:09)

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Episode 16: Challenging Success to Design Schools for Well-Being

What’s the difference between educating students for the future, and simply “doing school?” Are we designing school communities that foster the development of better adults, or are we clinging to old ideas about content and rigor that no longer serve us well? And what role do parental expectations, higher ed, and societal pressure play in the decisions we make about how schools function?

Guest: Denise Pope

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

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In This Episode:

• “Rigor is not the same thing as load…What I see with schools, it's exactly what you're seeing. They say, academic excellence, academic excellence. That's what our parents are sending their kids here for. And that's what we say we're going to promote. And academic excellence can very much be in the definition that, that you and I just set out, around critical thinking, around the skills they need, around teamwork, around cooperation, around weighing really challenging issues. And they need to see that that is not just piling on more stuff. And it's not the traditional way that they've been teaching, which is scary. Change is scary.” (10:10)
• “We're hearing I want my kid to be happy. I want them to be healthy. I want them to be fulfilled. I want them to go on to, you know, be independent and go to college and get a job. And what they say they want for success is not necessarily translated to their kids. So when we ask the kids how they define success, it's often money, grades, test scores, college, popularity.” (16:47)
• “The parents have to do their jobs, but the school has to do their job too. And that's one of the main things we talk to schools about. Less is more. What's going on with your schedule, what's going on with your homework policy. What's going on with the fact that they have to take so many classes at a time, or so many advanced placement or honors things happening at the time, right? Less is more.” (25:34)
• “You've got to fix the relationships happening at school first and foremost. You've got to make sure that kids are sleeping, that they have room for mental health, that they are not going, you know, 24-7 like chickens with their heads cut off. And then when you've created that space of belonging and health and safety, let's go to the next step on Maslow's hierarchy.” (39:09)

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Episode 15: Inspiring Wonder and Community in Schools

After the many challenges of the past two years, how healthy are our school communities? How attuned are we to the lessons we can learn from the people and influences around us? How can we approach learning with gentleness, curiosity, care, and a sense of wonder? And what do mushrooms have to do with any of it?

Guest: Michelle King

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

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In This Episode:

• “Winter is the hardening of the ground. So this is a time of reflection. This is a time of restoration. This is the time of withdrawal. In our culture, we treat everything like spring, go, go, go, grow, grow, grow. But you don't get the incredible brilliance of the flowers of spring without the hardening of the ground in winter.“ (3:59)
• “And I think about students who taught me so many life lessons, who are, who also had a sense of wonder, but they, these things can not be quantified or contained on a standardized test, but that wasn't a standardized being. That was a very complex and beautiful being that showed me the world.” (14:38)
• “How many spaces do you walk in, and you're like, as you're more than enough as you are? You know, a lot of times we come into spaces and it's like, especially teacher PD, is oriented around the idea that you don't have enough. You're not enough.” (20:19)
• “I remember reading a piece years ago that said busy-ness is another form of laziness. And I was like, what? I'm American. Busy is a currency, you know? But what's called for is connection, real connection. And to have that kind of connection requires trust. Trust, community, all these things are living concepts. They are not like, okay, we got trust in, you know, on Wednesday. And we're good for the rest of our lives. It is a living entity, just like community is a living entity.” (23:50)
• “I think one of the things as humans that we really want to be is to be seen. And another way to say that is to be loved. Is to be seen in our full complexity. I think that's when we come alive, I think we can inspire and teach people from that place of being fully seen.” (28:17)
• “We all have a part of stardust. And you think like, look at that. That's amazing. That being over there, even as complicated and challenging as they might be in this moment, that's a wonder. And I think to have that kind of a delight, and if we can't find it, I feel like we are not doing right, what it means to be lovers of life.” (38:09)

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Episode 14: Mapping the Future Purpose of Education

Independent schools are inherently mission-driven. What would happen if we focused on becoming purpose-driven instead? How would we define our purpose, and how could we allow our schools and our communities to be changed through purpose-driven leadership? What challenges could we meet, and how would our schools be positioned to positively impact the future of society?

Guests: John Gulla and Donna Orem

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

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In This Episode:

• “Once we do start to talk, we realize there is a lot that we don't know about each other. I also think compounding this, and there's been a lot of research on this, is that probably for the last 40 to 50 years, trust in core institutions has been declining. And that's not just education, but it's all the core institutions that make up the fabric of our society.” (10:44)
• “Schools—meaning really elementary, secondary, college, universities—are often the places where we come into the most intimate connection with those who are unlike us. And it's a result of that otherness, that lack of familiarity that causes the disagreements that, I regret, in today's world seem to require, on the behalf of all sides, success defined only as winning the argument and not in coming to a deeper understanding of how others might think.” (14:03)
• “Of the literally thousands and thousands of teachers I've had conversations with on behalf of the foundation, I don't know anyone who went into the profession so that they could make a more effective widget for the global capitalist system. That's just not what I think motivates people at their core.” (19:49)
• “I think that we've had for too long this industrial model of education with children progressing through schools in age cohorts, in quanta of classes, taught the same material from often the same text by a single teacher, without the differentiation that can come as schools reconceive the way in which they will go about this work. And part of what's necessary, if my dream for education were to come to fruition, would be, you know, 10,000 different flowers blooming of different types of schools, that will ultimately make it a lot more difficult for parents to define in their terms, the right school for their child, because it will require them to really know who their children are to decide what is the right school for their child.” (26:18)
• “I think as we also know through brain research, the connections between mental health and physical health and academic outcomes, you know, that we create schools where mental and physical health are really at the center of what we do, that we understand where children and adults are situated, and we understand very specifically what each one of them needs to be whole mentally, to be whole physically. Because I think once we are able to do that, you know, we are taking those rocks out of the way for students and adults to achieve anything. But we have the means now to do that, I think we have more of the understanding to do that.” (35:53)

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Episode 13: Giving Away Power for More Authentic Leadership

We’re used to working and teaching in hierarchical structures, where power flows from the top down. But what would happen if, instead of maintaining power at the top, leaders gave power away to others? How could sharing power change the way we work, the way we relate to others, and the way we approach problem-solving? And what would schools look like if everyone was part of a constellation of contributors?

Guest: Matthew Barzun

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

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In This Episode:

• “The problem with power sharing is it, because so much of us are in this pyramid mindset, it's sort of like, well, if I have 10 units and we share it, I guess I'll have five and you have five now. But what all these amazing leaders who inspired me realized was no, no, no, power isn't a finite thing, like something you mine in Western or Eastern Kentucky, like coal. It is something, it is infinite, and you make it. And you make it with other people sitting around a table, virtual or real. And it all begins with giving away power.” (14:28)
• “Diversity and division. They have the same root, ‘div’. So what they love most and fear most has something to do with separateness. And so that, you know, now we see where it ends with the constellation. I was like, so they want to stand out as an individual like me, but they don't want to stand out so much that they're lonely. Right? So they want to stand out and fit in. And then I was like, boy, do we have a good image for that in the form of a constellation. Stand out, be special and form something special to you. Easy to say, hard to do.” (30:57)
• “We want freedom together. And not some mushy compromise, right? Half freedom, half together. Freedom with and through one another…the hard part was how could we figure out how to be free together? Thirteen separate colonies. And we did a constitution and we, you know what I mean, all that kind of stuff. And we had a motto for it: From Many One. And we had an image that was supposed to go⁠—remember, he named that ship the USS Constellation. We had an image that's supposed to go with that motto.” (43:37)
• “It cannot be isolated to the teacher or to the student or to the comedian or to the thing. It's this mutuality, it's this interdependence. It's the invisible. When someone shows you Orion's Belt, right? The lines aren't there, you have to imagine them. And then once you've seen them, you can't unsee them. And so that, I think, is what's going on here, that if we can find those connections, pass them onto the next generation, they will be alive and not be able to unsee them and be able to build useful, much more powerful things together than we could on our own.” (47:25)

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Episode 12: Applied Imagination and the Possibilities of School

We know what it means to teach history. But what does it mean to teach the future? Ruth Wylie applies imagination and critical thinking to big questions about science, technology, artificial intelligence, and what it means to shape the futures we want to see.

Guest: Ruth Wylie

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

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In This Episode:

• “I think that even, you know, at maybe the most basic, but also perhaps some of the most profound, is to start to think about how to get futures thinking and foresight anticipation into our K-12 curriculum. So starting to encourage our young people to think about what are possible futures for themselves, but also getting away from the individual level and looking about what are possible futures for our communities, for our countries, for our world.” (5:44)
• “So when we're talking about futures, it's also about reflecting on our histories, our past, the indigenous knowledge. It's reflecting on what's happening today. And then it's about thinking about futures. So again, it's not about just creating a brand new course and hiring brand new teachers, but it's about creating a culture of futures thinking and embedding that into our everyday classroom practice.” (8:29)
• “And so we need to also be thinking about how we're building technologies to address equity, to address people across different lifespans, different spectrums. And I think it's really important again, that if we're going to be making decisions that have larger community, global, national impacts, we need to make sure that people from all of those different spheres are at the table when designing those technologies and thinking about the implications.” (18:50)
• “Agency is a construct that we talk a lot about at the center, and about how do we develop agency and shift that mindset away from ‘the future is going to be unveiled at the next press conference or it's being done by folks in white lab coats,’ and we really take and empower people to realize that they have agency over their future.” (27:48)

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Episode 11: The Importance of Play in Schools

Societies depend on our ability to “play well together.” That concept is at the heart of Jill Vialet’s revolutionary work. But at a time when there are so many perceived threats to our well-being from external forces, how can we convince leaders of the importance of play? And what unique value does play bring to our schools and communities?

Guest: Jill Vialet

Resources and Expanded Show Notes

Full Transcript

In This Episode:

• “We're not totally comfortable with silly. We are a culture that, you know, in many ways, still very much buys into sort of the Horatio Alger myth about pulling yourself up by the bootstraps and, you know, it's diligence and hard work that's going to overcome obstacles..I just think teachers and people in schools are in a really difficult position.” (6:04)
• “I think one of the things that play tells us over and over again is, given the right sort of stepping stones to achieve that, kids are capable of quite rigorous negotiation and compromise and insight around how to take care of each other. So often, I would say, better than their adult counterparts.” (16:25)
• “I think our kids are amazing. And, and they are capable of so much and we need them so desperately to find their own agency and leadership. Like the very future of our planet is, is depending on their ability to do a better job than we have done. And so I feel like trust your gut, they can do it.” (19:45)
• “ I think American democracy has always been an experiment. Some aspects maybe need to be rethought. We've gotten a little sclerotic in our willingness to be innovative in democracy. But again, a playfulness, a willingness to experiment, a sort of-- an openness to tapping creativity and how we do it. Like, and again, it's like, think about, if you are an educator listening, about the kids. If you think about kids playing, their ability to self handicap, like Jill and Tim, you switch sides. Like that's a pretty nuanced human interaction. Or like, Ooh, this rule is not working. Let's, let's change it up so that, like, this is the boundary instead. Like that spontaneous sort of re-imagining of how we work together, that's what's needed for us to navigate this moment.” (24:38)
• “I guess I'm hoping that we come to recognize that actually the education of our youngest citizens is foundational to our ability to navigate the current challenges we seek, whether that's climate or misinformation or all the myriad things that are worrisome in this moment. That ultimately educating our young people well, it's, it's the only hope that we will actually address any of these challenges. But to do that, you need humans who are cared for as well.” (34:25)

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January 2022 Bonus Episode: Designing Backward to Move Forward

What is the goal of modern education, and are we designing our schools and practices properly to help us meet that goal? That’s the central question of this episode with Jay McTighe, who provides a detailed road map to help educators navigate the answers. What should a school’s mission statement actually include? What is the most productive and meaningful structure for “professional development” days? And what are we missing when we focus on covering content instead of designing our classrooms for deeper learning?

Guest: JayMcTighe

Resource List:

• Jay’s website: Follow his work and keep up with Jay’s latest news and thought leadership.
• Understanding by Design: Delve into the framework Jay developed with Grant Wiggins to help provide a planning process and structure for schools.
• Books by Jay: Add Jay’s published works to your reading list.
• Jay’s articles on ACSD: Read Jay’s writings on topics like “For School Leaders, Reviewing Isolated Lessons isn’t Enough,” “Assessing Deeper Learning After a Year of Change,” and more.
• What is Understanding by Design? Watch a video interview with Jay as he breaks down the key concepts of the framework.
• A Conversation on Assessment: Jay joins Carol Ann Tomlinson and Dylan Wiliam for a recorded webinar on assessment practices.

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We are excited to share an episode from our sister NAIS podcast, Member Voices, which features stories from the independent school community.

This episode shares the story of Logan Bowlds, Head of School at Stratford Academy, who talks about what it was like to be appointed head of school at age 29, how he got to this point in his career so quickly, and how he finds balance with two young kids at home.

The episode was released July 1, 2019, when Logan was a brand new head of school. Member Voices also recently aired a 3-episode miniseries taking a closer look at the transition to headship.

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After a season of conversations about education, leadership, and the future, we’re pausing to reflect. What changes do we need to make to our systems and practices to best support students in navigating a future shaped by the events of 2020? Teaching and learning through a pandemic and a period of historic social and political change has exposed cracks in our system—but also surprising strengths. What have we learned to value more highly in our learning environments? What new, meaningful contributions were made by students, and what enabled them to make those contributions? And how do we design new, better systems of education that support the changes we want to introduce?

Guests: Ashley Harper, Wakefield School; Lisa Waller, Berkeley Carroll School; Luthern Williams, New Roads School

Resource List:Wakefield School: Learn more about Ashley’s school community in The Plains, VA.

Berkeley Carroll School: Explore Lisa Waller’s school community in Brooklyn, NY.

New Roads School: Get acquainted with Luthern’s school community in Santa Monica, CA.

Entry on New Roads’ Innovation on Hundred.org: Take a deeper dive into the innovative practices supporting the liberation of human potential at New Roads.

In This Episode:“If I was to center education around three principles in the future, it needs to center on knowing yourself, seeking to understand others, and finding your purpose. I think those are the three most important elements of education.” (5:12)

“And so for me, I think the role of education has to be now foundationally to provide a foundation for well-being—and, you know, as the basis for liberating human potential, in all of its forms, and helping the kids understand how to function in a variety of contexts. And sometimes when they don't have the skill, to create the skill, that they need to improve upon our condition and to serve the common good.” (9:08)

“I always say in a school, there is no one who is not an educator. Everyone in the school is an educator, and that's the sort of position and posture that everyone should take.” (17:57)

“When the pandemic hit, we were doing all of this work, and good work, and we were moving forward and I was proud of what we were doing, but I felt like in many ways we were taking very incremental moves. And something bold had happened and incremental moves weren't going to make it. And so in that moment, I said...I want you to do what's right for the students in your estimation. We have 48 hours for you to pivot from one style of learning to another style of learning for our students. And I trust you.” (19:18)

“We have to move to having the drummer's instinct. And that is an urge not to lead people, but to be part of it in rhythm with others. And I think that that's a piece of what each of the heads have said, is that we have grown and learned so much by letting go of those instincts, by being vulnerable, by being humble. And so, if I have a huge hope for the future for leaders, it's that we all adopt the drummer's instinct.” (23:54)

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Are we being good ancestors? This thought-provoking question strikes at the heart of what it means to design for the future. What can school leaders do right now, in the present, to ensure that long-term thinking is a pervasive, prominent practice in our schools? How can we overcome the daily short-term pressures of educational settings to take a future-focused approach to teaching, learning, planning, and innovating? And what would schools look like if we modeled seventh-generation leadership in everything we do?

In many ways, school leadership is immediate, present-focused work. Leaders must respond to constantly changing daily circumstances, external pressures, and influences. Never has this immediacy been more clear than the past 18 months, when school leaders have had to constantly adapt and react with real urgency to shifting guidelines, precautions, and safety concerns while continuing to provide a valuable educational experience. But all this quick, reactive decision-making can lead us to neglect long-term thinking—the kind of deliberative planning and forecasting that allows us to create sustainable, nurturing systems that will serve not just today’s students, but the students of the future.

In this episode—in the temporary absence of co-host Tim Fish—Lisa Kay Solomon sits down with Roman Krznaric to dig deeply into the concept of being a “good ancestor.” Roman, a public philosopher, bestselling author, and founder of the world’s first empathy museum, explains how the good ancestor framework can be a foundational guiding principle for school leaders. Starting from the place of asking what legacy our present-day decisions will leave for future generations, Roman traces good ancestor thinking from indigenous cultures to present-day innovations in Canada and Japan. He shares how grounding futures thinking in a deep understanding of empathy can lead people to make radically different choices than they would make under other conditions. And he makes the argument that the way we approach strategic planning may not actually be very future-focused at all.

Roman challenges us to make the future both real and felt by bringing future generations into the room. He examines embodied practices like role play and costuming as ways to envision the future as part of our present communities. Roman also raises the question of approaching long-term thinking as community-building: Why are we able to expand our ideas about impact to people who live at a geographic distance from us, but not to people who will live in our own locations years from now? How will we be remembered by those future residents, and how can our current decision-making have a positive impact on their lives? Roman makes the case that schools are already inherently a long-term setting, providing educational foundations that will serve students 10 or 20 years down the road. But what innovations might we create if we started to think farther into the future, beyond 20 years, and design our schools for generations ahead? And what potential might we unlock in our students right now by starting to teach them to look up from the instant gratification of their curated worlds, and think about the worlds they want their children to inhabit?

Some of the key questions Lisa explores in this interview include:

• How can school leaders not only take a longer-term view, but communicate that stance clearly to their key stakeholders—parents, the board, alumni, etc.?
• Although our brains are vulnerable to short-term distractions, The Good Ancestor also makes the case that we’re hardwired for long-term thinking. What’s the difference between our marshmallow brains and our acorn brains, and how do we train ourselves—and our students—to be more attuned to acorn thinking?
• How can we practice the kind of long-term, good ancestor thinking that ensures our school community’s values are sustained and upheld through future generations? And how does this kind of thinking impact the way we design and plan for priorities like capital campaigns?
• Can good ancestor thinking help leaders to design truly diverse, collaborative conversations that invite multiple perspectives, rather than designing conversations that subtly seek buy-in to decisions that have already been made?
• How can we use good ancestor thinking and long-term perspective taking to inform our study of history? Can we begin to teach students to examine events both backward and forward—with consideration for how history informs what is happening in the present, and will inform the future?

Resource List:

• Roman’s website: Dive into more of Roman’s work, including videos, cartoons, graphics, and resources for expanding your understanding of good ancestor thinking.
• The Empathy Museum: Explore the world’s first empathy museum and the “Mile in your shoes” exhibit.
• The Man Who Planted Trees: The short story by Jean Giono, which Roman cites as an inspiration for his own work.
• The David Suzuki Foundation: A future-focused climate sustainability foundation that embodies good ancestor principles.
• Future Design in Japan: Read more about the municipal planning practice Roman discusses in this episode.
• Roots of Empathy Curriculum: Get more information about the evidence-based program reducing childhood aggression and increasing social competencies.

In This Episode:

• “What I mean by conceptual emergency around long-term thinking is that I think most of us have picked up newspapers, looked at websites and things, and seen people talking about the incredible short-termism of society, whether it's the fact that our politicians can't see beyond the next election or even the latest tweet, or businesses can't see beyond the quarterly report or a market spike and crash and speculative bubbles.And we're constantly looking at our phones.” (2:17)
• “Let's not just step into the shoes of people who are maybe voiceless or marginalized in today's world. Let's try and step into the shoes of future generations.” (8:20)
• “You know, in many ways we know we are the inheritors of very positive legacies from the past, you know, legacies of cities we still live in, or medical discoveries we still benefit from. But we also know we're the inheritors of very negative or destructive legacies, legacies of colonialism and slavery and racism that create deep inequities that must now be repaired, or legacies of economies that are structurally addicted to endless growth and fossil fuels that must now be transformed. And that raises a question. You know, about what are we going to pass on to the next generation, given what we've inherited, which bits do we want to keep and which bits do we want to move on from?” (8:50)
• “And it's to recognize that, you know, like for me, my 12-year-old daughter could easily be alive in the year 2100, you know, that future isn't science fiction. It's an intimate family fact, and caring about the lives of someone now in the future is kind of what schools are all about, right? Because it's about giving kids something great in their lives today, but also about doing something for their lives into the long future and giving them the tools that they need to survive and thrive in a very uncertain and turbulent world.” (21:11)
• “A satisfying conversation is one that makes you say things you have never said before.” (32:32)
• “I think just that question of recognizing who I am as a leader, you know, the definition of a leader, in a way, needs to be inspired by the idea of seventh-generation decision-making. A good leader is one that's thinking seven generations ahead, let's say, as a rule of thumb. And that is a leadership quality that has worked for indigenous peoples for thousands of years, you know, it's a form of ecological stewardship, but the stewardship that a school leader has is also a kind of a social stewardship, you know, about the community they're creating and they're generating and regenerating.” (41:11)

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About Our Guest:

Roman Krznaric is a public philosopher who writes about the power of ideas to change society. His latest book is The Good Ancestor: How to Think Long Term in a Short Term World. His previous international bestsellers, including Empathy, The Wonderbox and Carpe Diem Regained, have been published in more than 20 languages.

After growing up in Sydney and Hong Kong, Roman studied at the universities of Oxford, London, and Essex, where he gained his Ph.D. in political sociology. He is founder of the world’s first Empathy Museum and is currently a research fellow of the Long Now Foundation.

Roman has been named by The Observer as one of Britain’s leading popular philosophers. His writings have been widely influential amongst political and ecological campaigners, education reformers, social entrepreneurs, and designers. An acclaimed public speaker, his talks and workshops have taken him from a London prison to the TED global stage.

Roman has previously been an academic, a gardener, and worked on human rights issues in Guatemala. He is also a fanatical player of the medieval sport of “real tennis” and has a passion for making furniture.

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How do we support our young people in becoming independent, thriving, adaptable, confident learners? How do we encourage them to develop a sense of their own agency and shape their lives, rather than having their lives dictated to them? And what is the role of schools in creating capable, responsible adults -- not just high-stat students who achieve academically but struggle to “adult” beyond the classroom?

The impact of the college admissions race on students and schools is becoming increasingly clear. While students pursue an ever-growing number of advanced courses, impressive extracurricular achievements and other “resume-builders” to boost their chances of getting into top colleges, educators and parents are taking stock of the other skills that seem to have fallen by the wayside. Is the pursuit of academic excellence at all costs leading to a generation of students who don’t know how to handle the basic tasks of adulthood? Julie Lythcott-Haims, NY Times bestselling author of “Your Turn,” “Real American,” and “How to Raise an Adult,” joins New View EDU to shed light on how our current concepts in education may be inadvertently restricting students’ growth.

In this episode, hosts Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon talk with Julie about her personal concept of “rooting for humans” and her investment in helping all people thrive. A former dean at Stanford, Julie shares how her own observations about the emerging harm of helicopter parenting led her to begin exploring how young people suffer when they’re deprived of opportunities to develop agency, self-determination and problem-solving skills. She urges school leaders to consider how responsibility and care for the community can be infused into the school experience from the youngest ages, rather than left as “community service hours” check boxes for older students to complete. And in the wake of the pandemic, Julie encourages all adults to reconsider their definitions of both service and success -- understanding that no child can be considered to have “failed” when confronted with a global crisis, and that for many students, stepping up to help at home to fulfill a need may have been the highest form of service possible.

More deeply, Julie examines the ways in which true inclusion and care for every student make a stark difference in the educational landscape. Who “matters” in each school and classroom, and how can educators examine the evidence presented to them that shows which students feel seen and which don’t? What can educators do to commit to creating school cultures where each and every student feels that they matter deeply to someone? And how can school leaders ensure that everyone within their communities understands, commits to and lives the values upon which the school is founded, using those values to invest deeply in relationships that uplift every person?

Some of the key questions Tim and Lisa explore in this interview include:

• What opportunity currently exists for school leaders to let go of practices that don’t serve their values, and embrace changes that do?
• How do we design schools to deliberately embrace relationship-building and connection as core concepts, not secondary to test prep and rigor?
• In what ways might we be able to redefine concepts like SEL and service learning to become more joyful, integrated and internalized, and less performative?
• How can schools create cultures that support “fending” skills from the youngest ages, and why is it important to do so?

Resource List:

• Your Turn: Julie’s bestselling book about “how to be an adult.”
• The Your Turn Study Guide: A helpful resource for using Julie’s book to start “fending” and finding your voice.
• Julie’s inspiring talks: Watch Julie speak on topics relevant to parents, educators, and young people who are trying to grow into competent adults.
• Hunt, Gather, Parent: The new book by Michaeleen Doucleff Julie mentions in this interview
• The Daily SEL Leader: Julie’s recommended book for educators looking to improve their SEL practices
• Hella Social Impact and Vaya Consulting: Two organizations Julie recommends to help schools level up their DEI efforts.

In This Episode:

• “You don't just sort of give someone the opportunity to fend at their 18th birthday. It doesn't happen that way. Fending is intrinsically about skills. You don't, we don't go from handling everything for kids to them suddenly being capable of doing for themselves. That's called being cut off cold turkey, and it's cruel, and it leads to, you know, can lead to real devastating results. So we are definitely in for a reframe.” (8:16)
• “At a very practical level, Home Ec and shop class-- Home Ec and shop class were terrific places to learn some of the fending skills. And in many communities, those courses have gone the way of the dinosaur because we've gotten so enamored of what we think of as enrichment, which we think is only the hardcore academic stuff. So we've jettisoned the stuff of life out the window, and we shouldn't be surprised that we graduate people with high GPAs, who cannot do much for themselves.” (10:17)
• “I try to hone in on the root, the Latin root educare, you know, educate, educare. Educare, I'm told-- I was never a student of Latin, but I have learned-- means to bring forth. And I tell educators, what's your subject? And they'll say French, Latin, Spanish, Math, English, History, Art, Music, et cetera. And I'll challenge that. I'll say, isn't your student the subject? Aren't you bringing your student forth, and simply your expertise-- math-- is, is what you use to bring them forth?” (14:15)
• “Our educators are hurting. They're, they're stretched so thin. They've been burning the candle at both ends and in the middle. And we all need to restore the self, if we have any hope of being of use to other humans. And when we can walk that walk, then I think we are reshaping education and reshaping the experience our children have within it.” (20:15)
• “You know, for some kids, they're just proud they're alive, and we need to celebrate that because people were pushed to the brink. So celebrating, recognizing the stronger capacities and emotional strength that was built because of this struggle. That would be an important thing, I think, to embed at least into this coming fall, if not to make it a part of a much bigger practice.” (27:31)

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About Our Guest:

Julie Lythcott-Haims believes in humans and is deeply interested in what gets in our way. She is the New York Times bestselling author of the anti-helicopter parenting manifesto How to Raise an Adult which gave rise to a TED Talk that has more than 5 million views. Her second book is the critically-acclaimed and award-winning prose poetry memoir Real American, which illustrates her experience as a Black and biracial person in white spaces. A third book, Your Turn: How to Be an Adult, is out now.

Julie is a former corporate lawyer and Stanford dean, and she holds a BA from Stanford, a JD from Harvard, and an MFA in Writing from California College of the Arts. She serves on the board of Common Sense Media, and on the advisory board of LeanIn.Org. She volunteers with the hospital program No One Dies Alone.

She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her partner of over thirty years, their itinerant young adults, and her mother.

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The way we understand equity in our schools is constantly evolving. Students and staff in our communities reflect a broader and richer spectrum of identity, heritage, and self-discovery at this moment than at any other moment in American history. Yet educational practice is still catching up, and the students most likely to be heavily impacted by trauma, such as the spectrum of recent events, are students of color, students with disabilities, and learners from other marginalized communities. How can a deeper understanding of the struggle for true equity in education inform the way we design schools and learning opportunities in the future? And what opportunities would exist for our school communities if we learned how to design education to be truly inclusive of all voices and perspectives from the very beginning?

As educators and school leaders hone their methods in response to a growing understanding of the importance of representation and culturally responsive practices in the classroom, New View EDU dives into the subject with a transformative conversation on the power of structured imagination in creating inclusive cultures. Guests Lonny Brooks and Ahmed Best are, together, the co-hosts of the Afrofuturist podcast and creators of the game Afro-Rithms From the Future.Lonny is also a futurist, scholar, professor of communications, and co-principal investigator for the Long Term and Futures Thinking in Education Project; Ahmed is an award-winning actor best known for his role as Jar Jar Binks in the Star Wars films, as well as a writer, director, producer, futurist, and science fiction devotee. They delve into how their shared understanding of the future-thinking orientation inherent in the Black American experience, and the lack of representation of the Black community in the science fiction and gaming worlds, led to their creation of a communal game experience devoted to “democratizing the future.” They also share what their work means for educators and schools everywhere.

“For every algorithm of oppression, we have to have an Afrorithm of liberation.” What are Afrorithms? What does the concept of an “algorithm of oppression” mean for the way we build systems and structures throughout our society? Lonny and Ahmed trace the importance of futurist thinking from the historical realities of the slave trade, through the Drinking Gourd and the Underground Railroad, to the present day. With a keen eye toward the voices that are invited to tell and shape stories, and the perspectives that are left out, they examine how marginalization of different communities has shaped a culture that doesn’t fully reflect its full diversity of heritage, ethnicity, experience, or thought.

In this episode, hosts Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon ask Lonny and Ahmed to share the inspiration and process behind the creation of their imaginative gameplay experience, and how they have consciously structured a virtual world that invites inclusive participation. Exploring how sensitivity to the importance of every individual’s perspective and intrinsic value develops student agency, Lonny and Ahmed reflect on the ways in which educational and social structures may stifle the emergence of vitally needed new voices and points of view. A rich and nuanced discussion sheds light on the growth of Afrofuturism and the potential the discipline holds for transforming the way we learn, share, communicate, and build our future worlds, In what ways do we need to interrogate our well-meaning current practices and beliefs to create meaningful long-term change? And what would education for the next generation look like if we radically shifted practices to bridge divides and intentionally design a more inclusive future?

Some of the key questions Tim and Lisa explore in this interview include:

• How do we bring structured imagination into our classrooms and communities to reimagine more just, equitable, and abundant futures?
• What role does the future—or futurism—play in helping us better understand the present?
• In what ways can school leaders and communities intentionally bring more future-oriented practices into their planning and into their classrooms?
• What is the value of being “seen,” and what does it take to become a “seer” of our students and community members?

Resource List:

• The Afrofuturist Podcast: Learn more about Afrofuturism and Lonny and Ahmed’s work by listening to their podcast.
• Afro-Rithms From the Future: Check out Ahmed and Lonny’s immersive game to democratize the future.
• Institute for the Future: Familiarize yourself with Lonny’s work as a research affiliate for IFTF.
• The Long Now Foundation: Check out the work of a foundation dedicated to long-term thinking.
• Afro-Rithms in Action: See Afro-Rithms From the Future played in this video from Fathomers.
• Community Futures School: Learn about Lonny’s work to bring futures thinking and imagination to education.
• Black Speculative Arts Movement: Dive deeper into the world of Afrofuturism and structured imagination.

In This Episode:

• “Afrofuturism is a combination of speculative fiction and science fiction and fantasy to envision alternative futures and memories about—about the future, leveraging our ancestral intelligence from the Black Diaspora, indigenous, people of color, but fundamentally based in the Black experience of the Middle Passage.” (2:12)
• “I think African people and those of African descent have always had the futurist mindset, the futurist thinking, and you know what I, what I like to talk about when we play Afro-Rithms, our game, is how as enslaved Africans were brought throughout the Western world, we had no choice but to look forward to a time where enslavement wasn't a possibility. Even the idea of the Civil Rights movement, and even before that, when we're talking about, you know, the 14th, 15th, 16th amendments in the United States, you have to be a futurist in the thinking in order to convince a body, a governmental body of which you have no representation in, that you are worth being moved from commodity to an actual human being.” (4:48)
• “A lot of times with futures thinking, people don't invest the amount of time that I think is necessary into futures thinking because they believe they can't afford it. Right. I think most people look at the past and try to learn from the past, and hedge the present on the past without looking forward to the future.” (10:03)
• “The screen is a portal to the universe. And if you are not taking advantage of the portal to the universe, the students are going to find another way to do it.” (11:25)
• “And I just think, you know, like with any language, the kids come to it more naturally. They are like the natural linguists in adopting that language and implementing it. So my students, you know, have access to putting in—implementing their voices, and especially their own cultural experiences into the game, that really expands and gets them excited about doing this work.” (22:00)
• “What I am interested in is letting you know that you are the only you in this universe, and that is special. And I want to hear what you have to say, right? I don't want you to do algebra. I want you to do your algebra. What does that mean? I don't want you to learn history. I want you to be able to learn history your way, right?” (30:21)
• “But I think what's tantamount, what's really important, is we have to, to stop thinking about the 20th century industrial age type of thinking where everybody's going to be on an assembly line and get a job. I think we have to move more toward the individual idea of the process of each person. Believe that each student is special in their own right. And give the student the ability to get a dream rather than get a job.” (34:12)

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About Our Guests:

Ahmed Best was a founding member of the acid jazz group The Jazzhole and starred in the Broadway musical Stomp. He then went on to be the first CGI lead character in a motion picture, starring as Jar Jar Binks in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith.

A graduate of the American Film Institute, Ahmed is an Ovation Award, LACC Award, Stage Raw Award, and Annie Award winner. He’s the executive producer of The DL Chronicles (GLAAD award winner for Best Anthology series); co-director of the web series Bandwagon; and the creator, writer, and director for the web series This Can't Be My Life and the sci-fi comedy The Nebula. Ahmed is addicted to culture and devoted to the future.

Lonny J Avi Brooks is an associate professor in the communication department at California State University, East Bay, which is, in turn, part of the newly formed School of Arts Media. He teaches in the public, professional, and organizational concentration in communication, and he is the co-principal investigator for the Long Term and Futures Thinking in Education Project. He has piloted the integration of long term and futures thinking into his communication courses for the last four years.

His current manuscript is Working in the Future Tense@Futureland: Circulating Afrofuturetypes of Work, Culture and Racial Identity (in review). His latest articles include the forthcoming “Minority Reports from 2054: Building Collective and Critical Forecasting Imaginaries and Afrofuturetypes in Game Jamming”for the special 2018 issue of the Canadian journal TOPIA: Black Lives, Black Politics, Black Futures, and “Cruelty and Afrofuturism,” a special commentary section for the Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies journal. With Dr. Reynaldo Anderson, Lonny published “Student Visions of Multiple Urban Futures 2050” in Envisioning Futures for Environmental and Sustainability Education.

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Complexity deserves an improvised response. In the wake of more than a year of uncertainty, our impulses may be to more tightly control and script the experience of school. But what opportunities might reveal themselves if we instead learn to let go and apply the principles of improvisation to leading our communities? With greater flexibility and a spirit of possibility, can we use this moment to imagine School 2.0?

Structure is, and always has been, an important element of school. We create systems, benchmarks, routines, schedules, and ways of “doing school” that allow us to measure and define the learning process. But we know that too much structure can have its downsides, sometimes sapping creativity, joy, and inspiration from the experience of school. How can school leaders create the right amount of structure to support emerging agency while giving space for new ideas? And how can we learn to view challenges or setbacks as new possibilities instead of disruptions? Author, co-founder of the online learning space Yellow, and associate fellow at Oxford’s Saïd Business School Rob Poynton joins New View EDU to share how improvisation can be a game-changer for school leaders.

In this episode, hosts Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon chat with Rob Poynton about how schools can become more Yellow—or in other words, how the same thoughtful, seemingly loosely structured approaches to learning and discovery Rob has designed in his online learning space might be adapted to K-12 schools. Leading from the insight that improvisation is actually a discipline with its own set of guidelines and practices, Rob shares the deliberate process behind making choices that set the stage for deeper learning and relationship-building in a classroom. This starts with how entering a room, greeting students, or placing chairs in different locations can all have startling effects on class behavior. Exploring the idea that a longstanding standardized approach to education is poised to give way to something new and different, he encourages school leaders to view improvisation not as a last resort in difficult circumstances, but a daily practice that can be incorporated into this new vision of what school can become.

What, and who, is education for? What’s the necessary and healthy tension between structure and discipline, and freedom and creativity? If both are needed in our schools, how can we learn to constantly adapt to the right levels to allow our communities to grow and thrive? And how can we use challenges as springboards to new possibilities—moving from a problem-solving mindset to one that acknowledges that not all problems can be solved, but all problems can lead to potential growth? Rob reminds us that we can’t plan for every outcome, control every circumstance, resolve every challenge, or fill every moment. Instead, he urges school leaders to lean into the power of pause, let go of the need for certainty, and invite every member of their communities to join them in co-creative action as they reimagine what the next version of school could be.

Some of the key questions Tim and Lisa explore in this interview include:

• How can school leaders set up environments that reflect where they want to go, not just where they’ve always been?
• What is the value and power of “pause,” and how is intentionally pausing part of good leadership practice?
• How can we learn to reframe challenges and concerns, such as worry over possible “learning loss,” with a spirit of possibility? How can we learn to approach problems not correctively, but creatively?
• What does it look like to invite others to co-create a community of learning?
• How can we become more willing and able to support risk-taking in our schools?

Resource List:

• Rob’s Website: Learn more about Rob and his unique approach to using improvisational theater to improve leadership practices.
• Yellow: Check out Rob’s online learning space, offering “generative and re-generative learning journeys for the real world.”
• Do Pause: Rob’s most recent book explores the power of pause in life and leadership.
• Do Improvise: Rob’s foundational work on how the practice of improvisation can benefit all disciplines.

In This Episode:

• “You know, so if you take that last piece of practice, use everything, one of my favorite ways to think about that is to reframe any shortage, shortcoming, error, or mistake as an offer. And this is really important. It's not about being Pollyannaish and saying, oh, it's all lovely, it's not about that at all. It's about being much more pragmatic and saying, OK, this has just been canceled or we don't have the budget or there's no time.How can we use the fact that there is no time?” (10:50)
• “You know, in improvisation, it's not true that we don't prepare. We don't plan in a detailed, detailed kind of micromanaging anticipatory way, but we do a huge amount of a different kind of preparation. We prepare for a territory, not a path, if you will.” (26:50)
• “Sometimes we forget that the decisions or choices we make about where to put our attention have what I would call an energetic cost. And so if you choose to spend your time focusing on those things you shouldn't do, and that you have to avoid for compliance, and we all understand how important that is and you obviously can't, you know, you can't shirk that, but if all your energy, and if the mood that accompanies it goes on that, the energetic cost is ... you know, we're all now so exhausted and tired and neurotic and paranoid that, that nobody's going to dare suggest something new or different, or let alone outlandish or playful or crazy.” (32:36)
• “There are costs attached to safety. I know that sounds completely weird, but, you know, there's a lovely quote from Keith Johnston, who's a guru in the improv theater world, but this one is so deeply relevant to all walks of life, particularly teaching and education. ‘Those few people who say yes are rewarded by the adventures they have. Those people who say no are rewarded by the security they attain. Unfortunately, there are more no sayers than yes sayers.’" (34:21)
• “Pause is not the opposite of action. It's part of action. So pausing is not stopping. It's not surrendering. Pauses enable people to act more effectively more quickly. If you never pause, pause will be forced upon you.” (40:15)

Full Transcript

About Our Guest:

Robert Poynton is the founder of Yellow learning, an online space for regenerative learning, and author of Do Pause and Do Improvise.

He lives in rural Spain, in a remote, off-grid house, and is a co-founder of On Your Feet— a consultancy based in Portland, Oregon. He is also an associate fellow of the Saïd Business School at the University of Oxford, where he works on Leadership Programmes, using improv theater as a tool to explore complexity.

Rob believes in playing around with things (and people) rather than trying to control them, and is fascinated by the power of place and the absurdity of human attempts to control ourselves, other people, and things around us.

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Are we creating school environments that allow us to see the “assumed awesomeness” in everyone? Now, more than ever before, school leadership is about modeling hope, resilience, and a sense of possibility, so we can support our communities in developing their collective superpowers.

School leadership has never been easy, but at this moment in particular, there are new challenges and opportunities that could completely transform school, for better or worse. What is the role of a leader at this point in time? What are the practices that will help school leaders navigate the ambiguity and uncertainty ahead while staying true to a vision for their communities? This year, and the years ahead, are going to be a test of resilience, trust and courage. And to pass the test, CEO coach, author, and executive director of the Fuqua/Coach K Center on Leadership and Ethics at Duke University Sanyin Siang believes we’ll have to make a fundamental shift to prioritizing relationships in our schools.

In this episode, hosts Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon invite Sanyin Siang to apply her learnings from working with top leaders from the military, athletics, and global entrepreneurship to the school setting. What are the essential understandings, skills, and practices school leaders can adapt from other settings to create dynamic and supportive environments for students and staff? How can we learn from the legacies of great leaders like Coach K to transform our own teams and live lives of significance? It’s a big topic to tackle at a time when many are focused on just getting students back to school and back to the traditions and systems we recognize. But Sanyin argues that in this moment of transformation, we have a unique opportunity to adapt our practices to help our schools thrive in a rapidly changing world.

Examining resilience through the lens of leadership, Sanyin explains how individual resilience must give way to a deeper understanding of collective resilience. She offers insights into the difference between developing learning environments for transactional education—such as knowledge acquisition—and developing learning environments for relational education that recognizes the personal contributions each person can make to a team. And she vividly paints the picture of leadership as an art form that chips away all but the “assumed awesomeness” in each person, leaving every student and staff member ready to develop their own superpowers.

Some of the key questions Tim and Lisa explore in this interview include:

• How can seeing themselves as coaches help school leaders model more effective practices?
• How can we see the full range of value and possibility inherent in every person within our school communities?
• What does it look like to honor the contributions of each person to a larger team dynamic, rather than focusing on individual achievements? How can we measure the impact of great “assists?”
• What does it mean to live a life of significance, and how do we shift our leadership practices to model and support lives of significance for everyone in our communities?

Resource List:

• The Fuqua/Coach K Center on Leadership and Ethics: Learn more about the center’s work on leadership and listen to its “Life of Significance” podcast series.
• Sanyin’s Forbes Profile: Read Sanyin’s articles on ethical leadership strategy.
• The Launch Book: Motivational Stories to Launch Your Idea, Business or Next Career: Sanyin’s latest book on leadership and inspiration.
• How You Build Resilience for the Long Haul: Sanyin’s article on resilience, which Lisa quotes during the episode.

In This Episode:

• “When we look at our students, we're dealing with human possibilities here. Why can't we look at our teams the same way and say, ‘Hey, I wonder what awesomeness there is that have yet to be discovered about you, that you don't even realize, and how we can draw that out?’” (5:48)
• “I know the great coaches all care deeply and want to see only the best things happen for the person they're working with.” (9:03)
• “I think we're also moving from eras of transaction to eras of relationship. When you think about knowledge acquisition, that can feel transactional. Knowledge is very individualistic. But the world is moving so fast, no one single person could have the answers. And so we now are moving to a world of, instead of individuals, to teams. And so with moving to this world of teams, we have to talk about relationships.” (12:51)
• “And one thing I know about us high achievers is we tend to play our mistakes over and over and over in our head. Instead of thinking about them as mistakes and failures, can we just reframe failures as simply outcomes different than the ones we had hoped for or anticipated?” (19:39)
• “And what we've discovered is some key themes such as big moments matter, but to be true in the big moments, you have to be true in the small moments. And moments, moments matter.” (38:20)
• “What is the real role of education? Is it only about knowledge? Is it creating workers for the economy? Or is it about something bigger, more purposeful than that, which is unleashing human possibilities? Because teachers, I think the reason why we think of teachers, is they were among the first to really see us. And when we see someone that's how we matter.” (39:22)

Full Transcript

About Our Guest:

Sanyin Siang is on a mission to discover and enable greatness in others. Whether it’s in her work as a CEO coach, educator, startup advisor, or author, she teaches individuals and organizations to find the champions within themselves and gives them the tools to keep on winning.

Sanyin co-founded and leads Duke University's Coach K Center on Leadership and Ethics at its Fuqua School of Business and is a professor with Duke's Pratt School of Engineering. The center is a leadership laboratory that convenes think-tank gatherings across sectors to explore today’s complex leadership challenges. Sanyin has worked with four-star generals, world-class CEOs, athletes, and Nobel laureates.

Her ideas on leading innovation, storytelling, culture in an age of disruption, and sports business have been featured in The New York Times, Fortune, Forbes, and The Wall Street Journal. She was named to LinkedIn’s Top 20 Global Influencer Voices in 2017 and 2018. She is a member of the 86th Joint Civilian Orientation Conference, the Department of Defense’s oldest civilian program. Her book, The Launch Book: Motivational Stories for Launching Your Idea, Business, or Next Career, inspires readers through stories of different leaders and gives them an action plan for leveraging change using behavioral science concepts.

She is also an advisor for GV (Google Ventures) and Sports Innovation Lab, a faculty member with Story Lab at Duke, and serves on the boards of the Emily K Center and North Carolina Museum of Life and Science.

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What does it mean to be a citizen of this world, of our community, and of our future? What does “citizen” mean, anyway? And what is the role of schools in growing citizens—or what should it be?

The current reality facing schools is one of rapidly changing social and political conditions that affect educators, students, and communities as a whole. Whether it’s a question of how personal choices impact collective health, or finding the right balance in helping a school community process and respond to current events, school leaders are grappling with the role of educators in teaching citizen behavior in the classroom. Does our current “civics” curriculum go far enough in helping students identify ways they can become engaged members of a thriving society? Or is “civics” just the tip of the iceberg, leaving the larger topics of developing personal agency and community engagement unexplored in our schools?

In this episode, Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon are joined by Baratunde Thurston, award-winning writer, activist, comedian, and host of the podcast How to Citizen With Baratunde. Together, they explore the idea of changing our mindset about the word “citizen,” from engaging with it as a noun to treating it as a verb—a set of guiding principles that can be translated into actions each person can take to contribute to society. Rather than thinking about “citizen” as describing where someone is from, Baratunde argues that we should think about it as describing how people behave as members of a community, and that schools should take an active role in helping students develop proactive citizen behaviors that will serve them, and their communities, well.

Baratunde shares his “four pillars” of How to Citizen, as well as personal stories about how his experiences as a student at an independent school shaped his own worldview and citizen behaviors. He also explores ideas about the different ways in which school leaders, educators, and students can understand the concept of power and how both individuals and institutions can exercise power effectively. Lisa, Tim, and Baratunde delve together into questions about how schools can create environments that encourage students to clarify their own perspectives, engage in respectful debate, and find ways to participate in creating the change they want to see in their communities.

Some of the key questions Tim and Lisa explore in this interview about growing citizens and developing thriving citizen behaviors at school include:

• How does teaching students “how to citizen” fit into our broader ideas about the purpose of schools?
• Why, and how, should school leaders encourage the active teaching of “citizen” as a verb at this particular moment in history?
• How can schools provide appropriate opportunities for students to practice personal agency and changemaking?
• What’s the difference between teaching civics and teaching citizening—and how can schools become more deliberate about including both?

Resource List:

• Baratunde’s Podcast: Listen to How to Citizen, the podcast that inspired Tim and Lisa’s conversation with Baratunde about the role of schools in growing citizens.
• Baratunde’s Newsletter: Sign up to get regular updates from Baratunde and learn more about his work.
• Living While Black: NBC’s Brian Williams called Baratunde’s TED Talk “one of the greatest of all time.”

In This Episode:

• “I think the founding of public education, citizenship was a key element. And I remember always wondering, like, what did we mean when we said school was a place where we would create citizens? And are we in fact doing that? Have we ever really done it effectively? And for whom or what, who did we think of as a citizen and what opportunities were available?” (2:19)
• “(To be a citizen) is not just to be born in a certain place and inherit rights and privileges, but to live in this practice of self-government. We're trying to live together. We're trying to live together with a lot of difference and we're trying to rule ourselves. Not be ruled by others.” (3:08)
• “We're taught your power is your vote. And your vote is your voice. And it's partially true, but it's not the whole story.” (4:49)
• “It's such a basic concept, but educational institutions are not just there to educate the students. Everyone should be learning. And I think if you're the leader of a school, that does not exempt you from learning, and that's true in every domain where there's this kind of structural power.” (25:01)

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About Our Guest:

Baratunde Thurston holds space for hard and complex conversations with his blend of humor, wisdom, and compassion. Baratunde is an Emmy-nominated host who has worked for The Onion, produced for The Daily Show, advised the Obama White House, and wrote The New York Times bestseller How To Be Black. He’s the executive producer and host of How To Citizen with Baratunde, which Apple named one of its favorite podcasts of 2020. Baratunde also received the Social Impact Award at the 2021 iHeartRadio Podcast Awards on behalf of How to Citizen with Baratunde. In 2019, he delivered what MSNBC’s Brian Williams called “one of the greatest TED talks of all time.” Baratunde is unique in his ability to integrate and synthesize themes of race, culture, politics, and technology to explain where our nation is and where we can take it.

Baratunde serves on the boards of BUILD and the Brooklyn Public Library and lives in Los Angeles, California.

Follow Baratunde on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram: @baratunde

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It’s easy to say “have a good day at school!” But are we actually designing the environments that will support our students and staff in having good days?

In a world that’s only becoming more complex, simple concepts like having a good day can almost feel too rudimentary to think about. School leaders have plenty to do without worrying about who’s having a good day, and who’s not. But having a good day is much more complicated -- and far more important -- than it seems. Some of our most talented staff are burned out. Our highest-achieving students leave the classroom uncertain about their ability to navigate the world with confidence and agency. Leadership expert, executive coach and author Caroline Webb shares the research behind the science of thriving, and how changing your practices to help everyone have better days can fundamentally improve almost every aspect of education.

In this episode, Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon grapple with how weary school leaders, staff and students can summon resilience and optimism to return to the classroom. Infusing schools with positive attitudes that instill lifelong learning dispositions, critical thinking skills, empathy and the ability to thrive seems like a big ask. But it’s also the kind of environment we know will serve students in the long run. Caroline draws upon her extensive experience in using neuroscience and behavioral research to improve leadership practices, applying her practical methods to the school environment.

Caroline’s suggestions for leaders are both concrete and unique. Walking through the neuroscience behind why people react as they do in certain situations, she shares how to stop negative reactions in their tracks and create positive outcomes. She also gives advice to leaders on creating welcoming, affirmative cultures that make “having a good day” more possible for everyone in the school community. And she shares the science of intentionally directing our attention so we can make the most of our time and efforts.

Some of the key questions Tim and Lisa explore in this interview about having a good day and understanding the science of thriving include:

• How do we teach lasting resilience and thriving to our young people?
• How can we deliberately reframe our practices so that we uplift “soft skills” as critical to thriving in the long term?
• We’ve just come through a year of heightened ambiguity and uncertainty. What can we learn from leaders who navigated it successfully? How might we bring those lessons to our leaders and learners?
• How can school leaders encourage and deliberately design workplaces that support “having a good day?”

Resource List:

• Caroline’s Website -- Learn more about Caroline and her work on leadership and behavioral science
• Caroline’s Science Essentials -- The must-have list of scientifically proven practices behind having a good day
• How to Have a Good Day -- Stay up to date with Caroline’s consulting practice and book
• How To Have A Good Day in Uncertain Times -- Caroline’s video series on thriving despite ambiguity
• Behavioral Science Will Be More Important Than Ever in the 4th Industrial Revolution -- “We’re still uniquely placed to reach deep insight and connection with fellow humans, and to display wisdom and innovation in situations where there is no right answer.”

In This Episode:

• “In order to be the best leader you can be, I've seen this time and again, with leaders in very challenging situations, you need to invest in yourself. You need to not see that as a luxury.

You need to take the time to get to know yourself and your patterns, to take a step back perhaps and reflect on the past year and say, okay, now how do I equip myself as best I can for the continued uncertainty that we're all going to face?” (3:40)

• “I'm very much a fan of things that it takes three seconds to do, because I think, you know, our lives are busy and challenging and if an intervention is complex, then there's an excellent chance that we won't end up doing it. So just simply understanding that giving someone a little bolt of appreciation has such disproportionate effects on their state of reward and therefore their state and their ability to think expansively and in discovery mode rather than go on the defensive.” (19:10)
• “Leaders often think they're giving plenty of praise and they're not doing it half as much as they think, and they're not doing it in a way that is as effective as it could be.” (19:50)
• “I can shift my demeanor, then I can shift that person back towards the arms of their better angels.” (31:30)
• “And it's not hard to learn it, except it is.” (37:00)

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About Our Guests:

Caroline Webb is an executive coach, author and speaker known for being one of the world’s leading experts in using insights from behavioral science to improve professional life. Her bestselling book on that topic, How To Have A Good Day, has been published in 14 languages and more than 60 countries. In a previous life she was a Partner at McKinsey and co-founder of their leadership practice, and in an even earlier life she was an economist working on public policy.

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2020 made us think about school safety in a completely different way from before. As we move forward, how can we redefine what we mean by “safety,” and imagine new ways to create school environments, conditions, and cultures of true safety and well-being?

It’s not just physical safety measures, like masks and social distancing, that mark the pandemic as a turning point for school safety. Some experts believe that the main work of educators in 2021—and for the foreseeable future—will be trying to mitigate the effects of COVID-19 and multiple big-picture social and cultural traumas on student achievement. In a landscape where trauma is an ongoing reality of American life for many members of our school communities, how do we envision forward-thinking systems that effectively treat emotional well-being as a core construct for teaching and learning? Celebrated architect Barry Svigals, who helped to reimagine and rebuild Sandy Hook Elementary School after the tragedy, joins us to share his philosophy on school safety. Also with us is Barry’s friend and colleague Sam Seidel, Stanford K12 Lab director of strategy and research.

In this episode, hosts Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon invite Barry and Sam to share the foundations of the work they do to help communities reimagine school safety. Sam shares one of his moments of inspiration, revolving around a personal experience as a visitor during a school shooting drill that led him to question the purpose—and the hidden costs—of some of our common safety practices. Barry delves into the careful, compassionate, and surprising questions he asked school leaders at Sandy Hook when reimagining safety for their community. And both guests talk passionately about the importance of creating linkages between schools and their surrounding neighborhoods to help foster a sense of communal caring.

In addition, Barry and Sam share simple, actionable ideas for exercises schools can implement right away to help them improve well-being and belonging. From starting with love to designing for joy, this conversation about school safety is filled with unexpected approaches to a challenging topic.

Some of the key questions Tim and Lisa explore in this interview include:

• As school leaders think about safety choices they may make for the future—starting “anew”—what should they be considering? What questions should they be asking?
• If “safety is everyone’s job,” what should school leaders know about creating holistic environments of safety for every member of their communities?
• If feeling safe and being safe are two different things, what does it mean to feel safe, and to be safe, at school?
• How do we manage the tension between protecting students from physical threats, while also allowing them to feel a sense of agency and empowerment?

Resource List:

• Questions to Your Answers About School Safety: Barry and Sam’s thoughtfully designed set of 47 guiding questions school leaders and communities can ask to help make empowered decisions about safety in their schools.
• Being Safe and Feeling Safe Are Not the Same Thing: “Pre-pandemic, our national obsession was the rare instances of extreme violence, while far greater problems stemming from an inattention to emotional well-being were often marginalized. But who would believe they were greater?”
• School Safety: Follow the work the Stanford K12 Lab is doing on reimagining school safety.
• Sam Seidel on Medium: Stay up-to-date with Sam’s latest writings on education.
• The Overprotected Kid: “A preoccupation with safety has stripped childhood of independence, risk taking, and discovery—without making it safer.”
• Tim Gill on Child-Friendly Urban Planning and Design: “Children don’t live in cities at all. Children live in neighborhoods. … A neighborhood that’s good for children has lots of choice.”

In This Episode:

• “The methodology that we need to bring to schools is that we need to start with questions. We need to begin with, first, the most fundamental of questions. We don't start with, ‘What kind of chain link fence should we have?’ or ‘What kind of camera systems should we have?’ or ‘Who should we hire to be security resource officers in our school?’ I mean, a whole other host of things that superintendents and administrators of schools very often begin with. It is precisely the wrong place to begin, because as we know, for a hammer, all the world is a nail.” (10:30)
• “What allows for a joyful experience in your school? If all our strategies around school safety are put through that lens, you come up with a whole different set of outcomes.” (13:00)
• “I think we get too often caught up in this idea that it's a zero sum game, that if we prioritize physical safety, we automatically have to sacrifice emotional well-being. Or community.” (20:10)
• “If you want to know something about a school, there are three people you should talk to: the person at the front desk, the person who works in the cafeteria, and the person who is maintaining the school.” (24:30)
• “If you don't think kids can change things, think again. If you ask them to be involved, the most extraordinary things can come of it.” (29:20)

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About Our Guests:

Artist, architect, musician, keynote speaker, and thought leader Barry Svigals is helping communities and organizations become more creative and collaborative, making places that express who they are. Trained as both an artist and an architect, he wove those two worlds together in the founding of an architecture+art firm that he led for more than 30 years. At the heart is his passion to challenge his own creativity as well as the creativity of others in service of what is needed in the world. A graduate of Yale College and the Yale School of Architecture, Barry’s focus on community engagement as well as art enlivening architecture contributed to a long list of projects for diverse clients, among them major universities, corporations, and institutions. The firm’s best known project is the Sandy Hook School in Newtown, Connecticut, completed in 2016.

Sam Seidel thinks, writes, speaks, and designs learning experiences at the intersections of education, race, culture, and design. He is the director of K12 strategy and research at the Stanford d.school. Sam is also the author of Hip Hop Genius. He has taught in a variety of settings, from first grade to community college, and directed youth programs for young people affected by incarceration. He speaks nationally about education issues and writes for the Huffington Post, among other publications.

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Imagine that we have been given the opportunity to completely redesign the concept of school. Where would we go?

During the COVID19 pandemic, educators have been forced to reimagine almost every aspect of school, changing our ideas about what’s truly essential. As we rest, recover and reflect on the past year, we can also refine our vision for the future. NAIS President Donna Orem and celebrated author and speaker on the future of education, Michael B. Horn, join us to talk about redesigning the purpose and future of schools, collaborations between K12 and higher education, and creating a culture of wellbeing in school communities.

In this episode, hosts Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon dig into a number of big ideas, starting with a full examination of the purpose of schools. Donna brings up the historical purpose of education, but one relevant theme that surfaces throughout the episode is that purpose is also the future of schools. But how do school leaders and parents understand the purpose of school? Are they on the same page? And where does higher ed fit in?

Building on questions about the way parents and educators view student achievement, Michael points out areas of disconnect between K12 schools and higher education. He shares his views on what needs to change in terms of creating a stronger culture of collaboration between colleges and K12, as well as how the current dynamic feeds a culture of fear among parents. Donna also wonders how that culture of fear holds schools back from creating a more purpose-driven educational environment, and how parents and schools could become better partners in helping students pursue their passions.

Some of the key questions Tim and Lisa explore in this interview about the purpose of schools include:

• We need to increase collaboration between K12 and higher ed. What could that look like?
• Independent schools should become centers of wellbeing. How might that be the defining value proposition for many of our schools?
• Purpose-driven education is the future. How do we design schools and universities to develop passion, purpose, and well-being?
• How do we move from a narrative of fear to one of hope?

Resource List:

• Begin With the End: What’s the Purpose of Schooling? -- “As we seek to build schools back better, individual schooling communities must be clear about purpose and priorities.” Michael Horn, in Forbes
• https://michaelbhorn.com/ -- Keep up with Michael’s work
• The National Association of Independent Schools -- Stay up-to-date on all the developments in the Independent Schools community
• Hopes and Fears: Working with Today’s Independent School Parents -- Make a major difference in how well your school works with parents. Learn practical, empathic advice from psychologists Rob Evans and Michael Thompson in this book from the National Association of Independent Schools.
• The Future of Education Substack -- “We’re living during an amazing opportunity to transform learning worldwide so that all individuals can achieve their full potential.”
• Future U Podcast - Jeff Selingo and Michael Horn discuss what’s next for higher ed and talk with the newsmakers you want to hear from most.
• Class Disrupted Podcast -- A weekly pandemic education podcast hosted by Michael Horn and Diane Tavenner
• Michael Horn on Youtube -- Hear from Michael on the latest topics of importance in the education world
• More books by Michael:
• Disrupting Class
• Choosing College
• Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools

In This Episode:

• “I went back a few years ago and found the historical purpose -- which is to bring people to as full a realization as possible of what it is to be human. Isn’t that the greatest purpose to think about? What does it mean to be human today?” (6:36)
• "Hope is your super power. Don't let anybody or anything make you hopeless. Hope is the enemy of injustice. Hope is what will get you to stand up when people tell you to sit down." (11:59)
• “I do think that the walls between higher ed and K-12 need to come down in more concerted ways. And you think about how we have divisions between those two institutions. That is a function of history, not perhaps what we need in the current moment.” (19:22)
• “So I think if K through 12 and higher ed can get together to really figure out how to open up these pathways, how to help students really explore their purpose and to, you know, really meet that potential head on. It's going to create a different society for us and, you know, that's my hope. That's how I want to use my super power, in creating the world that looks like that. “ (26:29)
• “We need to blow past the zero sum game to get to a positive sum world.” (27:30)

Full Transcript

About Our Guests:

Donna Orem is the President of the National Association of Independent Schools. Prior to joining NAIS, she was the vice president for products and services development at the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE).Orem speaks frequently about leadership, governance, innovation, trends in independent education, workforce development, and student health and well-being. She is co-author of the NAIS Trustee Handbook and contributes regularly to Independent School magazine, the Independent Ideas blog, the NAIS Trendbook, and Looking Ahead.

Connect with Donna on LinkedIn

Michael Horn speaks and writes about the future of education and works with a portfolio of education organizations to create a world in which all individuals can build their passions and fulfill their potential. He is the author of many books, including Choosing College, and Goodnight Box, a children’s story. Michael is also a senior strategist at Guild Education, which partners with leading employers and organizations to help offer education and upskilling opportunities to America’s workforce. He is also the co-founder of and a distinguished fellow at the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation, a non-profit think tank.

Connect with Michael on Twitter: @michaelbhorn

Connect with Michael on LinkedIn

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A new podcast from the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS) by Tim Fish and Lisa Kay Solomon.

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