InspirEd by Kubrio: Recent Episodes
Kubrio Team
The school as a global network of pods connected through world-class learning experiences. Galileo is now Kubrio!
There is a lot of pressure on today’s teens. The changes over the last 2 years alone have drastically increased the number of teens that are experiencing anxiety globally.
Now more than ever, teens need to be equipped with the necessary skills and support to manage these changes.
At this event, Heidi Conway (founder of Changemaker Teens Global) will be chatting to 15 year old Arianna Fox about her experiences as a changemaker teen.
At only 15 years old, Arianna is an Amazon Best-selling Triple Author, Keynote Speaker, Entrepreneur, Actress, and Voice Over Professional.
Changemaker Teens Global invites parents and alternative learning educators to be the catalyst for positive change by holding the space for young people on their learning journey.
Heidi and Arianna will be discussing the following:
- What does a Changemaker on the Rise mean to you?
- Do you think all teens can be a changemaker to make the future better for everyone? What evidence do you have to support this?
- If you had all the resources in the world, what would you specifically do to change what you see as the biggest ‘pain’ in the world? What is the outcome you would expect when you did that?
- What do you need from your parents' generation and even older to support you and your generation to do that?
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Poetry begs its audience to lean in closer to language, sound, and emotion. It provides children the freedom to positively explore and express feelings and it teaches practice and patience in a playful yet poignant way. A career in writing is one that is inspired and impactful.
Tasmin Hansmann is a published author who is passionate about encouraging the pursuit of a career in the arts. She believes poetry is a powerful tool that allows students to develop their voice which can be a catalyst for social change. Her poetry collection “The Anatomy of Waves” and her novella “Welcome Home Dear Soul” came out last year and she is the founder of Azorean Stories.
Tasmin is a Galileo collaborator and host of the “Poetry for Beginners” nano where she covers poetic invention, form, flow, dealing with failure, and publication. She stimulates learners to embrace the happiness and influence of being an entrepreneurial writer.
Join us for this event where Tasmin shares her inspirational and motivational journey of raising awareness and finding success through professional writing.
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What does the future of education look like?
While we don’t know for sure, there are some trends and insights from experts that can help us to paint a picture of what it may look like.
In this event, Higher Ground Education Founder Ray Grin will be sharing his insights on the following:
- The current dominant trends in the private education market.
- Companies and programs doing innovative work in this field.
- Fundamental ideas about how children learn and how this is shaping the future of education.
In March 2016, Ray Girn founded Higher Ground Education with the vision of greatly accelerating the growth of Montessori education globally. Higher Ground aims to create a comprehensive international platform to deliver high-quality, high-fidelity Montessori programming everywhere, as well as to conduct the research and development necessary to extend Montessori principles to new, innovative models of secondary education.
Prior to founding Higher Ground, Ray had a 13-year career with LePort Schools. Working at LePort’s K-8 lab school, he helped lead a team of educators in architecting LePort’s upper school curriculum and program. In 2010, he took over as CEO, expanded the team, and implemented an ambitious growth strategy. In five years, Ray and his team took the company from a small, local family business of three schools to the largest Montessori operator in the United States.
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The Galileo moms are back!
At this event, the Galileo moms will be talking about the importance of recognizing mental health in the education space. More specifically, they will be discussing how self-directed learning environments can often better meet the needs of neurodiverse children.
However, this can be extremely taxing for parents - so how can you deal with it all?
Join the Galileo moms to hear their stories, ask questions, and share your own experiences.
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Getting investment as an early-stage startup is a tricky game.
It can be especially challenging when you’re not connected to some kind of network or institution.
Michael Gibson and Danielle Strachman wanted to change that. So, they founded 1517 Fund.
1517 Fund is a venture capital fund that supports early-stage startups, specifically those outside of formal institutions. They believe that you don’t need any kind of fancy degree or qualification to launch a great idea, and often these people without such credentials get overlooked.
Michael was vice president for grants at the Thiel Foundation and a principal at Thiel Capital. For nearly five years working for Peter Thiel, he has contributed research to Peter’s global macro hedge fund, assisted in teaching a course at Stanford Law School on sovereignty and technological change, and helped run the Thiel Fellowship. He serves on the board of the Seasteading Institute.
Before his academic apostasy, he was working towards a doctorate in philosophy at the University of Oxford. He has written on innovation and technology for MIT’s Technology Review, the Atlantic, and Forbes.
Danielle has worked with young entrepreneurs for about a decade. In 2010, during the founding of the Thiel Fellowship, Danielle joined to lead the design and operations. She's worked with some of the most prestigious founders like Vitalik Buterin and Ritesh Agarwal.
Prior to her work with Peter Thiel, Danielle founded and directed Innovations Academy in San Diego, a K-8 charter school serving 400 students, with a focus on student-led project-based learning and other alternative programs.
Alongside colleagues Nick Arnett and Zak Slayback, Danielle and Michael will be discussing the work that 1517 Fund does as well as the opportunities and challenges that young entrepreneurs are facing.
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Healthy habits and positive attitudes around financial well-being are important money milestones for teens. Financial education can guide our children toward developing the decision-making skills needed to balance a budget and save for the future.
In this event, the Galileo moms gather to go over how to lead our independent kids down the path of responsible spending. Join the conversation to pick up tips and share resources for helping teens learn to earn, invest, borrow and protect their funds.
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In early 2022, Mary-Ellen Fimbel launched the Galileo Edupreneur Academy. The Galileo Edupreneur Academy offers parents, educators, and edupreneurs the knowledge they need to support their learners in Self-Directed and learner-centered education.
In this upcoming event, Mary-Ellen and Fabienne Vailes will be discussing:
- How parents and educators play a role in meeting the basic needs of a learner's wellness and motivation.
- An introduction to the Flourishing Learner Wellness Profile and how does it assist parents and educators.
- How parents and educators can identify and address areas of concern when it comes to a learner’s wellness.
Fabienne Vailes is an expert on emotional and mental well-being within the education sector. She is on a mission to change the face of education - embedding well-being into the curriculum to create an environment where both students and staff flourish and become empowered lifelong learners to succeed both academically, socially, and in the workplace.
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The newly re-launched Galileo Edupreneurs Academy is back in full swing! In this episode, Galileo’s Kelly Davis chatted to Academy leader, Mary-Ellen Fimbel, about what’s going on in the Academy as well as her advice for those embarking on a self-directed education journey.
The Edupreneur Academy is a space for parents, educators, and anyone interested in learning experiences to understand how to support learners in discovering and following their interests and passions.
The Edupreneur Academy offers a number of different programs that are all related to upskilling in the field of education and self-directed learning.
Mary-Ellen has been involved in the self-directed learning and unschooling space for several years, as both a student and a teacher. She noticed that the most common hurdles experienced by families starting on this journey is that they don’t have a realistic idea of what to expect from the self-directed learning experience.
Mary-Ellen says: “Many parents who are new to self-directed learning think that they can work on deschooling or unschooling for a little bit after leaving school and then all of a sudden their kid will be interested in science and everything takes off and is perfect.”
However, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Mary-Ellen wanted to design an applied self-directed learning course that helped parents and educators to understand what it takes to go through a self-directed learning process so that they can better support their children.
“For kids who've been in school for a long time, there's a lot of anxiety that comes with being able to choose whatever you want to learn about. One thing that we talk a lot about in the course is how we can support kids in this, but also how we can be empathetic to the fact that when you can choose literally anything, sometimes you do need a little bit of direction to help spark ideas and interests.”
This episode unpacks why it’s important for parents and educators to have this perspective for transitioning into self-directed learning environments, as well as some of Mary-Ellen’s top tips. Happy listening and learning!
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Parents are motivated to understand and support their children’s needs in a non-traditional school setting. 1:1 mentoring provides parents a pathway to foster skill development and creative thinking in their home-based students.
Len Loving is a Learning Experience Designer who has all the answers to your burning 1:1 teaching questions. He is passionate about the “freedom to learn” and self-directed education that affirms a child’s imagination and inspires a lifelong thirst for knowledge. He focuses on encouraging the hard questions, not arriving at common answers.
Len has been teaching for 30 years in subjects like music, languages, anthropology, and debate. He currently instructs in a hybrid format and is based in Japan. Len strives to improve education globally by leveraging technology to stimulate learning.
Tutoring allows independent students to apply their innate abilities with confidence and creativity through individualized teaching support. Len will talk about how 1:1 mentoring looks different from group instruction, what it could mean for your child, and how to implement the practice in your home.
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Within all of us is a unique confluence of what we love, what we're good at, and what we can contribute to our community. We carry around unconscious ideas about the limits of our abilities, but no one's success is predetermined.
Prolific author and Stanford graduate Dr. Gay Hendricks brings us a profound understanding of why people set upper limits for themselves. He will tell us how to test those limits through exploring inborn power and how to commit to embracing a version of ourselves that moves beyond these imaginary boundaries. Gay believes that by removing these self-imposed ideas, we can expand our potential and ultimately find greater achievement and joy.
Gay is a leader in the field of relationship transformation. He has been practising psychology since 1974 and has written more than 40 highly-rated books on subjects like wish fulfilment, overcoming internal obstacles, and clearing away unconscious patterns that hinder prosperity. He believes in the power of intention and aims to nudge us into our particular zones of genius.
Transcending the invisible ceiling will take you to a place where your practised strengths and intrinsic gifts shine a bright light on what is wholly you. Join us to learn how to expand your enjoyment by existing to your full potential every day.
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When Iris Chen saw her own childhood experiences with Tiger parenting repeating with her own children, she knew she needed a complete mental and emotional shift.
Tiger parenting refers to an approach to parenting that is common in immigrant Asian families, specifically Chinese families. It involves very strict and controlled parenting, with high academic expectations.
The term was originally started by Yale Law School professor Amy Chua in her 2011 memoir ‘Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother’.
Iris experienced tiger-parenting in her own childhood and realized that she was still dealing with the trauma from it, and inevitably projecting that onto her own children. Iris shares:
“I learned how to respect my children, how to share power with them, and treat them with dignity. All of that spilled over into how I saw myself in empowering them in their education, which follows all these peaceful parenting principles of autonomy, consent, and respect. So I felt like unschooling was definitely just a natural result of practicing peaceful parenting with my children.”
This episode explores more of Iris’s thoughts on the Un-tigering movement, education, parenting, and unschooling. Happy listening and happy learning!
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Imagine you could spend 14 years travelling the world and seeing 48 different countries. Now imagine doing that with 3 kids and worldschooling them in the process.
Well, this was the life of Behan and Jamie Gifford!
We spoke to Jamie about her experience with worldschooling and any advice that she had to share with others who were curious or considering worldschooling for their own families.
One of the main pieces of advice that Behan had to share was that the experience is always going to feel intimidating, but you just need to push through the fear. She shares:
“I'm 14 years in, and I still experience fear. But I think it's a healthy fear now. We know it works out. But it is also a constant evolution. You just have to be aware and involved in it and work on it. You don't just suddenly work. There's not a magic moment where everything is easy and good.”
In this conversation, Behan shares how her children have integrated back into the education system for college.
Happy listening and learning!
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Have you ever heard the phrase you can’t teach an old dog new tricks? Well, it’s time to put that old adage to rest and embrace the idea of lifelong learning, no matter your age or stage of life.
Within the education space specifically, it’s important for teachers to continue learning alongside their students in order to stay up to date with education best practices.
To learn more about this, we chatted to learning and education expert Sean Dagony-Clark to hear his thoughts.
Sean shared some of the key reasons continuous learning is important in the education space:
- Education research has developed so much over the last few years, but classrooms don’t always reflect this.
- New fields of research outside of education (like psychology and neuroscience) can teach us a lot about how to improve educational practices.
- Without continuous learning and development, it’s common for unfounded learning myths to creep into the field of education.
Sean shares: “There's been a lot of research in the field of education in the last maybe 50 or more years. I think a lot of us have experienced teachers who teach the way that they were taught. That's something that I definitely had in school, and I actually see it in my children's schools. It bothers me because there are new theories and new best practices that have developed through research, experimentation, and observation of teaching best practice.”
In this episode, you’ll hear Sean chat to host Joe Burgess as they unpack the topic further. Happy listening!
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Imagine if you could get the inside scoop around the challenges and developments that are being experienced in all corners of the education world.
Well, look no further! We recently chatted to EdTech entrepreneur Andreas Marinpoiulos who has spent over 7 years working in the EdTech space. During this time, he worked with hundreds of schools (district schools, micro-schools, private schools, start-ups, and more).
In the conversation, he shared the incredible insights that he’s gained regarding:
- How schools should be framing their value proposition.
- How schools should approach marketing and student acquisition.
- How schools should be rethinking their operating models.
- How schools should consider their scaling processes.
- The importance of family-teacher fits.
In this episode, you can hear the full conversation between Andreas and Galileo’s Vlad Stan. Happy learning!
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Have you ever wondered how young is too young to start encouraging entrepreneurial skills development with your kids? Well, we’ve got the answer.
According to entrepreneurial education expert and author Dr. Birgitte Wraae, kids are never too young to start learning these skills. This isn’t necessarily because all kids should be starting a business (although that’s not a bad idea either!), but because entrepreneurial skills teach important life skills.
So why are these skills so important?
Dr. Wraae shares:
“I started out thinking that entrepreneurship was focused only around the business plan, learning how to do a business plan, and winning competitions. Then gradually, I realized that this is not why I'm teaching. What I was actually doing was developing people.
I wanted to have students leave my classroom thinking that they have gained some skills, some self-confidence, and more knowledge about themselves. Most of all, I wanted to teach them that they could work as change agents, no matter the choice of career.”
In this episode, we dive deeper into why these skills are crucial and how you can start developing them with your kids.
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Self-directed education offers children so much freedom and opportunity in their education journeys. However, for parents and other caregivers, it can be a struggle to tow the fine line between giving just enough support and structure versus giving too much.
In this episode, the Galileo moms discuss what a day in the life of a self-directed learner looks like, as well as how much structure parents should be supporting their kids with.
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Education is becoming more and more accessible thanks to today’s incredible tech innovations and movement towards hybrid learning models.
However, it’s one thing to deliver quality education, but it's another thing to deliver quality education at scale.
So how can we ensure that education is scaled without losing its quality? Joseph Connor will be answering this question in our upcoming event.
Joseph is the Founder and CEO of Agora, the leading platform for managing education savings accounts. Prior to starting Agora, Joseph founded and ran SchoolHouse, a network of micro-schools.
He scaled the network to 50 schools in 10 states serving several hundred students. Joseph started his career as a teacher and school leader at the KIPP and Rocketship Education charter school networks.
He has also worked as legal counsel for school organizations and companies including Match Education, AltSchool, the Notre Dame Ace Academies, Prenda, and Primer.
Join Joseph Connor and Vlad Stan for a conversation about how we can scale our existing education models without compromising on quality.
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How do young people feel about the future of EdTech and alternative education?
Are they inspired? Are they optimistic? Or are they downright apathetic?
NYU student Alex Yang is here to offer us a fresh perspective and some youthful optimism about the future of the education space.
Alex is an undergraduate junior at NYU Stern. For the past 4 months, he's been working on an EdTech investment thesis in the alternative education space. He became passionate about EdTech after working on an entrepreneurship project after his freshman year and discovering self-directed learning during the pandemic.
Alex will be sharing what he’s uncovered in his research so far, and discuss the biggest and most relevant challenges and opportunities that the education space is facing in modern times.
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It is a new age in education. Society is seeing that teachers are aware of curriculum needs but also have a unique insight into the needs of individuals. The motivation is no longer to shuffle students through the traditional system but to develop spark and creativity in students.
“What can happen in a textbook?” questions Denise Newsome in this episode on educator independence and impact. Denise is an inspiring online instructor who discusses how to make a difference in students’ lives through teacher liberation.
Instructors may struggle with a lack of resources which results in their feeling overwhelmed. In “The Elephant in the Teacher’s Room”, Denise shares innovative approaches to evolving education that frees the calendar, builds a connection with the kids, and lifts the community in creative ways.
To give students the skills to solve complex problems, teachers need time to serve as both educators and mentors, and they can leave no one behind. This time can be found in virtual freelancing through the many tools that facilitate content creation and help turn the teaching side hustle into a full-time gig. Educators can develop their own pathway toward entrepreneurship.
Denise shares how to step away from the fears of saying goodbye to school buildings. She encourages teachers to take the next leap by relying on their community and letting go of ideas about what’s “right”. There are many opportunities and teachers have much to contribute.
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Self-directed learning is a core component of most forms of alternative education. Did you know that this is based on the self-determination theory?
Self-determination theory is a macro theory of human motivation and personality that concerns people's inherent growth tendencies and innate psychological needs. It is concerned with the motivation behind choices people make without external influence and interference.
We’ll be joined by two Educational Entrepreneurs, Jon Tan, and Jai Flicker, to discuss self-determination theory and how this relates to a student’s relationship with learning and their education.
Jon Tan is an Education Entrepreneur, Angel Investor, and Obama Leader at the Obama Foundation. He has founded two impact-driven edtech companies, Saturday Kids and Doyobi, that work to inspire kids to become curious, self-directed learners, to become original thinkers, and to lead a life with a sense of purpose.
Jai Flicker has worked in the education space since 1999, where he discovered his love for teaching and working with young people. In 2004, Jai founded his own educational practice, LifeWorks Learning Center, based on the idea that teens need more than just academic support to thrive. Since then, Jai has developed and refined his approach to working with teens, drawing upon the latest research in child development and attachment theory to deepen his impact.
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Just as we’re coming to terms with the World Wide Web, something new is emerging: Web3.
Web3 is an idea for a completely new iteration of the World Wide Web that we know and currently use. This new structure will be based on blockchains and will be connected to decentralization and token-based economics (like NFTs and Cryptocurrency).
Sergii Sokoliuk is an entrepreneur and marketing professional who is passionate about helping people stay on top of the latest market trends, specifically when it comes to tech, bitcoin, crypto, NFTs, and Web3.
Sergii has more than a decade of experience across big corporations and startups as well as his own ventures. He is an entrepreneur at heart, where he founded or co-founded four companies, with the first one at the age of 16.
In this episode, Sergii will discuss the state and development of Web3 and how this could impact the education space.
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Imagine a gender-equal world.
A world free of bias, stereotypes, and discrimination. A world that is diverse, equitable, and inclusive.
Unfortunately, even in the education space, we still have a long way to go in terms of gender equality.
In celebration of International Women’s Day, we celebrate Galileo’s resident female entrepreneur powerhouse, Kelly Davis.
Kelly is the co-founder as well as the Director of Education for Galileo.
Her teaching experience began during an off-the-grid experience in a remote village in Fiji in a 3 walled-schoolhouse and it was this adventure that compelled her to continue teaching.
During a study abroad experience in Australia that enabled her to travel to Fiji, a series of incredible opportunities to teach in small villages and various countries throughout Asia have fed her desire to make the most of an opportunity to travel and teach.
Kelly will be hosted by Heidi Conway, the co-founder of Changemaker Teens Global.
The organization works with mothers and alternative learning educators to be the catalyst for positive change by holding the space for young people, on their learning journey.
Changemaker Teens offers young people to follow ‘The Changemaker Way’ programme, which is an independent or facilitated coaching pathway for young people to discover, create and live their purpose or passion
Heidi is a qualified Life Coach, trainer, speaker, best-selling author, and edupreneur. Heidi has also homeschooled her own children for 7 years.
Galileo’s co-founder and Director of Education, Kelly Davis, chats to fellow edupreneur Heidi Conway about her experience as an entrepreneur and leader within the education space.
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What does it really mean to let children follow their passion?
Ronan Robertson is a 15-year-old unschooler, hunter, horse wrangler, trail cutter, and skier. At age 14, Ronan left home to live in the Canadian wilderness to work as a trail cutter and horse wrangler. His current dream is to become a professional hunting and fishing guide.
Ronan also loves to travel. He has lived in multiple countries and plans to see more. Next on his list is to ski the mountains of the world.
In this episode, Ronan chats with the Director of Entrepreneurship at Galileo, Stacey Piercey, about leaving home at 14 to follow his dreams, what he’s learned in the process, and what he hopes to share with other young people considering the same.
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Students require more than just academic support when it comes to learning. For effective learning, students need psychological and emotional support, too.
Having strong relationships with a caregiver is crucial for a child's development and how they progress in their education. This is also connected to ideas around attachment theory.
Attachment theory is a psychological, evolutionary, and ethological theory that relates to the relationships between humans. The most important idea around attachment theory is that young children need to develop a relationship with at least one primary caregiver for normal social and emotional development.
In this episode, Educational Entrepreneurs John Tan and Jai Flicker discuss attachment theory and how this relates to a student’s relationship with learning and their education.
John Tan is an Education Entrepreneur, Angel Investor, and Obama Leader at the Obama Foundation. He has founded two impact-driven edtech companies, Saturday Kids and Doyobi, that work to inspire kids to become curious, self-directed learners, to become original thinkers, and to lead a life with a sense of purpose.
Jai has worked in the education space since 1999, where he discovered his love for teaching and working with young people. In 2004, Jai founded his own educational practice, LifeWorks Learning Center, based on the idea that teens need more than just academic support to thrive. Since then, Jai has developed and refined his approach to working with teens, drawing upon the latest research in child development and attachment theory to deepen his impact.
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Many families dream about traveling the world and allowing their kids to learn as they go. This is also more formally known as Worldschooling.
But how feasible is this and how exactly does it work?
In this episode, the Galileo moms discuss the ins and outs of Worldschooling and answer all your burning questions.
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Creativity is such a big part of life, however, it’s often overlooked in a school environment.
Kate Robinson and Dr. Penny Hay are on a mission to change this.
Kate Robinson is a writer, speaker, and co-founder of a number of initiatives dedicated to the legacy of her father, Sir Ken Robinson. She works as an international consultant in creativity and innovation in education.
Kate’s expertise lies in raising the profile of inspiring initiatives, with a particular focus on startups and building strong partnerships with a social purpose. Her passion lies in engaging youth voices, and through this work has been awarded for Outstanding Contribution to Education Empowerment.
Dr. Penny Hay is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Cultural and Creative Industries and Reader in Creative Teaching and Learning and Senior Lecturer in Arts Education, School of Education Bath Spa University; Director of Research, House of Imagination.
Penny’s doctoral research focused on children’s learning identity as artists. She is a Co-Investigator on the AHRC Global Challenges Research project ‘Rethinking waste: Compound 13 Lab’ in Mumbai. Penny is also a visiting Lecturer at Plymouth College of Art, National Teaching Fellow, and Fellow of the Chartered College of Teaching, with awards from Action for Children’s Arts and Creative Bath.
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The education landscape is changing. Learning models are moving towards a more hybrid-orientated direction. Online learning is being coupled with smaller, in-person learning groups and the overall structures are becoming more and more flexible.
Amar Kumar believes that the future of learning will most definitely be a hybrid model.
Amar Kumar is an education entrepreneur who is passionate about making learning more personal, more social, and more engaging.
He is the founder of KaiPod Learning, where small group learning is paired with online schools to deliver a new type of learning experience. In his past experience, Amar was the Chief Product Officer for Pearson's Online K-12 division. He has also been a school teacher and a principal at a high-needs rural school in India.
In this episode, Amar discusses the future of hybrid online and in-person learning as well as what he’s learned about the hybrid learning space through Kaipod Learning.
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Just how much will the economic and technological changes on our horizon impact the education space?
In this episode, we’re joined by tech entrepreneur Jeff Booth to hear more about this, as well as his own experiences of Worldschooling his own children.
Jeff Booth is a visionary leader who has lived at the forefront of technology change for 20 years. He has led BuildDirect, a technology company that aimed to simplify the building industry, for nearly two decades through the dot-com meltdown, the 2008 financial crisis, and many waves of technological disruption.
He is a Founding Partner of OtioLabs, Co-Founder of addyinvest.com and NocNoc, and serves on the boards of Terramera, Cubic Farms, LlamaZOO, Synthiam, and the Richmond Hospital Foundation as well as numerous advisory boards.
In January 2020, Jeff released his first book titled “The Price of Tomorrow – Why Deflation is Key to an Abundant Future”. In it, Jeff offers his provocative thesis about the current state of our economies and what must happen to enable a brighter future.
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Homeschooling is an incredibly freeing and empowering experience for parents and children alike. However, having the time and resources to pursue homeschooling and alternative forms of education often requires a great deal of socio-economic privilege.
In this episode, we’ll be speaking to Judy Sarden about how to foster more inclusivity and diversity in alternative education spaces, as well as why traditional schooling systems are not necessarily the best environment for black students and students from minority groups.
Judy is a wife and mother of 2, who have been homeschooled since the oldest began kindergarten. An avid supporter of home education, Judy encourages all families, and especially African American families, to consider educating their children at home.
Judy has been a corporate attorney, business advisor, and entrepreneur for over twenty years. After feeling the need to home educate her children, Judy left her corporate legal job and began working for herself at home as a contract attorney, business coach, and writer.
Recognizing that many families need two incomes, Judy works with parents to help them discover how best to use their talents to generate income. She also coaches parents to establish a successful homeschool. Judy has also published a best-selling book, Sarden's Practical Guide, How to Start Homeschooling.
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Unless you’re clairvoyant, it’s impossible to predict exactly what the future will look like for today’s children. We can try to predict which industries will grow and which will shrink, what sort of skills might be in demand and what skills will become redundant.
However, at the end of the day, only time will tell.
What we can do in the meantime is equip them with the necessary skills to confidently take on the unpredicted challenges they will face.
Rhys Cassidy is an education futurist obsessed with learning and human development. He has worked in private and public education settings in Brisbane and the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia, and lead media and arts education teaching associations.
Rhys is dedicated to redesigning education from first principles, focusing on design thinking, agile, complexity and real-world learning experiences in non-formal, informal, and formal settings.
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So much of education today is focused on theoretical knowledge. In a school environment, learners are so far removed from the reality of what they’re actually learning.
It’s been proven time and time again that learning by doing is one of the most effective and impactful ways to learn, however, this is rarely incorporated in schools.
We’ll be joined by two experts, Caleb Hicks and Tara Baumgarten, to discuss how we can make learning more meaningful for students.
Tara Baumgarten is focused on the future of work and how millennials learn. She’s passionate about open education, the future of edtech, and how we can create a more equitable workforce. Tara also holds a Master’s in Educational Leadership & Technology and has worked as an Instructional Designer, Learning Designer, and Product Manager for a number of years.
Caleb Hicks is passionate about building the onramp to life after school for driven teenagers. He's spent the last ten years in career and technical education, helping teenagers prepare for the world of work, and preparing career switchers for new jobs in tech. He’s worked for Apple, co-founded Lamda School, and has recently founded his own initiative, Factor.
In this episode, Tara and Caleb discuss the science behind the concept of ‘learning by doing’ and why this is crucial for impactful education.
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Self-Directed Education and Unschooling are not the norms in today’s world. Additionally, it’s not always the easiest option for educating our children. Although a homeschooling environment provides us with what traditional education systems often lack, alternative education is not without its own challenges.
Let’s admit the envy we feel when our friends’ children leave the house in the morning and return 7 hours later. When we make this choice, we take on a terrific responsibility.
Why do we do this? How do we get comfortable breaking the expectations of society and forging our own paths? How will our children be different or better off than traditionally educated students?
In this episode, Julie, Elizabeth, Nadine, and Mickelle facilitate a group Q&A session and share their own experiences.
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So where can you begin if you want to learn more?
Agustin Cortes is a self-taught entrepreneur who has created a platform, Lirners, that teaches and connects those who are interested in learning about everything related to Web3.
Lirners is a digital school that focuses on the 7 main components of Web3: NFTs, DeFi, Social Connections, Cryptoeconomics, DAOs, Blockchain Development, and a General Study.
They believe that when it comes to Web3, everyone has value to contribute. Their goal is to create a professional network for learning and collaboration.
In this episode, Agustin discusses how to approach education on Web3, as well as the importance of collaboration and how one can validate self-taught learning without a degree.
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When children have been exposed to trauma in the early developmental years of their life, it can be a long and complex journey of healing.
So where does education fit into this?
More importantly, how can we help vulnerable kids to overcome the challenges of the past and engage with the education they receive?
In this event, we’ll be joined by Gareth K Thomas and Nadine Ziegeldorf to speak about their experiences of raising foster and adopted children and what Alternative Education has offered them.
Gareth is the founder of a creative strategic consultancy called Clarifiedco, but he comes to InspirEd to talk about something very different. Gareth will be sharing his experience raising 3 adopted children and how Alternative Education has changed his perception of what they need.
Gareth will be joined by inspirEd team member and Galileo mom, Nadine, who is also raising 2 adopted daughters.
In this episode, we discuss the emotional and educational needs of vulnerable children when they find a new safe space to learn and grow, as well as what Alternative Education offers in this regard.
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If you’ve been to any corner of the internet recently, you would have heard about something called an NFT.
And if you haven’t heard about NFTs yet, you’re about to find out!
NFT stands for ‘non-fungible token’ and are cryptographic assets that exist on a blockchain. Each NFT consists of unique identification codes and metadata that distinguish them from each other. As a result, NFTs can be used as a medium for commercial transactions. NFTs can be anything that takes a digital form, like an image or video.
For artists, this is a novel way to sell any kinds of digital art that there otherwise might not be much of a market for. For example, NFTs have a feature that ensures you are paid a percentage every time the NFT is sold or changes hands, making sure that if your work gets popular, you’ll be credited.
If this still isn’t making sense to you, we have a team of experts who are ready to share their expertise. Meet Michael, Shauna, and Vriti.
Michael Cohen, otherwise known as The Tech Rabbi, is an author, design thinking guru, teen startup mentor, an Apple Distinguished Educator, Google Certified Trainer, Adobe Certified Trainer, and has been ranked as one of today’s top 50 EdTech influencers.
He is the founder of Dubbleup, a short-term cohort-based incubation program that helps teens between the ages of 15 and 19 launch the next great disruption. Michael's book "Educated by Design: Designing the Space to Experiment, Explore, and Extract Your Creative Potential" geared to educators, shows us that creativity is a mindset that anyone can develop.
Shauna is passionate about personalized learning, educational choice and freedom, educational technology, lifelong learning, and helping others, especially those who are marginalized, find success on their educational journeys.
She has served and supported teachers and families as an administrator at a personalized learning public charter school and has also been a high school English teacher.
Vriti is the CEO & Founder of k20 Educators. k20 Educators aims to be the largest networking, learning, and career hub for educators, with the most comprehensive directory of professional learning. They are on a mission of enabling knowledge sharing to dismantle global silos in education.
Michael, Shauna, and Vriti will be discussing everything you need to know about NFTd, why they are important for the future, and how artists can be making use of them.
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When it comes to making the switch from traditional school to homeschooling and alternative education, it always seems to be a decision that is initiated by the mom.
More often than not, the dads are more hesitant about making the change and getting involved. But why is this?
In this episode, we’ll hear from the Galileo Dads, Ken Weary, Gerry Kirk, Nathan Day, Daniel Prince, and Vlad Stan. They’ll dive into their first-hand experiences as dads of self-directed learners and what they think about the mom vs dad debate.
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As a society, we've come to believe that learning can only happen within a traditional school environment. Sending your child to a public or private school for 12 years has become the status quo.
But what if, as individuals and collectives, we were to take education into our own hands?
This is a concept known as a democratic school.
A democratic school is a school where the students are trusted to take responsibility for their own lives and learning, and for the school community.
Students have the ability to dictate their own learning journey and structure their education to suit their own personal preferences.
Jerry Mintz has been a leading voice in the alternative school movement for over 30 years. In addition to his seventeen years as a public and independent alternative school principal and teacher, he has also helped found more than one hundred public and private alternative schools and organizations. He has lectured and consulted in more than twenty-five countries around the world.
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The past two years have seen many families become accidental homeschoolers, with traditional schools having to move to online mediums. This has been a rare opportunity for parents to experience what a different sort of education would look like and how this could work for their family.
However, for the families that have become ‘accidental homeschoolers’, there’s still a lot to learn and many hurdles to overcome.
Homeschooling veteran, Jamie Heston, hopes to help families in this transition process and share her wisdom on the common misconceptions that newer homeschooling families may have.
Jamie Heston is an experienced homeschooler, with over 14 years of experience homeschooling her own children as well as facilitating and being part of a number of homeschooling associations. Jamie is a homeschool community leader and consultant, a current volunteer, and a former Board Member-Secretary/Treasurer for the Homeschool Association of California (HSC).
She has been a part of the legislative, newsletter, and conference teams for HSC. Jamie also moderates a local homeschool support group, Bay Area Gifted Homeschoolers, and is the founder of the Google support group Bay Area Homeschool Activity Scene (BAHAS). She is passionate about helping parents discover how to homeschool and is a proponent of self-directed learning.
In this episode, Jamie addresses some common objections that newer homeschooling families face as well as some common misconceptions both newer and more experienced families might need to think about.
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The idea of Girl Scouts seems like something out of an 80’s children’s novel.
So what do Girl Scouts look like in the 21st century?
Today’s Girl Scouts are different from your mom's or grandma's Girl Scouts. Nowadays, there is an emphasis on entrepreneurship and STEAM, in addition to the more traditional life skills and outdoors.
How do Girl Scouts continue to inspire our next generation of female leaders? What can it offer your daughter? How does it fit into your families’ home or Worldschooling lifestyle?
In this episode, Elizabeth Streett, Director of Coaching and Facilitation at Galileo and co-leader of a worldwide Girl Scout troop, will be joined by her co-leaders Amy Kennedy and Vicki Adams.
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Having a marketable skill is often what gets people to consider entrepreneurship. The key factor is to develop a mindset where you see opportunities to use those skills. Graham Kirk has a newly formed audio editing company specifically for podcasters. But he went about it a different route - he was presented with an opportunity and worked on developing the skills necessary to capitalize on that opportunity. Whichever way you approach it, this teen took an opportunity and made it into a business.
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Sir Ken Robinson was a trailblazing voice in education and educational reform, and his legacy of activism will live on for years to come.
In our latest podcast episode, we hear from the late Sir Ken from the Homeschooling Global Summit in 2019 about his incredible work, specifically:
- The importance of having great mentors, heroes, and teachers;
- His report: All Our Futures: Creativity, Culture and Education (The Robinson Report) - a report commissioned by the UK government to cultivate a culture of creativity in schools;
- Meeting Queen Elizabeth and being knighted for his work in reforming education
- Why arts matter and how art and science are connected;
- Distinction and connection of imagination, creativity, and innovation;
- How alternative education (such as homeschooling, unschooling, worldschooling, and self-directed learning) paves the way to re-think schools and focus on the natural conditions and impulse to learn;
- The future of education and how can we make the change.
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Learning is an important life skill that helps us to grow and evolve as people, as well as to stay in touch with the ever-changing world around us.
In this episode, we’ll hear from education entrepreneur, Christopher Pommerening, in a conversation about the importance of fostering a lifelong love of learning and how this can be achieved alongside our existing education structures.
Christopher Pommerening is the Founder of Learnlife. Learnlife is an open ecosystem that facilitates lifelong learning alongside new and traditional education systems.
In collaboration with education thought leaders, Learnlife is developing new learning elements, learning spaces, and learning technologies that are responsive to the inspirations, needs, and challenges of today's children and future generations to come.
Learnlife’s impact goal is to empower 100 million Learners, 5 million Learning Guides and 100,000 Learnhub Teams to experience the new paradigm for learning that is suited to the rapid and evolving changes in our world and societies by 2030.
Christopher is an entrepreneur and learning visionary on a journey in which he has evolved from an internet entrepreneur and venture capitalist, into a high-impact entrepreneur on a mission to change education positively worldwide. He has founded 10 companies and organizations and invested in more than 30 start-ups.
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There’s no one, perfect way to be an unschooling parent. No matter how long you’ve been doing it, there will always be unexpected challenges and unprecedented ups and downs.
No matter what age, every child has their own unique way of thinking, learning, and seeing the world. So how can we better connect with and support them without inserting our own opinions, ideas, and expectations on them?
As an unschooling parent, it’s important to continuously evolve and reevaluate your own ways of thinking and frames of reference in order to keep up!
Luckily, we have an expert on hand to share her wisdom.
Pam Laricchia is a long-time unschooling mom from Canada who loves exploring unschooling and sharing the fascinating things she’s discovered about learning and parenting along the way. She hosts the weekly Exploring Unschooling podcast and recently created The Living Joyfully Network online community, bringing together unschooling parents to support and learn from each other to question and explore many of the conventional beliefs around learning and parenting.
Pam’s writing has been published in various magazines including Toronto Life, Natural Parent Magazine, Life Learning Magazine, and the Journal of Unschooling and Alternative Learning. She's also written five books about unschooling.
In this episode, Pam will share why all parents have blindspots and how parents can reevaluate their own learning processes and reinvigorate a joyful and fruitful relationship with learning and unschooling.
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At 13 Dylan Soh started his first business with his invention the 'GIY Stick' which reuses plastic bottles and upcycled fabric to make any pot self-watering. This was Soh's first crowdfunding campaign and he raised $25,000 on Kickstarter.
Now, at 17, Dylan has launched another invention into a startup business called the One Kind Block, "The world's first LEGO-like hydroponic unit designed to make cities fertile by adapting to your windows, balconies, corridors, and walls." The time of this recording, his current Kickstarter campaign (this is the second round) has raised over $40,000 USD. If you'd like to be an OKB backer you can go here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/onekindblock/one-kind-block-new-relaunched
Galileo was fortunate to have Dylan teach our students about crowdfunding in 2020 and share his knowledge with our budding young entrepreneurs.
In this episode, we discuss the origins of his inventor's mindset and how he got started. Dylan shares the challenges of using crowdfunding with the increase in products on platforms like Kickstarter. He explains how he used local resources to prototype and produce OKB. Dylan has some great advice for young entrepreneurs as well.
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The internet seems to be filled with talk of NFTs and Web3 - so what the heck are they and how can one get involved?
An NFT is a ‘non-fungible token’. They are cryptographic assets that exist on a blockchain. Each NFT consists of unique identification codes and metadata that distinguish them from each other. NFTs can be used as a medium for commercial transactions.
Web3 is an idea for a completely new iteration of the World Wide Web that we know and currently use. This new structure will be based on blockchains and will be connected to decentralization and token-based economics (like NFTs and Cryptocurrency).
In this episode, we’ll be chatting to Yohei Nakajima about what we should make of NFTs and Web3, as well as how we can start educating children about this exciting new direction that will be shaping our future.
Yohei Nakajima has worked exclusively with startups his entire career, specializing in helping startups to build relationships. Today he runs Untapped Capital, a pre-seed Venture Capital firm investing in unexpected founders, not well connected to VCs, primarily sourced through outbound.
He started building this skill set at Techstars, where he helped spin-up the Disney Accelerator before his role as the Director of Pipeline, where he supported all 30+ Techstars accelerator programs in recruiting startups.
In addition to running Untapped Capital, he runs PixelBeasts, a kid-friendly IP and 10k NFT collection for VCs and founders exploring web3 together.
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Children's business fairs are often the spark that gets kids thinking about what's possible. Lovebites and smoothies hit their first high when they participated in kids’ biz fair Africa (Dec 2019), the first kids’ biz fair in Nigeria.
Interested in creating a food-based business, these sibling young entrepreneurs started Lovebites and Smoothies, offering great tasting healthy food without necessarily seeing or tasting the greens. Having watched their parents grill chicken on a regular basis, these two agreed on adding barbecue to the drinks to have a complete meal. With the CEO’s love for sandwiches, it was only a matter of days that sandwiches became a part of Lovebites and Smoothies offerings. Amazed at their own success, Elijah and Jemimah not only sold out during their first sale making ₦68,000 NGN (~ $175.00 USD) but also won an award for the Best Sales Pitch at the fair.
The key insight was finding their markets and planning ahead. Business only got better from there.
"Elijah Adediran, Co-founder/CEO, is a Grade 7 student with a strong passion for writing, grilling, business strategy creation, and a natural comedian. He largely handles the grills and shares the production of the smoothies with the COO. Jemimah Adediran, Co-founder/COO, is in Grade 3 and a resourceful, self-motivated individual with excellent presentation skills. She handles the sandwiches and shares the preparation of the smoothies with her brother." - from the Love Bites and Smoothies marketing
With a gifted blender and some new markets to test, Lovebites and Smoothies is set to finish their first year in business with a whirl of success!
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Matthew Milan has spent the last 20 years solving tough software innovation challenges for a wide range of organizations. The team at Normative, a company he co-founded in Toronto Canada, has launched major products in financial services, location technology, healthcare, and digital video. He focuses on integrating evidence-driven innovation techniques with a customer development mindset.
In this episode, we discovered a common children experience - failing up - where the school system deems you are not their star pupil, and as a result, you drift through mediocre grades and a complete lack of interest in anything you are learning.
It was when he watched his own daughter go through the same painful experience of being told what she was allowed to learn, the whole family went on a path of discovery down the homeschool, and eventually the unschool rabbit hole.
Now living with his wife and three children in British Columbia Canada to bring his eldest daughter closer to her passion for Freeskiiig (a specific type of alpine skiing, which involves tricks, jumps, and terrain park features), Matthew explains why the world needs independent critical thinkers and how that impacts innovation.
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For many parents considering some kind of unschooling approach outside of a traditional school, there is always one common, overarching concern.
The concern in question? Accreditation and transcripts.
Many parents want to ensure that their children have the option to attend a college, university, or another kind of tertiary institution when they’re older. Additionally, parents also worry if their unschooling children will have the same opportunities for higher education as traditionally schooled students.
However, for many of these options, students are required to present transcripts and have a record of some sort of institutionally ‘accredited’ education.
In this inspirEd conversation, the Galileo moms speak to Peggy Webb from West River Academy. Galileo has been working with West River Academy for a number of years to help our students with transcripts for their education.
As Director of West River Academy since 1993, Peggy has watched the growth of homeschooling, including unschooling, not only in the US but throughout the world.
We will also be joined by 19-year-old West River Academy graduate,Damian Tegheni. Damien graduated from West River Academy in 2021 and has been with the academy since 2013.
Damian is working in Human Resources for a British company. He just got back from a trip to Rome. He is a photographer, musician (plays the flute), an artist (drawing), who loves to read, write poetry, travel, and study animals, plants, and history.
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Julie Atri was dissatisfied with what the traditional education system could offer her daughter. Julie wanted her daughter to be her own individual and wanted to provide a supportive environment for her to become herself.
As such, Julie removed her daughter from school and allowed her to start self-directed learning at Galileo immediately. At first, it was a struggle for her daughter to come to terms with directing her own education and she was unable to make her own choices for her learning.
But quickly, Julie’s daughter was able to understand that she could have the freedom to learn what she wanted to through her own interest-led learning.
Julie encourages parents to have self-reflection and think about what they want their children to become. She stands by the belief that ‘kids don't come with a manual, so read a lot of books and the more you learn and let it happen, you will know ‘what should I do?’.
Julie has been a Galileo parent for over a year now and has never looked back since making the change.
In this episode, Julie shares her experiences with transitioning to self-directed learning, how to support your child through it as well as how to empower them to thrive as a human being.
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When Isabel started in the How to Start Your Own Business program she was on fire! Her greatest challenge was narrowing down the ideas to one she could prototype in a week and complete in time for the business fair.
I don’t even remember what she brought to prototype but it wasn’t what she proposed the first week. By the end of that second class, she had another idea brewing. In an effort to curb Isabel’s mercurial idea generation we worked on defining some rules to help her refine the decision-making process. First, she was only allowed to use what she had on hand for the full product offering. If she only had enough to make three that wasn’t a good option. Second, she had to calculate her return on investment by how long it took her to create a single item of the product. If it takes too long then she won’t be able to get that back in the price her customers would be willing to pay.
Isabel arrived at the business fair with birdseed feeders (for several different types of birds) and scented eye pillows (with several options and variations). Because she simply couldn’t let go of any single option and they fit the rules!
The business was appropriately named “Isabel’s Everythings”.
Isabel went on to create more products and now rents her own tables at other market fairs. At the time of this interview, she had moved on to dog and cat treats.
Here's a breakdown of her business profits so far:
Expenses (Cost of Goods Sold): $75.00
Revenue: $289.00
Profit: $214.00
Her latest venture "Kitty Buddy Business" is a cat sitting and care business. How does she advertise? While she sells her dog and cat treats at markets of course.
Isabel has developed a keen understanding of customer behavior and applies her selling experience to every new opportunity.
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How much autonomy do parents and children really have over their own education within a government school system?
This lack of separation between school and state calls into question what rights children actually have when it comes to their education, and ultimately their future.
Bradley Thompson and Aquinas Heard will be tackling this relevant, intriguing, and complex issue in our next event.
Bradley Thompson is a Professor of Political Philosophy at Clemson University, the Executive Director of the Clemson Institute for the Study of Capitalism, and the founder of the Lyceum Scholars Program. He is the author most recently of America's Revolutionary Mind: A Moral History of the American Revolution and the Declaration that Defined It. He also writes and blogs at his Substack, The Redneck Intellectual. He is also the founder and lead blogger at EdWatchDaily.com, which is America's leader in the #JustWalkAway movement.
Aquinas Heard is a gymnastics coach, Outschool instructor, and former private elementary school owner.
He is a longtime advocate of unschooling as well as the separation of school and state and founded the Aquinas Academy of Reason.
In this episode, Bradley and Aquinas will discuss the separations of school and state, what a free market in education might look like as well as what rights children really have when it comes to their own education.
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When their grade 5/6 teacher asked them "to create an idea that would change the world", Kayla, Keagan, and Ashley felt what was missing was a safe way for kids to fund their business ideas.
Existing crowdfunding platforms share private information so for these three teen sisters that wasn't an option. In fact Kickstarter, a popular crowdfunding hub, clearly states in their Terms of Use "To sign up for an account, you need to be at least 18 years old, or old enough to form a binding contract where you live. If necessary, we may ask you for proof of age." They simply weren't built with kids in mind.
That was the beginning of Kid Everest, the world's very first crowdfunding platform meant just for kids.
Hoping to inspire more young entrepreneurs to follow their dreams, these sisters aim to "build an empire"!
They offer some great insights for every young entrepreneur to help keep them motivated and are a great example of 'be the change you want to see in the world'. A really inspiring interview!
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Education as we know it has evolved radically from what it used to be.
We’ve moved from an era of books and lectures to knowledge at the click of a button. This huge paradigm shift also circles around what learners need and want to learn.
In order to understand where we are heading, it's important to see how far we've come. History provides us deeper insight into the decisions that were made in education in the past.
This understanding shows us how we can learn from our failures and triumphs to redesign education.
Today, we are challenged to think about change.
What does the future hold for the next generation? How can we inspire our learners with interesting and significant knowledge? How can we remain relevant in the digital age? What type of education do we need for a future we can’t predict?
These questions and more are what Dr. Matt Bateman will be delving into.
Dr. Matt Bateman is the Vice President of Pedagogy at Higher Ground Education, where he oversees intellectual and pedagogical oversight across the organization.
Matt earned his bachelor’s degree from Sarah Lawrence College in 2004 and bagged his Ph.D. in Philosophy in 2012 from the University of Pennsylvania. He taught and continued his research at Franklin and Marshall College in the Department of Psychology, on topics ranging from neuroscience to evolutionary theory to philosophy.
He is involved with the development of new programs, such as language immersion and high school. He is also passionate about sharing his knowledge on educational philosophy with researchers and the larger educational community.
In this episode, Matt discusses the past and potential future of our educational landscape.
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Self-Directed Education and Unschooling are not the norms in today’s world. Additionally, it’s not always the easiest option for educating our children. Although a homeschooling environment provides us with what traditional education systems often lack, alternative education is not without its own challenges.
Let’s admit the envy we feel when our friends’ children leave the house in the morning and return 7 hours later. When we make this choice, we take on a terrific responsibility. Why do we do this? How do we get comfortable breaking the expectations of society and forging our own paths? How will our children be different or better off than traditionally educated students?
Why, oh why, should our own parents support our crazy notions when we turned out “just fine”?
Hear from a group of Galileo moms who are all at different stages of the unschooling journey as we talk about growing confident with our decision to engross our families in self-directed education.
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Ashley doesn't hold back on an adventure or great ideas. She has used her artistic talents to create business opportunities very early on and has developed a following as a commissioned artist. Whether it's designing t-shirts or wigs for cosplay artists - Ashley definitely has an idea for whatever your passion is. Her recent work designing stage wear for a music group in the US has brought her closer to her goal of designing for professional bands.
Ashley offers some good advice for creative teens looking to turn their passion into a business. Check her out on Instagram @ashsmetal
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In recent years, Taiwan has developed into a role-model country for educational choice and alternative education.
At the heart of this reform is Tim Chen, who is known as the godfather of homeschooling and is a famous advocate for educational choice in Taiwan. Tim and his wife Dorota have been homeschooling their multilingual and multicultural kids since 2002.
Tim has recently made a proposal to the Ministry of Education in Taiwan to create a self-directed learning environment for higher education, which is the first of its kind in any country.
Tim’s expertise in education is widely recognized. He is a member of the Taiwan National Curriculum Review Committee Plenary Session representing non-governmental organizations related to education. He also serves on several experimental education review committees for both central and local governments. He has been serving on the Executive Board of the Global Home Education Conference since 2013. He is a frequent conference speaker on home education, alternative education, and open education worldwide.
Tim and Dorota co-authored the best-selling homeschool book in Chinese titled My Home is an International School – Raising Global Kids by a Taiwanese Dad and Polish Mom.
In this episode, Galileo’s Head of Education, Kelly Davis, chats to Tim about his experiences with educational activism in Taiwan, and globally, to facilitate an active discussion around how you can activate change in your own community when it comes to education.
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More and more, traditional K-12 public schools are not helping their students get into the colleges of their choice, or to build up students as strong applicants to their dream colleges. How can we use alternative educational strategies to help kids get into their ideal colleges, and prepare them for success there?
Michael graduated from UC Berkeley and has helped dozens of students strengthen their college applications get into their first-choice colleges. A graduate of the best public schools in America, he knows the education system inside and out - and what’s needed to improve and surpass it. In 2014, Michael was named one of Marc Andreessen’s “55 rock stars in tech”. He also serves on an elected school board where he works to pull an outdated government education system into the future.
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Lizz Quain is a digital nomad and worldschooling solo parent to 12-year-old twin girls. She is passionate about travel and learning about other cultures. Lizz has traveled to, or lived in, over 45 countries throughout 6 continents. She and her twins have been traveling for most of the past 4 1/2 years visiting or living in 14 countries. Prior to embarking upon this amazing lifestyle, Lizz launched and ran a large children’s play café and preschool for several years outside of Seattle. She also has many years of experience in sales and marketing roles working in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York City. In the past few years, Lizz has sold products on Amazon, taught English online, consulted on sales and marketing projects, and coached parents who want to live a location-independent lifestyle.
Lizz’s twins have been enrolled in Galileo for over a year and it's the best way they've ever learned. Her aim is to raise her children to become free-thinking entrepreneurs and tech-savvy global citizens.
In this episode, we explore what it means to be an entrepreneur while raising kids. Especially all by yourself. Lizz kind of fell into owning her own business but it seemed to suit her need to be constantly doing more, learning more, and building something from the ground up. Where does it come from? Is it born or bred? Lizz can’t imagine life as anything else but we talk through the ‘what if’ her girls don’t aspire to the same goal.
Have you ever heard the expression “It takes a village to raise a child”?
When it comes to education, it couldn’t be more true. When your kids embark on a journey of self-directed learning, they have the opportunity to draw on the knowledge and expertise of anyone and everyone around them. One of the best parts of self-directed education is that each child’s experience will be totally unique and tailored to their needs.
As wonderful, enlightening, and empowering as this experience can be, it’s equally challenging and difficult at times. However, that’s where the power of community comes in.
At Galileo, we are joined by families from all around the world who have chosen to home educate their children for a number of reasons. For some, it’s to suit a nomadic lifestyle or to break the status quo. For others, they’re fed up with the traditional schooling system and want to do more for their children.
But at the end of the day, they all have this shared, self-directed learning experience in common.
So, who better to hear from than those who have been there, done that!
In this episode, we are joined by some of the Galileo dads to talk about the world of Bitcoin and how it relates to education, and how to teach your kids more about it.
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Finding his niche in the handmade soap industry has allowed him to bring his unique approach to colors and shapes that you won't find anywhere else. Fenley is a keen observer of customer buying behavior and has successfully scaled his business to include larger orders.
Starting with learning the skill of making soap, Fen found ways to create unique shapes with antique molds and began experimenting with different color combinations. This produced a one-of-a-kind product people can't get enough of - especially as a party gift!
He has frequented business fairs and markets, supplied parties and events, and has created a thriving online store. Starting small and scaling his idea while building his brand has worked well to keep him focused and always growing.
Fenley has some excellent advice for new young entrepreneurs and sets a 'Fentastic' example to follow! You can check out Fen's shop here: https://www.fentasticcreations.com/
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Since Feb 2020 Daniel launched a podcast called Once BITten which has quickly become one of the most well-known and prominent podcasts in the #bitcoin space. His mission is to help educate as many people about bitcoin as possible so they can gain their own financial freedom.
Daniel also spends time advising and investing in startup companies looking to disrupt yesteryear's business practices. With a passion for restructuring the sales process to serve the current and future business landscape Daniel works with founders and individuals to think laterally and implement new strategies.
Daniel left the financial industry 4.5 years ago to travel through Asia, Europe, and North America with his wife and 4 young children. The family has traveled the world via the sharing economy and home swapped their way around the globe. Together they have shared the most wonderful journey meeting new people, learning new cultures, and experiencing the most amazing adventures. Daniel has blogged all the family fun at www.princesoffthegrid.weebly.com where you can find information about the family, sharing economy, homeschooling, travel, and much more!
Daniel was an accomplished professional within the Banking and Finance sector. Over 17 years of experience at leading voice brokerage houses in the highly paced Foreign Exchange markets honed his skills in sales, deal-making, and networking. He enjoys the challenges of overcoming problems and building long-lasting relationships with those he interacts with both on a personal and professional level.
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Are you considering an unschooling approach for your children? If you are, chances are you have a lot of doubts, questions, and concerns. Our first piece of advice: don’t stress! This is completely normal. We’ve pulled together a team of experts to answer your burning questions.
In this latest episode, we are joined by Gina Riley, Ph.D. who is a Clinical Professor as well as unschooling expert, Pat Farenga with more than 34 years of fieldwork and advocacy, as well as veteran revel educator, Peter Bergson. Dr. Riley has spent over 15yrs working with teens diagnosed with learning disabilities and emotional/behavioral disorders. She is also a seasoned academic in the fields of special education, #psychology, school psychology, and mental health counseling.
Dr. Riley is known internationally for her work in the fields of Self Determination and Cognitive Evaluation Theory, homeschooling, unschooling, and self-directed learning. She is also the author of two books.
Pat Farenga is a writer and #education activist who addresses academic and general audiences about working with children, not on children, to help them learn. Pat has also founded numerous educational organizations and is the author of multiple books.
Peter Bergson is a veteran educator who believes that formalized education is the problem, not the solution. Peter empowers students to direct their own educations, favoring dialogue, discovery, and self-discipline over tests, teachers, and timelines.
Whether you are already in the unschooling process or are thinking about starting, this episode sheds light on the homeschooling experience.
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When Rowan joined his first class of How to Start Your Own Business he was only six and thought he would like to sell ice cream which he would make on-demand with bicycle power. Wow!
The drawings for his plan showed Rowan has the mind of an engineer. He had a clear vision of what the experience would be like for the customer. When asked, ‘why bicycle power’ he would explain his drawing and the innovation of using human energy to create food, not how that approach would offer better ice cream. It was clear the environmental benefits of bicycle power were his unique business offering. He was visualizing the experience and that was his selling point. But how was he going to pull that off in a week? We left that obstacle for him to figure out on his own. He was sure it was possible.
In the next class, each student was to bring a prototype of their idea and pitch it to the class. Rowan showed up with Ketchup.
Somewhere in the process of working through this at home, he discovered the limitations, both logistically and legally, of his ice cream idea. But I think he always had a food-based business in mind. His parents offered an alternative idea, a family organic homemade ketchup recipe which was a favorite of Rowan’s. This allowed him to produce a prototype in a week, and it met his unique business offering of providing an environmentally friendly food option. This idea evolved into a thriving business he continued for several years.
During this interview, Rowan is now eight. When I listened to him describe his learning from the first year business fair to the second year business fair, I was thrilled he figured out that by providing size choices to his customers he was essentially leaving money on the table. Plus he shifted his ideal customer from kids to adults because "they'll buy more expensive things" essentially realizing that although kids love ketchup, they aren’t really the people buying his product.
And the new labels, on the new bottles, now have the perfect tagline to reflect that:
"Ketchup for kids that love ketchup whose parents read labels".
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In the 21st century, technology is the ultimate double-edged sword.
Technology defines how we work, live, learn, play, and communicate. Overall, it empowers us in so many ways. On the other hand, some argue that technology is too present in our lives and has too much control.
This is a worry for many parents, especially when kids are using technology to facilitate their education and learning.
With a life that revolves around technology, how can we ensure that these tools, devices, platforms, and more aren’t doing more harm than good?
What’s needed is an approach to technology that is human-centric. This means putting the human experience at the center of the design to ensure that our use of technology is purposeful, fulfilling, and can expand opportunities for learning.
It’s this exact intersection that interests Alan Dix.
Alan is an entrepreneur, academic, researcher, author, and father who is interested in the intersection of people and technology. Alan is the Director of the Computational Foundry (Computer Science) with Swansea University, the Welsh Government, and the European Commission to promote ground-breaking digital research with a real impact on society.
Alan was one of the first academics to recognize the potential dangers of gender, ethnic and social bias in black-box machine learning systems. He has a new book being published on the design of physical-digital products and is working on another book on AI for Social Justice.
Alan is also the co-founder of two tech companies, has developed intelligent lighting, worked in local government and even submarine design. He is also involved in the education technology space for the past 8 years and, along with his wife, home-educated his children.
In this podcast episode, speaks to Galileo’s Kelly Davis about how technology can enable the learning process and prepare learners for a future of technological advancements as well as the importance of human-centered technology.
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Bitcoin is more than just a buzzword, but rather an incredible innovation that we should all be learning about. While it may seem like a financial fad, it’s definitely something that’s here to stay.
Learning about these kinds of disruptive innovations is crucial for preparing kids for the future that will be filled with these sorts of exciting technologies and systems.
If you are curious about Bitcoin, or if you are already down the Bitcoin rabbit hole and you have kids, this is for you.
In our latest episode, Daniel Prince, Nathan Day, Vlad Stan, and Alvaro Sanmartin discuss why understanding Bitcoin is an essential skill for young people, as well as what avenues are available to educate kids on the basics of the Bitcoin network.
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Entrepreneurship doesn’t have an age limit.
The entrepreneurial mindset teaches children how to think outside of the box, solve problems and understand the world around them.
It’s a valuable life skill that they will carry through with them for the rest of their life, regardless of what path they follow.
So has a parent, how can you help to foster these skills in your children? This is something that Ozan Sonmez hopes to answer.
Ozan is a dad and serial founder with a global focus and passion. He is an experienced angel investor, startup mentor, and accelerator director with +12 years of global experience in investing and building startup programs. He is affiliated with UC Berkeley, Stanford CPD, MIT EF, and other global institutions in the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Ecosystems. He has not only helped tech startup founders but also social and environmental impact founders in programs created by Endeavor, UCASTI, EBRD, Village Capital, Accelerate 2030, KAUST, and Founder Institute.
Ozan has also founded SAGE (Student’s Academy for Global Entrepreneurship), which is an entrepreneurship and innovation skill sets training program designed to engage high school students in the world of entrepreneurship.
In this episode, Ozan shares what he’s learned on his entrepreneurial journey and how to help young people to awaken an entrepreneurial mindset and perspective.
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What are the reasons you are home educating your children? It could be because you want to travel the world. Maybe Covid shutdowns showed you a better way for your kids. Maybe you know school failed you, and you want better for your kids… there are as many reasons for opting out of the system as there are people doing it.
Everyone in our Galileo community has their own reasons for being there, their own experiences, and challenges.
Whether you live as a world traveler, single parent, neuro-diverse learner, entrepreneur, or overall rule-breaker, we all benefit from sharing our obstacles, successes, and consternations.
Each and every one of our families has a question to ask or an answer to share. They are rejecting the demands of society that they conform to expected norms, and creating the life they want to live, the life that works best for them as individuals and as a family.
In this latest episode, some of the Galileo moms spoke about the world of online gaming, their experiences with their own children, and the immense benefits that are often overlooked.
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What does it mean to be educated?
In the context of the 21st century, the idea of being ‘educated’ is becoming less rigid and increasingly broad as more and more parents look beyond the walls of the classroom to find a meaningful education for their children.
This is a question that Jeremy Stuart has been asking himself for a number of years, which he decided to answer in an unexpected way: through film.
Jeremy Stuart is a film industry veteran who has worked with companies like Pixar, GoPro, Disney, National Geographic Channel, Discovery Channel, and more. After forming his own production company 3StoryFilms in 2015, Jeremy directed, co-produced, and edited his first feature-length documentary called Class Dismissed. Class Dismissed has gone to screen in more than 60 countries worldwide and has been translated into 5 languages.
We’re excited to have Jeremy join us on this podcast episode for a discussion around his experience as both a filmmaker and parent exploring the world of alternative, self-directed education and what it truly means to be educated.
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Many parents think that they can’t homeschool their children simply because they’re not ‘educators’.
But this couldn’t be further from the truth! You definitely don’t have to be a qualified teacher in order to educate your children.
While making the change from conventional school to home education can be a daunting process, it’s not as scary as it may seem.
Juliet English is a former social worker and home educator with over 20 years of experience. As a mother of 7 children, all of whom she home educated, Juliet has a wealth of knowledge and experience when it comes to alternative education. She is passionate about home education as well as supporting and encouraging other parents who wish to choose this route for their children.
Juliet has successfully run home education groups in 3 cities, coordinates the Learn Free Home Educators Conference annually in the UK, speaks and writes about all things to do with home education. She is also very involved in initiatives to promote home education as a legal right and valid option in the UK.
In this episode, Juliet and Galileo’s Chief Education Officer, Kelly, discuss why home education isn’t as scary as you think. They also share some real-life experiences (both good and bad!) from families that have been on the home education journey.
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While Montessori may be one of the first attempts to bring self-directed education into public education, there are a number of obstacles to its accessibility. The main challenges for many are price, location, with Montessori schools being few in number, and often quite costly.
Higher Ground Education is on a mission to make Montessori education accessible to children and families, no matter where they are. They do this through a blend of on and offline learning opportunities and developing a supportive global community dedicated to inspiring children to learn in a way that is natural to them.
By embracing the opportunities of the online world, Higher Ground is bringing the Montessori movement to the forefront of education in the 21st century.
They blend the core of the Montessori method with modern developments in teaching and understanding of learning, the team hopes to show mainstream education a better way to teach and learn.
In our latest episode, we chat with Ray Girn, CEO, and Matt Bateman, Vice President of Pedagogy, about the Montessori method, and the importance of the work they are doing to bring this child-centered learning methodology to the wider world.
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Picture a classroom in your mind. What do you see?
Probably a teacher standing in front of a room of 20+ students. This idea of what a classroom looks like hasn’t changed much over the past few decades - in fact, it’s barely changed at all.
The technology we’re using and the tools available to teachers and students have developed in leaps and bounds, yet in many cases, the approach to teaching has remained stagnant.
With the direction modern education is heading in, it’s become apparent that teacher-student relationships are becoming more vital than ever for a productive learning environment.
Brian Tobel is the CEO of SchoolHouse which is an organization that helps families to create small group micro-schools run by qualified, passionate, and experienced teachers. He's been working at the intersection of technology, learning science, and startups for over a decade and, because of Joe, is now fascinated by great teachers.
Joe Burgess is a software developer who fell in love with teaching in high school. He combined these two talents and joined Flatiron School as the first employee and instructor. After teaching for a few years, Joe managed the in-person school, curriculum development, and launched Flatiron’s online program. Since then, Joe has been building tools for teachers to understand their students in the modern era of schools.
Joe and Brian feature on our latest episode where they discuss the importance of teacher-student relationships, how to foster them and why they are meaningful for an impactful learning experience.
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The urge to protect our children is a natural instinct.
Every parent wants to see their child grow up to be happy, safe, and able to stand on their own two feet.
But, how far would you go to achieve this?
A few years ago, Lenore Skenazy wrote a newspaper column titled “Why I Let My 9-Year-Old Ride the Subway Alone”. Following its publication, she was faced with a media firestorm (and not in a good way). She even got dubbed with the nickname “America’s Worst Mom”. In her article, Lenore opened up an important conversation about empowering children to find their independence and subsequently wrote a book on the topic.
Lenore is also the co-founder and president of Let Grow, a national nonprofit promoting childhood independence. Let Grow aims to spread awareness about the power of childhood independence and provides programs at curricula for parents and teachers. Lenore now lectures everywhere from DreamWorks to Microsoft to schools across America.
In our latest episode, we hear Lenore’s thoughts on why today's kids are a lot safer, smarter, and stronger than we give them credit for, as well as how a culture of overprotection is counterproductive for their development. Lenore also offers practical tips and advice on how to foster independence in children and how to truly let them grow.
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We always assume the worst when it comes to teenagers. They’re often branded as lazy, uninterested and perpetually bored. Caleb Hicks begs to differ. Having spent years in the tech space, Caleb has witnessed first hand just how much teens can achieve when given the chance.
Just hop onto YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, or Twitch and you’ll find thousands (perhaps millions) of teenagers and young adults building massive online communities, building profitable business empires, and making big bucks while doing it.
The direction we’re heading in a direction of fewer rules. With the array of free tools and resources available to anyone, anywhere - the possibilities are truly endless. Just ask Ryan Kaji, who was the highest-paid YouTuber of 2020, and get this….he’s 9 years old.
The traditional education system that our kids go through leaves little room to take advantage of the opportunities that are out there. After leaving school (7500 hours spent in the 4 walls of a classroom), most high school grads have no clue what they want to do.
Most traditional schools are ill-equipped to give young people the community, mentorship, structure, or experiences required to help them discover and chase their path. But there’s a new movement of schools, organizations, and programs willing to fill this gap.
Having co-founded the school behind Lambda School, Caleb has built learning programs and statewide business clubs, and teen entrepreneurship programs, as well as Apple 's ‘Everyone Can Code’ program. With his new company, Factor, Caleb is helping students chart their course for after school, build experience, and launch their careers straight out of high school.
Listen to Caleb share his experience of working with driven teens around the world and what he hopes for their future.
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Mainstream schooling has been the norm for so many years that most people don’t question it.
School is accepted as the only place where children can learn.
But how true is this?
Did your child need to go to school to learn to walk and talk? It’s widely accepted that the steepest learning curve of any human’s life happens in the first few years of life before school enters their life. So why do we accept the idea that after this age, children need to be in a school or they can’t and won’t learn?
Blake Boles fervently refutes this idea. Having discovered the concept of self-directed learning when studying at UC Berkeley, he has become a passionate advocate for the profound benefits of self-directed learning. He “believes that a surprising number of kids don’t need school to become happy, competent, and successful adults”, and has become a real champion for the cause of alternative education.
An acclaimed speaker and educator, Blake has a wealth of experience and wisdom that he is bringing to inspire you and to help you understand and trust the process of self-directed learning for your own children.
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The internet has proven that while we have our country based nationalities, more than anything else, we are citizens of the world…
If you want your children to thrive in the world, both now and in the future, it is important that they are able to open their minds to the wider world.
We all know that travel is the best way to really experience being a global citizen, but it isn’t the only way.
Lottie Dowling is the Manager of the Going Global department of Meg Languages. She supports educators to develop global citizenship in their students, and has extensive experience in the field of global citizenship education.
She will bring this expertise to inspirEd and will discuss the importance of fostering a sense of global citizenship in children. She will share practical tips to help you do this with your children, whether you are world schooling, traveling or living at home in one country.
Travel may broaden your horizons, but with the whole world at your fingertips, there are plenty of other ways you can raise global citizens!
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Jenny has been a homeschooling mom for 8 years. She currently is an EdD student at Northeastern University working on her dissertation titled “The Experience of Homeschooled High School Graduates Transitioning to College in Taiwan.” With a computer science background, she is in tune with how to utilize technology to aid and augment educating her children. Besides being a homeschooling mom, she works as an English consultant to businesses and teacher to school-age children. She will be sharing how homeschooling has blossomed in Taiwan and how self-directed learning has become a key factor in homeschooling.
Ella is an 11th-grade homeschooler who has been homeschooled since 3rd grade. She is an artistic roller-skating athlete and enjoys painting, performing, and designing/making skating outfits. Prior to joining Galileo, she already utilized many online resources including taking pre-college courses and other readily available platforms. She enjoys many Galileo courses including clubs, boot camps, and nano courses. She will be sharing her self-directed learning experience including her time in Galileo.
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What have you learned today?
What has made you stop and wonder ‘How, who, what, why, or when?
All great learning and discovery that humanity has ever experienced have started with a question. The ancient philosophers asked questions and spent their lives debating the answers. Scientific discoveries, technological innovations. As long as we keep asking questions we keep learning and keep growing.
From the moment your child points at an object and you tell them what it is, they are learning by questioning. Any parent who has gone through the ‘endless why’ stage knows that children are innately curious and have a million questions about the world around them. The more we can empower them to find answers to their questions, to reassure them that it is always ok to ask questions, we keep that curiosity alive in them.
Research shows that when we learn about things we are actually curious about, we have questions about, we learn better. When we allow children to ask questions, and empower them to find their own solutions, the learning is far more meaningful.
Traditional education doesn’t tend to do this. More concerned with knowledge transmission rather than curious exploration and discovery, school often leaves children afraid to ask questions.
How can we overcome this? How can we keep the fire of curiosity and wonder alive in children as they grow?
Marko Koskinen is passionate about question-based learning and designed a successful method to teach math through question-based learning which has been used successfully in Finland for about 10 years.
Marko will be talking with Vlad and discussing how we can help children to use the fuel of their curiosity to ask questions and empower them to find their own answers.
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If you’re thinking of living the nomadic, unschooling, traveling life, you might be wondering how on earth you can make it all work? How do you ensure that your kids learn while you’re on the road? How do you provide them with a sense of stability and security when their home changes on a regular basis?
What is the best way to approach their education?
Robyn Robertson has been living this life with her family for years. After traveling to 7 different countries by the time she was 6, she grew up and settled into ‘rat race life’ with her husband and children, and became a private school educator. But the urge to travel never left her and they decided to head off to Jamaica for 6 months as an experiment. Years later, they are still traveling and have fully embraced unschooling as a way of life and learning for their children.
Robyn started the Honey I Unschooled the Kids! a podcast to create community, share her experiences and learn from others. She has interviewed some of the leading names in the alternative education world and has learned a huge amount about the journey of free-living and learning along the way.
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Empowering people to get how awesome and powerful they are is one of David’s biggest drives in life. He holds a doctorate degree in mathematics and has been teaching this discipline with students for the past 15 years.
In the past 3 years, he has taken on to expand his education mission and now trains other educators and is also a coach for personal training and development.
David strongly believes that the time is ripe for a revolution in education and he has received several awards for his innovative teaching methods. His secret power: pushing you just out of your comfort zone without you even noticing it.
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The ancient philosophers began their ponderings by observing the natural world and thinking deeply about what they saw. They were able to learn, through observation and distinction, how the world works. And they also recognized that we are part of nature, and saw that we could learn a lot about the human experience by observing nature and how we interact with it.
The more time we spend in and with nature, the more we feel connected to it, and the more we remember that we are part of it. Something we seem to have forgotten as a society, but something that is crucial to remember.
Learning isn’t meant to take place behind closed doors and concrete walls. The world around us provides us with such rich fertile ground for learning. Why learn about the seasons from a book when you can observe changes in the tree in your garden?
And learning in nature isn’t limited to science. All of life happens in nature, so all human experience happens there too. Art, geography, history, writing, physical exercise, and more can be covered beautifully in nature.
And as well as providing plenty of stimulus for learning, being in nature actually aids learning. Research shows that learning and thinking that happens in nature is far more effective, meaningful learning. There is a good reason Steve Jobs liked to run so much of his business outside while walking in nature!
Pilar Fortuny studied innovative education techniques, in the Montserrat School of Barcelona, complementing her studies with the Montessori and the Waldorf methodology and visiting hundreds of schools and initiatives.
This learning inspired her to develop her own methodology focused on developing a leading attitude based on finding their own potentials and the establishment of healthy relationships, multiple intelligences, project management, and cooperative learning.
This methodology has been developed with more than 7,000 students to help them develop emotional skills in the current environment of strong changes and in which creativity, cooperation, and respect for people and the environment are marking the new rules of the game.
We are delighted that she will be bringing the understanding this work has given her to inspirEd. Come and join us to learn more about the magic that happens where nature and learning meet!
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What do bitcoin and unschooling have in common?
Money and Education are two of the most important aspects in life, and both are, in the mainstream, controlled by governments and long-established institutions, with all the power at the very top of society.
Both these systems are being challenged in the 21st Century, with new, better alternatives emerging through the internet.
Alternatives that take power and choice away from government and put it into the hands of ordinary people.
What does this mean for people like us? How can we harness the power of alternative education and money systems to create the lives we want to lead? How do these changes affect how we live, work, raise families and be in the world?
Michael Saylor and Jeff Davidson have lived and worked at the intersection of alternative education and money for many years. Join us as we learn from them about the importance of the movement to decentralize money and education, and what educators and families can learn from the success of bitcoin, and vice versa.
This is a rare opportunity to hear from, and speak to, one of the prominent figures in the alternative education AND bitcoin world. Bring your own questions and let's talk about the future!
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Your child can learn in their own way, and still gain the diploma they need for their learning!
One of the biggest fears that parents face when considering unschooling their children is the lack of accreditation, and the impact this could have on their child’s future job and college applications.
When she encountered this issue with her own daughters, Peggy Webb looked at the learning experiences they’d enjoyed through their unschooling, and found ways to connect their learning to accreditation, providing them with the opportunities for higher education they wanted.
Peggy recognized that her family wasn’t alone in needing this, and so she founded West River Academy to offer other families a way to learn freely outside of school and still end up with a high school diploma and transcript.
In this inspirEd event, Peggy and Vlad will discuss.
What is the value of accreditation?
Why having curriculum/learning and accreditation separate is actually a good idea.
And how West River Academy’s process works.
If you have concerns or questions about how your child’s unschooling can still give them that needed High School diploma, join us and find the answers you need.
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Do you hope to create a positive future? Do you want to support in building a life that is relevant and specific to you?
If YES? Then join us in Clubhouse for an open discussion on Alternative Education choices with North Star co-founder Ken Danford.
Since 1996, Ken Danford has been working with others to make school optional for any interested teen in Massachusetts, US. He is the co-founder and executive director at North Star.
"North Star teens are individuals moving forward in unique directions at a pace that is right for them. North Star is not a school. We do not offer diplomas, credits, or grades. Rather, North Star offers an alternative to school where teens learn in the way that suits them best.”
The environment and instruction offered in school is not for everyone. Some North Star teens and families come from an alternative mindset. They are already comfortable with nontraditional choices. Others never planned to choose an alternate path. Many have tried to make school work for them in various ways and in various locations, with similar results.
A Customized Academic Plan
Together we envision and map a personal educational approach. The academic plan is based on the teen’s interests while also fulfilling the family’s needs. North Star facilitates this process through discussion and recommendations based on more than two decades of experience.
If the teen is younger than 16, we will help you prepare this plan as a homeschooling proposal for submission to your local superintendent. This is a very straightforward process. Your superintendent’s office will certify you as a homeschooler. This is the contract that makes leaving school legal for students 16 years of age or younger.
A Personal Advisor
Each teen is assigned a personal advisor. Through weekly meetings between advisor and student, we help imagine and realize goals, track progress, and facilitate tutorials and community connections. This relationship is at the core of the North Star experience.
family meetings
Advisors meet with teens and their families at least three times per year to envision possibilities and to review achievements. More meetings are scheduled as requested. Parental involvement is encouraged. There are many opportunities for parents to be a part of our community.
Classes, Workshops, and Tutorials
North Star offers classes, workshops, and tutorials between the hours of 9:00 AM and 4:00 PM Mondays-Fridays, September-May. In 2020-21, most of our classes, workshops, and tutorials will be delivered online, via Zoom. (See the links in the announcement bar at the top of the page to read more about our fall plans and experimental Distance Memberships.) Our classes represent the interests and passions of our core staff and volunteers and include a wide range of topics. Most classes have fewer than 10 students.
A New Way to Approach Learning, Education, and Life.
Our focus is on individuals and their particular strengths, needs, and goals. We meet teens where they are and support them in becoming whoever they want to be. Rather than focusing on weaknesses, we ask: “What are you good at? What do you love to do?” and build from there.
At Galileo, we feel inspired by Ken Danford's work over the past 30 years and can't wait to discuss the future of teen education with him.
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When you’ve spent your life in the school system, as a student, then as a parent and educator, making the shift to self-directed learning can be challenging. Whether the move is how you educate your kids, or your students, it requires a lot of unlearning and a radical shift in perspective.
Your experience of school, as a student, parent and teacher, might be the driver behind your change in approach. Seeing the impact that schooling had on you, your own kids, or on the children you teach might be WHY you want to try something different. To focus on what works best for the child, rather than the system.
But that doesn’t mean it comes easy. Years of conditioning and training need to be overcome.
And they CAN be overcome. You became an educator because you want to inspire children to be the best they can, and to show them a path to joyful learning. You want the same for your own children. THAT is entirely possible when you embrace Self Directed learning, and become a facilitator and mentor for children’s learning, rather than an authority figure passing on knowledge.
Former public school principal, Lesley Jones Sessler has over 30 years of experience in the K-12 system as an assistant superintendent, teacher, assistant principal, and nearly every role in between. Lesley currently runs her blog, WatchMonkeyMama, as a mom, educator, and homeschooler.
She is joining Galileo co-founder Kelly Davis to share what her journey has taught her about learning, education and parenting
In this discussion, Lesley will share
Her experiences as a principal
How to trust what your child is interested in and to let go
How children become readers without an expected reading age and
How important it can be for parents to deschool, in order to trust the SDE process
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Psychologist Naomi Fisher has been actively involved in Self Directed Education both as a parent and in her professional role as an advocate and supporter of children and their families.
Naomi recognized that there was much in the education system that is actively working against children’s needs and best interests, and wanted to promote a better way of learning, both for her own children and the families she works with.
After extensive personal and professional experience and years of research, Naomi has valuable insights and wisdom to share about the journey of self-directed education.
In this discussion, she will share
- What she thinks school is getting so very wrong for children
- How parents and children can prepare themselves for Self Directed Education
- How to research the best approach for your family
- How schooling harms children in the short AND long term, and why you might still be carrying some emotional baggage from your own school days
You will be able to ask Naomi questions and share your own experiences with her.
Join us to dig deep into this fascinating topic and benefit from Naomi’s years of experience and research.
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Let's keep the inspiring discussion going! Discover our events, articles, and more with these links:
inspirEd Magazine
inspirEd Events
Mailing list
You Tube
Let's keep the inspiring discussion going! Discover our events, articles, and more with these links:
inspirEd Magazine
inspirEd Events
Mailing list
You Tube
Let's keep the inspiring discussion going! Discover our events, articles, and more with these links:
inspirEd Magazine
inspirEd Events
Mailing list
You Tube