If you can change the culture of a huge business that has over 124,000 employees, does that mean you can change the culture of schools that in many cases have only a few hundred, or in some cases a few dozen employees? That’s the question Bruce and Will kick around in this the 24th episode […]

The news that Maryland’s biggest school district gave up on its attempt to change the grading scale for its 150K kids shouldn’t shock anyone. But reading between the lines of the Washington Post story that chronicled its retreat back to an A-F format offers up a relevant postmortem on why many changes we try to […]

It’s been a while since our last podcast, partly by design and partly due to travels to islands during hurricane season. (Smart move.) But regardless, we’re back with our 23rd episode! If you haven’t noticed, we want to push the conversations that we’re having about education to a higher level, and so much of that […]

It’s inspiring, isn’t it, to think that what was once just a whisper is today the voice of the crowd? The voice for change. Seventeen years ago as a new century was launched with fireworks and fresh ideas, a growing number of educators had an optimism for new models of school for the new millennium. […]

“We have to get a lot smarter, faster.” Yeah, thanks for that! Here I was having a nice casual call with my colleague Susan Einhorn, and she pops this comment out. But you know, she’s right. I mean if we’re even vaguely serious when we talk about the explosive growth of information that is now […]

Over the years, I’ve met and had conversations with hundreds (if not thousands) of school leaders. Superintendents, principals, heads of school, CTOs, curriculum directors, department heads…and various other titles and distinctions. I’m always intrigued by the initial interactions I have with them and that first sense that I get of who they are, what they […]

“But tell me why I can’t…” “No, no, there is no why. Nothing more will I teach you today.” — Luke Skywalker and Yoda This is a story of two cities. Well, to be honest, it’s about two workshops I ran in two New Zealand cities, Wellington and Auckland. Now let me say from the […]

Here’s an interesting question for your next workshop, faculty meeting, or maybe even a dinner party? “Would you rather that your children were literate, numerate, or curious?” Pick one, and why? For many, it’s a tough choice; for most, you want all three. But if you had to choose one, which one would it be? […]

So, what does work look like for our kids: A career means a string of jobs at different companies. So workers respond in kind, thinking about how to shape their career in a world where you can expect so little from employers. In a society where market rules rule, the only way for an employee […]

What is the role of the single teacher in a classroom in a world where millions of potential teachers are now a few keystrokes away on a laptop or phone? To ask that question seriously, you have to buy into the premise of “millions of teachers” (if not billions) being within reach online. You have […]