Author: svb802
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Incubating Innovation
Microschools, a collection of small numbers of young learners, are growing across America. What some parents learned about their public school during the pandemic (that some of those schools weren’t good places for their kids) launched a learning pod (even smaller versions of microschools) and microschool explosion that hasn’t slowed since 2020. Traditional public schools…
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The Messiness of Learning
When we opened our personalized learning lab school in Houston around 10 years ago, visitors complimented us on our creative and innovative practices. They were amazed at how much time we spent focused on learners, specifically how they grew in their reading, writing, and problem-solving abilities, how they were able to build relationships with their…
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Friday News Roundup
It’s Friday. Time for the News Roundup! Interactive: See How Student Achievement Gaps Are Growing in Your State (The 74) National NAEP 8th grade math scores have fallen 8 points since 2019. Those same math scores fell 12 points since 2013. These decreases have infected all students – including high-performing and low-performing groups. According to…
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10 Leap Day Predictions for 2028
On this Leap Day, 2024, I thought I might continue the prediction series started a few days ago when I shared the Center on Reinventing Public Education director Robin Lake’s prognostications for 2024. I’m not sure all of my predictions will come true in one year, so let’s just say we can revisit these “ten”…
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10 Predictions for 2024, Part 2
This week, Robin Lake, Executive Director of the Center on Reinventing Public Education, wrote an article for The 74 online titled, “10 Predictions About Learning Recovery, Innovation in Public Education in 2024.” According to the article, “Robin Lake looks into her crystal ball at a possible future of state takeovers, school staffing shifts, personalized AI,…
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10 Predictions for 2024
This week, Robin Lake, Executive Director of the Center on Reinventing Public Education, wrote an article for The 74 online titled, “10 Predictions About Learning Recovery, Innovation in Public Education in 2024.” According to the article, “Robin Lake looks into her crystal ball at a possible future of state takeovers, school staffing shifts, personalized AI,…
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We Can Do Better with DEI
It seems like “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” has become an overly controversial phrase in certain circles of society. Some want to connect these three words with the “woke” culture, suggesting that somehow emphasizing diversity, equity, and inclusiveness in the workplace, or in places like schools, is a bad thing. The Harvard Business Review published an…
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Friday News Roundup
Here’s the Friday News Roundup! Reading Supports Abound in Schools, But Effective Math Help Much Harder to Find (The 74) The reason kids fall behind in math more than reading has to do with state and local policy-maker decisions. According to The 74 online, “Lack of math help often starts with the states. A majority…
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Helping a Friend with an Interview
This week, I wrote the 350th column for A Better Path to Learning. When I started the column, I really didn’t have an interest to write on how the traditional public school system could be saved. Currently there are too many bad schools and too many kids struggling in all schools to think that. Instead,…
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Paying Teachers $100K
When we ran our personalized learning lab in Houston nearly a decade ago, we paid our two learning coaches around $100,000 each to make 50 middle school-aged learners smarter and stronger. In order to earn that type of salary, these two coaches had to demonstrate 1 ½ years of academic growth for each of the…
A Better Path to Learning 