Category: Learnings

Who the hell is Mike Miles? Mike Miles is the new superintendent for the Houston Independent School District. The State of Texas assigned Miles to Houston’s public school district after winning a court case that said a “takeover” of Houston’s public schools was acceptable. A new school board was also appointed by the Texas Education…

I’m back from a week’s vacation. I spent some of that time in West Virginia celebrating our son’s medical school launch. Let’s be clear about one thing. Parental involvement in a child’s learning does not mean that a small, self-interested group of parents get to decide what is right for young learners who aren’t their…

Summertime Thursdays are usually reserved for “A Little About a Lot.” But today, I wanted to share Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson’s piece printed earlier this week: “Florida’s decision to teach in schools that slavery in this country was of “personal benefit” to some enslaved people is obscene revisionism. It is like teaching that though…

If you’ve read this column more than a handful of times, you’ll know that I think our present public school system is pathetically dysfunctional, so much so that the system itself needs to be replaced with a public learning system focused on learning plans for every kid, learning coaches instead of teachers, and small groups…

One of my favorite shows streaming these days is “The Bear.” It’s the story of a young chef from the fine dining world who comes home to Chicago to run his family sandwich shop after a heartbreaking death in his family. I like to cook, and read recipes, and learn from chefs, so “The Bear”…

Have you ever visited a Pre-K classroom and watched the young learner’s eyes? I’ve always told young educators that eyes don’t lie, meaning if you want to see a young learner’s engagement with what they are learning, look at their eyes. Young learners are naturally curious about almost everything. But then something happens, usually while…

This past Sunday, Josh Shapiro, Governor of Pennsylvania, wrote an interesting opinion piece for The Washington Post. This past June, Interstate 95 – one of the nation’s busiest highways – collapsed in Philadelphia. The highway reopened in 12 days. When asked how that was accomplished, Governor Shapiro offered four reasons: Empower strong leadership. Speed up…

I’ve written about Caroline Pratt before. Pratt was the principal of City and Country School, a play-based campus located in New York City. She also wrote a seminal book titled “I Learn From Children.” Look it up and read it this summer. When we launched our personalized learning lab school in the Houston Museum District…

Before I started writing this column, I helped launch The Education Game with a Houstonian committed to changing the way kids learn moving forward. The Education Game’s theory of action was to educate parents about how most public schools were providing a sub-par learning experience for most children, including their own. Once these parents became…

In late June, Alec MacGillis, a staff writer for The New Yorker, wrote an article highlighting the difficulties the Richmond, Virginia school district was having getting their students back on track after the COVID-19 pandemic. MacGillis writes, “Richmond is a particularly stark example of what education researchers say is nationwide crisis. Student learning across the…