Book Recommendation: The Future of Smart
August 31, 2021I was asked by edu-leader Ulcca Joshi Hansen to read a pre-publication version of her new book, The Future of Smart, (available now for pre-order; shipping in mid-September) and I give it a strong “two thumbs up”. If you follow me and this blog, you know I am tired of hearing the same arguments for “why”…
The Monsoon Cometh
August 21, 2021Most of my posts are about education; this one is simply about rain. The monsoon is the lifeblood of the American southwest. During the summer moist, warm air flows north out of the Sea of Cortez and the western Gulf of Mexico. In a good year, daily afternoon thunderstorms march across the great western deserts…
Why School? Thinking About Meaning and Purpose
August 9, 2021Why do we teach? Beyond the facts and basic skills, what do we hope our students will learn? Why school? These big questions get lost in our daily routines, our standards and standardized tests, college-focused high school resumes, the sudden disruption of a COVID pandemic, too-full classrooms, and too many kids facing crushing life challenges…
Indigenous Resources to Diversify Your Curriculum
July 8, 2021Many of us are thinking, working, and struggling to find authentic ways to diversify perspectives across our learning experiences. We grew up in a system that vastly overweighted the Near East-European influences on history, literature, art, and science. Our desire to help our students receive a more balanced and historically accurate education is challenged by…
“Team-of-Teams” Really Works
June 18, 2021What can a wildly diverse group of architects, engineers, educators, and district administrators teach us about how to transform the K-12 learning experience? Plenty. As I posted last week, I am involved in helping to design and build a new public middle school in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Our charge: build the best school in America…
The “Best School in America”
June 13, 2021“We want to build the best school in America, that will be at the core of our community”. Those were the highlights of the request for proposals issued by Alamorgordo, N.M Public Schools (APS) for the design and construction of a new middle school. My long-time friends and colleagues at the multi-award winning design firm of…
Adding To the Weak Case For Grit
April 18, 2021Are we finally going to stop chasing grit? Way back in 2014, I posted a provocative blog that started a tense and widely read discourse between several profoundly smart edu-leaders on Angela Duckworth’s mega-hit theories of grit. Several of my readers literally shouted that bending the knee to grit as the Holy Grail of student performance…
“Dorgol”: A New Word Captures a Simple Leadership Principle
April 8, 2021I’m not sure I have ever been present at the birth of a new word; I have now! In working with the leadership team at The York School in Toronto, we discussed the value of leaders visibly sharing their own growth and learning goals with their colleagues. I raised the idea of each member of…
In Search of Grass: A Short Tale of Two Dinosaurs
March 1, 2021Once upon a time about 65 million years ago, give or take, there lived two dinosaurs. They actually lived with a whole lot of other dinosaurs: little ones that scampered about in the undergrowth looking for bugs and little lizards to eat; bigger ones who ate the little ones; and some much bigger ones that…
Courage: An Historic Teaching Moment
February 14, 2021My generation was weaned on John F. Kennedy’s Profiles in Courage. I can’t remember, without looking, just who the future president wrote about, but in that less partisan time, and rooted in his experience as a young officer in World War II, the gateway for inclusion was certainly not political. Today, most educators believe that…
Big Takeaway #2 From the Pandemic Year: Cross-Functional Collaboration Is Not An Option
February 5, 2021Post #2 in a series of seven: big takeaways from the pandemic year for school leadership teams. When the pandemic hit a year ago, most schools and districts created some kind of a “war room”: a place and time for people across a wide range of responsibilities to meet and make decisions, often in real…
Big Takeaway #1 From the Pandemic Year: Your Campus Is Not Your School
January 29, 2021Post #1 in a series of seven: big takeaways from the pandemic year for school leadership teams. Great learning is not dependent on buildings, classrooms, or even campuses. Great learning can take place anywhere. Great learning is dependent on relationships, engagement, and intrinsic motivation, and these can be both amplified and dampened in a traditional school…
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