Randy Ziegenfuss on Learner-Centered Leadership

You are listening to the Getting Smart podcast where we unpack what is new and innovative in education. I’m your host, Jessica, and today, Tom is joined by Kelly Young, president of Education Reimagined to chat with Randy Ziegenfuß, podcast host and former superintendent about his multi-decade influence in the education space.

Randy recently retired from the role of superintendent in the Salisbury Township School District, where he served for the past 15 years. He also teaches as a clinical adjunct professor of education at Morovian College and Delaware Valley University. You can read his blog at workingattheedge.org and listen to his podcast at either shiftyourparadigm.org

or tltalkradio.org. Don’t worry, we’ll link all of those in the show notes. All right, now let’s listen in as Tom and Kelly reflect on Randy’s influence and experience on leadership and learner-centered education. Hey, Randy Ziegenfuß.

Welcome to the Getting Smart podcast. It was good to see you again, Tom, and good to see you too, Kelly. Yeah. Glad to be here. Kelly Young, it’s really great to have you along as your co-host.

Thank you for the invitation. Well, Kelly, we’re in a view, I think for both of us, Randy is one of our favorite system heads in America, and we both deeply appreciate that. He’s a system head who has been learning out loud for the last 10 years, and we’ve been learning right alongside with them, and that’s why you and I are together sort of celebrating

Randy and his career. So thank you, Kelly, for joining us. Yeah, it’s really my privilege. Randy, it’s been an incredible privilege to be able to be alongside with you on this learning journey.

Thank you for including us. Randy, a lot of people know you as the Salisbury Township Superintendent, which is Allentown area. Did you grow up in Allentown? So Allentown’s in the Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania area, which is a group of a couple counties

in a couple different cities. So I didn’t grow up actually in Allentown, but in neighboring town called Bethlehem, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. So I grew up going to a rather large high school actually, and music was my thing. And so…

What instrument did you play, Randy? So I was a trumpet player, and actually started… This was interesting from a learning perspective, too. This was something that I didn’t really want to pursue as a young child, but my parents wanted me to take lessons, and they wanted me to play the trumpet.

I don’t even remember picking that instrument. They sort of picked it for me. And I started in third grade, which was a year earlier than when most kids tend to start in elementary school. So I had a year head start on everybody, and went to a high school, went to a freedom

high school, and excelled in music. Music was my thing. I did every music class and every music ensemble. And one of the really transformational learning experiences of that time, and thanks to my high school band director, Ron Demke, was that I got to be the student director.

And so that’s sort of where I think I developed a lot of leadership skills. This introvert, those who know me know that I’m about as introverted as they come. Those kinds of experiences helped me to develop some skills and dispositions that I think have probably served me much quite well throughout my career. Yeah, Randy, isn’t it interesting that when when pressed about powerful learning

experiences in their lives, so many people point to extracurriculars and to the arts as really formative places where they developed both personal skills and leadership skills. Oh, yeah, definitely. And I think, you know, in my work throughout all the different sectors of roles within education have a place in my heart for those teachers that are arts teachers, because the

vision that we have for education and learning in our schools, they’re already miles ahead of in terms of the DNA and their in their mindsets, they’re already miles ahead. The idea that the arts are oftentimes it’s about doing. It’s not just about accumulating knowledge. It’s about learning knowledge and developing skills and you’re actually doing something

with that knowledge. There’s a there’s a public performance or a public product. And there’s oftentimes like in a musical organization, there’s oftentimes community. So there’s that social aspect of it as well, where learners are developing those skills. And it’s more than just content knowledge.

It’s those dispositions of, you know, persistence and leadership and curiosity and risk taking and resilience. And I really do think the arts, all the arts really do have sort of a bit of a lead in terms of transformation and really understanding that aspect. Yeah, ready.

I often find that music teachers have a really deep appreciation for personalized and competency based learning because every one of their kids receives personalized attention and they’re on a competency based progression. But as you said, it happens in a social context, right? Yeah, I think music teachers often have a really beautiful view of what powerful learning

looks like. The other thing I appreciate about the arts is the learning curve that you go through. Remember that when you get a score of music and you look at it and then you listen to it and you can’t imagine how you’re possibly going to learn it. And then six weeks later, you’ve achieved a level of basic mastery and you’re performing

with colleagues on a stage, right? That learning curve is so visible and visceral in the arts. That’s why I think every young person really deserves either front of the house or back of the house experiences in the performing arts while they’re in high school to experience that learning curve.

Yeah, and I go back to the idea that the arts are really about doing and about competency and about performing and about working with critical adult mentors to get that really valuable feedback. And I think that those are all really important components that align with this vision, this learner-centered vision that we’re all sort of working for.

So, Randy, you stayed pretty close to home and went to Moravian and studied music. Did you know at the time that you’d be a teacher of music? Well, that was my initial plan, having been inspired by my high school music teacher. And I was already studying trumpet at Moravian with the trumpet instructor there. So logic was, well, I’ll just go there and study music.

Here in Pennsylvania, music certification is really in all areas of music. So it could be choral music, vocal music, instrumental music, all the way through primary through high school. Certainly, I think my aspiration at the time was I wanted to be a high school band director. But I had a really not a terribly good student or practice teaching experience at high school

band. And I thought, oh my God, if I stick with this, I’m going to go to school. I’m going to go deaf. It was just not the best experience. So after graduating, I ended up taking a middle school general music job.

And I remember people were sort of like, oh, well, you’ll just be there for a couple of years until you can get a high school band director job. But I loved it. And I never was really into solo singing or anything like that. But I loved the whole idea of working with kids’ voices and just teaching general music.

And what I loved most about general music was I got to see every kid in the school. It was a middle school of about 700 kids. Over the course of the entire year, I saw every kid build relationships with kids and really got to start to experiment in my classroom with this idea of what I didn’t really know at the time was more learner centered.

So what were kids curious about? What kind of music do you like? Do you like playing music? Do you like listening to music? Do you like writing music?

So my classroom was kind of almost like this three ring circus. I think there were teachers that walk by and they were sort of like, oh my gosh, what is going on in there? But kids loved it and they were actually performing and doing and there was competency that was shown or evident in that.

And I think that I did that for 12 years. And then I also got interested in musical theater because kids wanted to start musical theater programs. So in those 12 years, we were doing shows every spring. So that whole collaboration and the merging of the different arts really sort of resonated

very much with me. Great, Randy, did you ever take a group to Broadway? I know Elhamtown is sort of equidistant between New York and Philadelphia. Are you like three hours from the Big Apple? We’re actually half that.

We’re actually about 90 minutes outside. So one of my big, not so much over the last eight months, but we’re just a very short ride in. So while I’m not much of a performer these days, I am definitely a consumer of all sorts of the arts, definitely valuable.

So Randy, when and how did you make the shift to technology? What captured your attention about ed tech? So it was probably around my fifth year of teaching. Had to be like the early nineties. And I would go into my classroom over the summer to get things set up and notice that

there was a computer set up. It was the time when computers started to get into the classroom. And I had asked to take it home. And I was able to tinker with it and learned about something called MIDI musical instrument digital interface where you can connect electronic instruments to computers.

And I was like, wow, I can make all these accompaniments. I can compose music and I can sound really good. And then I started to have kids using that. And then I got like five more computers in my classroom. And we were doing all sorts of crazy things with them.

And probably late nineties, the district created a technology integration position, more like a technology coach who would work with teachers on how to use technology in the classroom. And honestly, back at that point, it was more about using applications. Like, how do you use Microsoft Word and how do you create a PowerPoint presentation and basic stuff like that?

So after 12 years, I left the classroom and largely felt like I had accomplished what I wanted to accomplish there. And becoming a technology integration specialist at the time was something that looked like a good opportunity. And it also gave me the opportunity to connect outside of music, to learn about what learning

looked like in other content areas. And so that was very much a curiosity of mine. Randy, today we just, Kelly and I really wanted to celebrate your 15 years as a district administrator, including the last six as a superintendent. Kelly and I really appreciate how you have learned out loud and shared your active learning,

not only with the people in your district, but with folks across the country. We both really appreciate your learner-centered leadership. And would love to know more about how you were introduced to education reimagined. And then would love to have both of you talk about the really powerful collaboration that you’ve had over the last few years.

Sure. So as I look back, certainly the connection with education reimagined has been, for lack of a better word, transformative in my career. I think inside of me, I always had that instinct for a learner-centered, but education reimagined and the vision and the lexicon and the learning labs and the newsletter and the stories and

all that stuff, I think really helps bring the idea of a learner-centered education to life, not only for me personally, but I think for many, many other people from around the country. So thank you, Kelly, for your vision and your work and all of your colleagues at Education Reimagined for the inspiration that you have injected into this conversation throughout

the country. Kelly, when did you hear this guy, Randy Z? So not too long after the vision document was released, and Randy, you just shared that you got a preview of the vision before it was actually released. So it was in very early days when I think there was a team of three of us at the time.

Randy had a podcast and you reached out to have an interview. So that was the beginning of when we knew it was kindred spirits immediately in terms of what your vision was and what you were committed to. So it was exciting to be able to be interviewed by somebody who actually got what we were trying to communicate.

And then that partnership grew from there. What would you like about his podcast, Kelly? Well, especially as we got on. So one, it was just that you put your learning on loudspeaker. I thought that was just an incredible insight is that you not only were learning yourself,

but you were learning with your community. And defining your community as both the people in your literal physical community and district, but also you were learning with us nationally and engaging us in that and asking us to reflect on questions that had us have insights. So one, it was that, two, it was an opportunity as you created Shift Your Paradigm podcast.

It was an opportunity for us to identify people from all over the country and give them a chance to share. And so, yeah, to me, it was just a marvelous partnership all around. Yeah. So a couple of, as I’m listening to that, I’m sort of reminiscing back to how we started

this. And so first, I want to acknowledge my co-creator, Lynn Funihattin, who was the associate superintendent at the time, who’s now the superintendent in Salisbury. As we were going through this, we had created the profile of the graduate with our community and had articulated outcomes in terms of knowledge, skills, and dispositions.

And it then begged this question of, well, what are the learning environments need to look like? And so we were having that conversation and certainly the work of the vision and of education reimagined helped to anchor that conversation. And then Lynn and I had this additional question, which sort of led to the creation of the Shift

Your Paradigm podcast. And that was, we’re asking our teachers and our students to change the DNA of their mindsets about school and education. What does that mean for us as leaders? Like what do we need to change?

And so the question that really the podcast pursued in answering was, what are the knowledge, skills, and dispositions of a learner-centered leader? And naturally, the participants in that podcast were people that were actually doing it. And education reimagined in those very early days helped connect us to some of what have been for me the most memorable conversations.

And I think some of the strongest examples of learner-centered education that we have in the country today. So that was sort of the impetus of the podcast. And I think also reflecting on quality of a learner-centered leaders that you’re always, you’re a practitioner who leads from inquiry.

You’re always asking questions. And I think that, as Kelly said, we felt like we wanted to go public with this. This was a good time that education needed to have this, needed to hear this conversation. Students that were doing it needed to be elevated and in this conversation and have their voice given a little bit more prominence and whatever we could do, we did.

And selfishly, it was also a great learning opportunity for us. Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate about those podcasts that the two of you learned from anyone anywhere doing something powerful centered on learners.

So it was often public school examples, occasionally private school examples, sometimes an after school or a summer school. You were so ecumenical about being able to learn from people doing good work, foreign with kids. So I appreciate that.

Number one, number two, I appreciate Randy very much the effort that you took to have learners involved in so many of your dialogues. I’m sure that worked out really well most of the time, but was probably interesting and challenging sometimes too, right? Definitely a very robust, interesting perspective.

And I think if there’s one thing that I’ve learned over the past five years in doing this is that it’s that learner voice that we need to give much more elevation to in terms of this conversation. And certainly education reimagined has led the way in that with the various events that you have for younger learners.

You include them in the learning labs and getting them on the podcast, particularly alongside their leaders can be, and I think were very powerful conversations. And for me, some of the most memorable. Yeah, I’m curious what you would say because I always learn so much from listening to the young people.

And one of the things that strikes me is that they’ve actually experienced learner-centered education. I didn’t, right? And so one is this idea that, wow, they really become different human beings through this. I’m curious what struck you in like what was powerful about hearing from the young people?

And do you think that listeners gained? What do you think listeners gained from hearing from them? I think the most powerful takeaway from listening to nearly all the conversations that we had with young learners is once we hit that stop button, we both go, wow. Wow.

And then that led to another curiosity of, okay, we have these same kids in our environment. How can we elevate that voice? That voice is there. And I think that’s one of the things that I have come to grow into in terms of learner-centered education that every single human being in our systems, young and old, have something

inside of them. And it is our job as leaders to create the conditions that allow them to release whatever that gift is to that community. And hearing these individual learners, I can think of Anya Smith-Roman, Jamar Lee, Mithal Pujar, all the incredible things that they are doing and have done in their environment.

Similar things are in all those kids that are in our care. And it is our job to be relentless about the pursuit of creating the conditions to uncover what those things are. Yeah. And can I just have to mention Jamar?

Because on our website, you can find these podcasts too and articles that were written by those three young people that you just mentioned. But it is true, like the uncovering, Jamar’s story of, it was not going to be like that for him. We met him too after he had been to Iowa Big in Cedar Rapids.

And he was an incredibly curious and creative and, yeah, just amazing human. And he was kicked out of school, right? I mean, it was not going well from him, from second grade on. And so it’s like, wow, like just shifting that notion that a kid is not, when a kid is not doing well, it’s not them.

Right? It’s we have not, to your point, we have not created the conditions for their gifts to really shine. So, yeah, I think I love that you pointed that out because that’s, for me, that is what I think every time I have that aha moment that every kid could, we could have a society

full of people, humans that are all giving their gifts. I think that’s part of the dream. And that’s what keeps us fueled in pursuing change, I think, is that what could be possible. Yeah. I’d love to have both of you reflect on learner-centered leadership and what you’ve come to understand

about that. Randy, as you think back, what does it mean to be a learner-centered system head? So we actually, I don’t know, probably after about 30 episodes, we wrote a series of articles that are on the Education Reimagined website where we both Lynn and I reflected on what were some of the major themes that we came up with.

And some of the things that I think stand out for me are, first of all, this idea of reframing the notion of transformation. I think one of our big challenges in education is language and that we oftentimes use the same language, but that language has different meanings. And one of those words is transformation.

And much of what you see out there in terms of transformation would be more like reform. We’re still trying to tinker around, and I know Kelly has said this numerous times, tinkering around with the parts of the system. And this is not what we’re talking about. And so I think a learner-centered leader really has that deep understanding of the concept

of transformation that we’re really talking about, a totally new system, a totally new system that doesn’t require the people within the system, the learners and the adults working in the system to conform to the needs, sort of like feeding the beast. It’s the other way around. How does the system rethink its structures to best serve those people who are in the

system? And I think one of the deeper things that we’ve learned about this is it’s not all or nothing on either side. And I think that’s one of the misconceptions when you start to talk about this idea of transformation with curious leaders is that they think that you’re just going to like

abandon any of the requirements of the system. And that’s not the case. And it’s this sort of this dance between the needs of the system and the needs of those people within the system. But you’re always starting with the needs of the people in the system first.

So I think that’s, you know, what’s a learner-centered leader? I think a learner-centered leader has a really good grasp on that shift that we’re talking about. I think the other thing that we learned from the podcast is this idea of relationships. Again, another word that tends to be tossed around.

But when we really look underneath the hood of how we’re using that word, we’re using it in a very superficial way. And in a learner-centered environment, it’s this idea of a deep, rich, almost two-way relationship too. The adults understand the learners, but the learners also understand who the adults are

as learners and as learning designers as well. And I could probably go on with a couple of the things. I’ll just say one more thing too. I think the idea of agency and learner voice is, I think, another thing that makes a learner-centered leader too.

And that the willingness to seed control and to engage other people in a joint conversation. Learner-centered education is a community effort. It’s not led by one person at the top or a couple people in central office or principal. It’s a community effort. So a couple things that stick out in my mind when you ask what is a learner-centered leader.

Kelly, what would you add to that? Well, that was very, yes, you touched on everything that I would touch on. So the things I would add is what does it mean to be a learner-centered leader now, as opposed to what it might be like once a system is actually designed to support learner-centered education?

Because right now what it demands is, to your point, on transformation. It demands being able to see what’s possible, not inside of the current constraints, not inside of the current system, but actually to imagine what it would look like if you had built it from scratch. And then figure out how to move from where you are to this new future.

So it takes being free from those constraints, which is certainly not an easy thing and is not everybody can do yet. And nor should we have to have people do that. Once you have systems that actually enable it, people don’t have to also imagine something that doesn’t exist yet.

And then the other thing is the ability to be able to hold a vision and bring a community along. And so I think you exhibited this incredibly well. It’s being a learner yourself and including people in that learning journey and starting with the end in mind, right?

You did the profile of the graduate so that people understand why they might be doing something that feels uncomfortable or is not the way that they’ve been trained to do something. So I guess in a nutshell, what I’m saying is courage, vision and partnership, which I just want to say, Randy, you exhibited all in incredible ways. Well, it’s very kind.

And it’s a team effort because there was a in every environment too. It’s not just one person. It’s a lot of people working together. Yes. But and that’s how, you know, just how we also knew, right?

Is that like Lynn, who we adore, you’ve you’ve when you left it didn’t all crumble, right? There’s there’s a community there continuing the work on to continue. Let me ask both of you another question about what would a learner centered ecosystem look like if we really made progress in a region that really valued these ideas of learner centered? What what would that look like for for a young person or maybe a family?

Randy, what would that look like on a good day and Salisbury Township or in the Lehigh Valley? So the first thing that comes to mind is something that is a huge curiosity of mine at the moment and that is sort of how do we reimagine what success is? Yeah, I think we have this false narrative of success in this country. And I fear that the world outside the domain of education is is changing so fast

that that narrative of success where we go to school for 13 years, right? Do really well, get into a good college, get a good job. Retire and then pass on to the next generation kind of like, how does that narrative that narrative’s got to change? And how does that narrative become more learner centered and more honoring the individuality

of each person? How does the individual play into defining what success is? Not only from a societal perspective, but also from that individual. You know, what is fulfillment to that individual? What are their curiosities?

What are the things? What are the problems in the world that they want to pursue? And I don’t think now our system is currently set up in a way that allows people to think outside of that traditional way of success. So I think in a learner centered ecosystem, that that notion of success is really totally redefined.

It’s transformed. I love that. Kelly, what would you hope to see in a learner centered ecosystem? Yeah, and you use the word that I would say that it would be an ecosystem rather than learning actually happening in a single place.

We would see the community and the world as this playground for learning. And so the role of public education would really be to serve in helping kids discover what success was for them, discover their interests, discover their passions and aspirations, and then navigate a world of learning experiences. And so you would see learning happening in lots of different places, lots of different times.

Summer summer camp would no longer be summer camp. It would just be camp that people go to periodically. And it would be acknowledged as actual real learning, just like you and band taking on the leadership role and band was one of the most useful, you know, experiences you had. So it would, it would be an ecosystem of learning.

Randy, last year was super tough. I heard some superintendents talk about cognitive exhaustion from zooming in and out from macro to micro from issue after issue and scenario planning. It was really a tough year for for a lot of people. Any thoughts about having survived what was probably the toughest year of your professional

career? Is that fair to say? Oh, definitely. I think the most challenging aspect of it was still trying to keep a balance between the operational side of things and progress towards the vision. And admittedly, I think it suffered a bit because the exhaustion was the just the daily,

like what kind of new thing are we going to be dealing with today? What kind of new mandate expectation, response, communication? It things just came at, I think, all leaders, not just superintendents, but principals and teachers and all the adults within the system and the families, too. It was just a crazy time and it it took a limited amount of energy that we already had and forced

us to disperse it over lots of different areas, probably none of which got handled the way that they should have, ideally. But yeah, I also think, though, that while we look at it as a challenging time, I think as leaders, it’s really important for us in our communities to communicate the message that within all those challenges are always opportunities.

And there’s no better time in education for learner-centered education than in this moment of chaos, basically. And through chaos comes lots of different opportunities. And I think as leaders, how do we work with our communities to find out what are those opportunities?

What are the things about the education system that are being laid bare that we don’t like, that we want to change and that we already have some vision about how we want to change them? And how can this be? How can this time be an accelerant towards bringing about those changes? And I guess we really won’t know until we sort of get through this a little bit further, because

I’d say we’re probably about in the middle of it now. And there’s still a lot of our energy, I think, that’s being focused on the operational side of things. And we really have to keep our energies on those, but also on identifying those opportunities and figuring out how do we move forward on those opportunities and align with that vision.

I’d be curious if it’s OK for me to ask a question. Randy, I’m curious what you think some of the cracks or the openings or the opportunities might be that came from this experience, from parents’ experiences, from teachers’ experiences. What do you think some of those openings might be that we need to kind of put our foot in the door and keep expanding?

So one of the things that comes to mind was we actually had fairly reasonable success with the online learning environment. What I would say would be more successful than probably what we’ve seen in the news. And I also think that there’s this perception that online learning is garbage. It’s all garbage.

And I think that the idea that learning can happen anywhere, where the teachers were comfortable and had received some support in redesigning learning, I think that accelerated the thinking around how we might do things differently. And I think we were able to create some reasonable learning opportunities where parents and students were seeing some success.

I think it also uncovers this idea that those who might think the online learning environment can’t be good. I also want to say if you think that the face-to-face learning environment is good for every kid, then that’s also got some issues too. So while the online learning environment isn’t the best environment for every kid,

the face-to-face learning environment isn’t, which gives us, I think, going back to your question, that there is no one best learning environment and that we need to go back to who are the kids, what experiences do they bring, what are their strengths, what are their curiosities, and what is the best learning environment for them. And I think that one of the things that we’ve learned is that we need to be more

adept at listening and then providing the best learning opportunities for them. That’s great. Randy, the reason we called is that Kelly and I just wanted to say thank you. We really appreciate your learning leadership, both the contribution that you’ve made locally but even more so the contribution that you’ve made nationally.

There’s a few people in this profession that do what they do at a local level so well that it makes a difference nationally. And I think Kelly and I both put you in that category. So thank you for your contribution to the sector. Thank you for your learning leadership.

We look forward to your next contributions, both written and audio. Kelly, what would you add to that? Yeah, one just to echo all of that. And it’s just been a privilege to be able to be on this learning journey with so many incredible people.

And you gave us the opportunity to do it with you and with people all over the country and with your community. So it’s just wonderful. And we do look forward to seeing what’s next. Well, it’s very, very kind and generous words for both of you.

And I would be remiss if I didn’t say that certainly a lot of people have influenced me along the way and certainly both of you. Tom, through your work with getting smart and all the books and material and podcasts and stuff that I’ve had the fortune of bumping up against and certainly learning. And then Kelly with your vision for education reimagined from the start and where it is now

and how much it’s grown. And certainly very exciting to see where that’s going to go into the future. And certainly those people in my own community, my colleagues who have certainly provided me with opportunities to learn and grow to. So learning and growing is certainly a social effort.

And I want to recognize all those people that have helped me along the way. Now, Randy, your community is in good hands. It’s really a beautiful thing when you can turn the reins over to a super capable deputy who’s not going to take the district forward. So give our best to Lynn and we wish her all the best in the new year as well.

We’ll do. Thanks. Thank you, Randy. Thank you, Kelly. Yeah, thank you. Thanks, Tom. A big thanks to Kelly and Randy for being on the podcast with us this week. We are so inspired by the work that education reimagined does on a daily basis.

We also have been and will continue to be inspired by the incredible work that Randy has done in the sector. We are grateful for his time spent impacting learners in such a positive way. For more with Randy, check out episode 170 of the Getting Smart podcast. Randy Zigenfuus on teacher leadership and student center learning.

We’ll put a link in the show notes for you. And for more on all things innovations and learning, be sure to check out our blog at gettingsmart.com. Lastly, don’t forget to hit subscribe so you don’t miss out on any future episodes. And so that every Wednesday morning, our latest interview is ready for you to press play. That’s it for today listeners. Thanks for tuning in for the Getting Smart podcast.

This is Jessica signing off.