Posts by Guest Author
Talent Is UNDERrated
By: Renee Hill. An intelligent, capable, results-driven pool of individuals who are willing to act interdependently and accountably, is essential for any school or school district to competently meet the needs of today’s students, parents, professionals, and communities. Talent is THAT important.
Collective Impact – Creating a Self-Sharpening Education System
By: George Tang. Over the last several years, collective impact has become common education vernacular and has generated as much buzz as Kimye. Ok, maybe not that much, but collective impact has become a household term for communities seeking to ensure children are effectively supported and seamlessly connected from early childhood to K-12 education to higher education to the workforce.
6 Ways to Promote Data-Driven Instruction in K-12 Schools
By: Jason Lange. The push for data-driven instruction has been widespread since the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act, which was signed into law in 2002. Yet the number of individual classrooms regularly practicing DDI remains startlingly low. It would be easy to blame teachers for the slow adoption rates, citing a supposed “fear of data,” but the true reasons are actually more complex.
Forming an Entrepreneurial Mindset in K-12 Students
By: Ryan S. Olson. Perhaps the most important question of our time is, Are we forming young people who will thrive in these times? Parents must address this. So must educators, who significantly form children. But educators fail students if they foster only technical skills and textbook knowledge
Why Public Schools Struggle to Innovate
By, Michael B. Horn. It’s not because they are public per se. Private schools struggle with certain kinds of innovation, too. Embracing new forms of blended learning or offering a lower-priced education have been difficult for independent schools, for example.
The Bond Between Charter Schools and Digital Learning
The bond between charter schools and digital learning is one of the great stories in American education reform. The partnership of these two powerful forces has already benefited countless numbers of students, parents, teachers, and the entire U.S. education system. And it’s only getting started.
Cage-Busting for Smart Cities
Creating a great education system isn’t just a matter of practice, because rules, regulations, contracts, and cultures can stymie even the most committed educator. But it can’t just be a matter of policy, because what really matters is what educators do in schools—and policies can make people do things but they can’t make them do them well (see school turnarounds, teacher evaluation, et al.).
Moving Towards Next Generation Learning
We are, let’s face it, a Tower of Babel when it comes to defining what we’re all doing here. That sounds disparaging, but I don’t actually mean it that way. Re-imagining the desired outcomes and the common student experience of America’s public schools is a messy, chaotic business – and that’s what real change looks like.
Now Is the Time: Leveraging Technology to Close Achievement Gaps
Turnaround efforts are hard work. It takes a mindset of constant improvement to get academic traction and find the right mix and placement of blended learning supports for students and teachers.
Teachers Drive Instruction; Technology Accelerates Learning
As we’ve grown, we’ve refined a model that features high-quality, small-group instruction combined with targeted use of instructional technology to ensure that every student can learn at his or her own pace, and achieve at the highest levels.