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BlogsFive Ways to Improve Creativity in Schools
Since the 1990’s, educators have been implored to pay attention to “21st Century Skills,” with creativity at the top of the list. A survey of Global 1500 CEO’s put creativity as the most desired skill in hiring new employees. A growing number of vision and mission statements for schools and districts include an elegy to creativity. But for all the hype about how important creativity is, the reality is that many schools not only fail to encourage creativity, but undermine it.
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BlogsGetting the Most Out of Professional Learning
Education systems invest enormous amounts of time and money in professional learning. The results range from transformative (“This profoundly changes the way I teach and lead”) to wasteful (“Another irrelevant workshop”).
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Blogs
Social-Emotional Learning Through an Equity Lens
We all want children to have a positive self-image, be resilient when faced with adversity, and create healthy relationships. But what do these aspirations have to do with social-emotional learning (SEL)? States across the country have legislatively mandated SEL as a way of combating society’s ills rather than through the lens of equity.
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Blogs
Using the Marshall Memo and the Best of Memo Books
Few school systems’ mission and vision statements fail to include the phrase “college and career readiness.” Who could possibly be against it? But while there is nearly universal agreement that students should leave high school ready to either pursue additional education or enter a career, there is wide disagreement on what “college readiness” means.
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Blogs
Too Many Standards – Too Little Time
Since the dawn of the standards movement, bitter controversies have divided educators, leaders, and policy makers about standards. But there is one issue on which almost everyone agrees – there are too many standards and not enough to cover them.
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Blogs
Academic Discourse: Beyond “Turn and Talk”
There is a growing recognition that student conversations in classrooms, if they happen at all, are often of limited value. Students sometimes respond in monosyllables and interact with the teacher, but not with their peers.
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Blogs
Need money for schools? It may be in your computers.
A stunning new study of 275 schools reveals that two-thirds of educational software programs are unused. In some schools, more than 90 percent of programs were sitting in student and teacher computers without being used. The economic cost to these 275 schools exceeded $2 million in wasted resources. This is consistent with my observations when […] -
Research Wednesday
What should schools do if ICE agents arrive at the door?
Administrators and teacher-leaders devote an extraordinary amount of time to developing school plans. But principals frequently tell me these documents amount to little more than a frustrating waste of time that are done only for the purpose of complying with state and district requirements. Here are five ways to transform school plans from document drills […] -
Blogs
This Is Not Your Mother’s MTSS
The passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) ushered in the opportunity to rethink what it meant to “educate the whole child” through a coordinated a system of supports that would meaningfully differentiate student learning and district accountability for academic and social-emotional growth. States crafted plans aimed at providing all students, regardless of background […] -
Blogs
Reading and Writing This Summer
Here are three ideas to enrich this summer with reading and writing for every student. First, start a book club. Columbia University Professor Lucy Calkins, founder of the Reading and Writing Project at Teachers College, Columbia University, tells a compelling story of the value of book clubs. She has long been an advocate of book […] -
Blogs
Four Ways to Supercharge Your Data Analysis
For the past two decades, there has been an inexorable rise of “data-driven decision-making” in schools. The appeal was obvious: Isn’t data better than intuition, hunches, or guesswork? Of course, we thought, data should be the basis of our decisions. But data about what? While the sophistication of data gathering and analysis has grown dramatically, […] -
Blogs
Rhetoric and Reality for College and Career Readiness
When students walk across the stage for their high school graduation, they will hear the refrain that they are “college and career ready.” But as Johns Hopkins University researcher Robert Slavin reports, the reality is strikingly different. First, a high school diploma does not qualify students for a job that has potential for a middle-class […]
Creative Leadership Blog
Dr. Douglas Reeves and colleagues regularly publish on relevant topics for busy educators. Whether it is a book, article, or blog, each contain facts and practical next steps for practitioners. As with all our resources, please share with colleagues and communities.
