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Tag: podcast

The Big Power of Small Changes, with RISE

Alec talks to Linzi Golding, Erin Asselin, and Melanie Gonzalez about keeping things simple, celebrating small changes, smart ways to share data with schools, and how to recognize and celebrate effort, even when it doesn’t lead to the outcomes we were hoping for.

How Teach Plus is Transforming Math Instruction

Alec talks to Cary Sabados (national director of teacher leadership development at Teach Plus) and Morgan Hython (fourth grade math and science teacher at Piccolo School of Excellence, a public preK-to-8 school in Chicago) about their work in the Teach Plus Network for School Improvement.

Liberating Learning One District At a Time

In this episode, Dr. Michelle Sadrena Pledger, David Montes de Oca, and Dr. Stacey Caillier explore how educators are transforming systems using ideas from Liberate: Pocket-Sized Paradigms for Liberatory Learning. Listen in for stories, strategies, and a vision for what’s possible when we dare to liberate learning — one district at a time.

Schools Can Get Better At Unleashing Student Potential

In this special live episode from the 2025 Deeper Learning Conference, educator Ron Berger talks to two Japanese educators and their two brilliant children, who have experienced education across cultures in Japan, the United States, and Europe. They talk about the ways in which schools in different countries unleash student potential, and the ways in which they do not—yet.

Leveraging Data Routines for 9th Grade On-Track Results

In this episode, Alec talks to Nichelle Woodson, the Chief of Network Success at RISE Eileen Mezzo, an Assistant Principal at Naugatuck High School in Connecticut. They talk about how the RISE Network has achieved remarkable gains in ninth-grade on track rates (for example, on-track for Black students has risen by 27 percentage points since 2015).

Improving On-track Through Student-centered Practices

Alec talks to Sara DeMartino, an English Language Arts Fellow at the University of Pittsburgh’s Institute for Learning (IFL), about how schools in the IFL’s network for school improvement increased 8th grade on track for Black and Latine students by more than 25 percentage points, and improved on-track rates for Emerging Bilingual Students from 35% to 80%, since 2018.

Tackling Chronic Absenteeism by Asking Students What They Need

Sofía Tannenhaus talks to Julie Smith, co-founder of Community Design Partners, and Casey Chiofolo, an Assistant Principal at Respect Academy, an Alternative High School in Denver, about how Respect Academy dramatically improved first period attendance by talking to kids about what they wanted from school, and what was keeping them from getting there on time.

Improving Literacy in a Large Urban District

Alec talks to Amiee Winchester, director of continuous improvement at Baltimore City Public Schools (BCPS), and Zack Jaffe, a manager of continuous improvement at BCPS, about their improvement work on middle school and high school literacy, and particularly about the particular challenges and rewards of doing continuous improvement within a large urban school district.

Sean Mortimer on how to help people tell their stories

Alec talks to Sean Mortimer, co-author of autobiographies by Tony Hawk, Rodney Mullen, and Joe Namath, about how to help people figure out how to tell the stories of their achievements—whether they’re pro skaters or educators.

Kicking A** by Taking Names, with Ben Daley

Alec talks to High Tech High Graduate School of Education president Ben Daley about one of the most powerful (and simplest) data-collection tools in the world: the “by-name list.”

Finding Your Leadership Soul

Big Picture Learning Co-Executive Director Carlos Moreno and Co-founder Elliot Washor talk about love, care, and vulnerability, the three key characteristics of leadership that Moreno identifies in his book, Finding Your Leadership Soul

If the Work Matters, Every Child’s Work Matters

Alec talks to the XP Trust’s Chief Academic Officer, Andy Sprakes, about how XP schools make sure every child’s work makes it into the final product, and the hard lesson that made them take this so seriously.

If the Work Matters, Every Child’s Work Matters (Director’s Cut)

Alec talks to the XP Trust’s Chief Academic Officer, Andy Sprakes, about how XP schools make sure every child’s work makes it into the final product, and the hard lesson that made them take this so seriously. This is the longer “director’s cut” version of this episode.

What are the Conditions for Grade 9 Success?

Stacey Caillier interviews Connecticut RISE’s Nichelle Woodson and Peter Lorinser about how to keep it simple while improving 9th grade on-track for students furthest from opportunity

“Optional is not equitable”

Sofia Tannenhaus talks to High Tech High International’s College Advisor, Erik Castillo, about how his team makes sure no student slips through the cracks

Improvement as Teacher Empowerment

Stacey Caillier interviews math teacher Janet Hanshaw and instructional coach Joanna Burt-Kinderman, both of West Virginia, about the Mountaineer Mathematics Master Teachers (M3T).

Deeper Learning: Origins, with Brandon Wiley

Brandon Wiley has been a part of Deeper Learning from the beginning. In this episode he gives his perspective on how the Deeper Learning group came together and developed, and how to bring Deeper Learning into your school.

The first time you do a project is a “first draft”

Veteran PBL teacher Brian Delgado explains the power of thinking about the first time you do a project as a “first draft,” and unpacks a phrase coined by High Tech High cofounder Rob Riordan: “Let the experience be the text.”

Rochelle Gutiérrez on Rehumanizing Mathematics

Rochelle Gutiérrez, a professor of curriculum and instruction at the University of Illinois specializing in mathematics, talks about reconnecting math to our lived experience, and sharing the world’s rich history of different approaches to mathematics with kids.

Rapper Ruby Ibarra

Rapper (and Deeper Learning 2023 headliner) Ruby Ibarra talks about identity, Bay Area hip hop, the legacy of Tumblr, how her mother handles haters, and much more

Educators as Inventors: A Fresh Take on Improvement

Stacey Caillier sat down with Sofi Frankowski, Dana Diesel, and Taqwanda Hailey to talk about their organization, Schools that Lead, which runs networked improvement communities of schools across North Carolina.

Bridgemakers Founder Walter Cortina

In this keynote from the 2023 Deeper Learning Conference, hear a story from Walter Cortina, 19, founded Bridgemakers when he was still in high school. Check out what he did, how he did it, and who helped him out along the way.

Deeper Learning with Superintendent Andre Spicer

In this keynote from the 2023 Deeper Learning Conference, hear from LA Region South Superintendent Andre Spicer, who tells about what was missing from his own education, and how he’s making sure every kid in his district gets what he didn’t.

C3 Mobility: Increasing College Success

Last year, 14 high school seniors took part in C3 Mobility DAO, a summer program created by the High Tech High Graduate School of Education’s CARPE Collaborative with a very specific goal: to help students from underrepresented populations navigate the transition from high school to community college, and then from community college to a four year university. To achieve this, the DAO used a secret weapon: college students

Deeper Learning: Origins, with Laura McBain

High Tech High Graduate School of Education Director of Liberation Michelle Pledger talks to Stanford D.School’s Laura McBain about how the Deeper Learning conference came about, and what it takes to help conference-goers EXPERIENCE deeper learning, rather than just talking about it.

Weaving Equity Work & Improvement Work

Adelric McCain (Network for College Success) and Xiomara Padamsee (Promise 54) explore the intersections of equity and improvement while sharing stories, wisdom and wobbles from their own journeys to integrate the two.

Eduard Vallory: What School Can Learn From Scouting

Eduard is the Director-General of the Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology, the chair of the center for UNESCO in Catalonia. And this is striking because Eduard did really, really badly in school, but he thrived in scouting…

Improving Adult Learning in Schools

Michelle Bowman and Elizabeth Foster, of Learning Forward, share how they have incorporated continuous improvement into adult learning in schools.

Redefining Student Success

This episode is a live recording of a deeper learning Den Talk, hosted by Michelle Pledger, with guests Suzie Boss and Ken Kay. Suzie and Ken have both done way more in education than I can get into here, but most recently they co-authored the book Redefining Student Success: Building a New Vision to Transform Leading Teaching and Learning.

Anjel Newmann & sam seidel at Deeper Learning

Anjel and sam met 20 years ago as student and teacher. This co-keynote about deeper learning, hip hop culture, design thinking + community will amplify over two decades of learning together and leave you ready to do the work as you return to your context.

Fix the System, Not the Kids: Network for College Success

Stacey Caillier talked to Network for College Success’s Adelric “Del” McCain and Sarah Howard about how Chicago Public schools increased their “on track to graduate” rates from 61% to 89% in ten years. The secret? “Fix the system, not the kids”

20 Years of Projects at High Tech High

Alec talks to Jean Kluver and Jeff Robin, co-authors of Changing the Subject: Twenty Years of Projects at High Tech High, about how they wrote the book, what they learned from it, and how they hope schools will use it.

What if Doctorates in Education Improved Education?

Doctoral candidates in Western Carolina University Education Leadership Program need to design and run actual school improvement projects in order to get their degrees. Here’s what happened when four of them asked “how can we make sure principals are better prepared when they start their jobs?”

Storytelling in Mexico

There’s nowhere in the world quite like the Habla Center in Mérida, Mexico. Teachers go there…

The AbleGamerz Project

Sixth grade students at High Tech Middle Mesa design and build adaptive gaming controllers for people with physical disabilities

Addressing Equity & Racism in Schools

This episode is a recording of a “Den Talk” from the 2021 Deeper Learning Conference, on “Leading School Staff in Work to Address Equity and Racism.”

What Can School Learn From After-school?

A conversation about why more engaging learning tends to happen in electives and extracurriculars than during “core classes”, and how what we can learn from these “peripheral” classes, teams, and clubs.

“We’re about ALL kids, and ALL kids being successful”

In this Guest Episode from the Educated Guess podcast, Rodrigo Arancibia and Cesar Fernandez interview Escondido Principal Adriana Lepe-Ramirez about how she came to education, and how she and her staff are transforming the whole school culture.
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