[Applause]
I’m going to talk about liberating
teachers I’m actually from a family of
teachers my dad my wife my mother-in-law
are all teachers most of my friends are
teachers and I was a teacher for 11
years and if you hang around as many
teachers as I do you know that there’s
not that many of them that are thrilled
with the direction that education is
headed and like many teachers when I
first started I had a tremendous sense
of idealism and optimism about the power
of traditional schools like I went to
growing up to not only improve the lives
of young people but to make the world a
better place the picture I had running
through my head was this one the famous
Oh captain my captain scene from the
Dead Poets Society right I was gonna be
that guy you know leading my students up
the mountain of knowledge to the
pinnacle of wisdom or some such thing
however my view from the front of the
classroom was much more often like this
and this is a problem and at first I
thought it was my problem thought of new
at this I suck at teaching I just need
to get better and so I tried all the
innovative things I could think of and
you know some of the kids really got
into it but the overwhelming feeling was
much more like you know is this gonna be
on the test
and what I came to realize was that it
wasn’t just me but that there was a
systemic issue with the way that we’ve
chosen to educate young people yeah I
had always liked school growing up but
what I learned from my teaching career
is that many of my students did not and
that far from looking at high school as
an opportunity to learn and grow many of
them looked at it more like a four-year
sentence they just had to put in their
time and I don’t want to be overly
dramatic here but eventually you know I
came to feel a little bit like a prison
guard yeah I was making kids who didn’t
want to be there in the first place do
things they didn’t want to do and this
is not an inspiring way to spend your
days and certainly was not the reason
that I went into teaching in the first
place and so I knew I had to get out
small problem now if you’re a teacher
but you don’t like school
and what do you do I got pretty
desperate you know I was googling things
at night like jobs for teachers who hate
teaching and in all of that searching I
came across this place called North Star
and North Star is based on an idea
called self-directed education and as I
was reading their website and really
understood you know what they were doing
I got so excited I literally jumped out
of my chair into this little dance
around my office a little like an Irish
jig which I will not recreate for you
here today
because this was it this is how I had
always imagined working with young
people and really since that day I have
dedicated my life to making
self-directed education and option for
as many young people as possible so what
are we talking about here what
self-directed education why does it have
the power to liberate not only students
but teachers as well
well boils down to what author Blake
Bowles refers to as educational consent
this is a really simple and an obvious
idea when you think about it but it has
profound implications for the way that
we work with young people so when you’re
dealing with like medical professionals
for instance they have to get your
consent before treating you if doctors
don’t just strap you to a table and
start poking and prodding you they ask
like hey can I take a look at that thing
growing on your arm okay they give you
treatment options and ultimately you
have the right to say yes or no to
whatever they suggest if they don’t get
your consent it’s a violation an
actually consent is pretty central to
all of the positive and meaningful
relationships we have in our lives right
so why not in school yeah I probably
taught a little over a thousand kids in
my career and how many of them did I
ever actually ask if they were
interested to spend a hundred and eighty
days with me learning about US history
zero
yeah how many do you think would have
taken me up on it if they had the choice
or you brought the question a little bit
how many of you want to be here in
school at all I think we don’t ask kids
the question because we’re afraid of
what the answer would be right and we
adults don’t see any other path it’s
either you go to school
even if you don’t like it or it’s not
working for you or you end up a bum like
there’s your choices well fortunately
those aren’t the only two options and
what a lot of people what a lot of
people don’t know is that there’s this
whole world of wonderful opportunities
for young people who choose not to go to
school that you can learn independently
of the traditional public and private
school system and every door is still
open to you college career
entrepreneurship travel that everything
you can do later in life by attending
school you can still do without
attending school you know when I’m
talking to people about this for the
first time this is generally the point
in the conversation where the needle
makes that scratchy noise across the
record like earn what you can be
successful without going to school like
don’t kids need a high school diploma
you know the Act the answer is actually
usually no we’re here in Princeton New
Jersey for instance and you don’t need a
high school diploma to attend Princeton
University who know I mean you still
have to meet their admissions
requirements and do a lot of amazing
things with your time but graduating
from high school is just not on the list
you know some colleges some entry-level
jobs might require to have some kind of
piece of paper from the state you just
take a GED test sort of check that box
off and just get on with your life
obviously you don’t need a diploma to
start your own business or travel it’s
just generally a non-issue for whatever
path kids want to take next
but when we’re talking to people about
you know self-directed education or not
you know non-coercive education people
have a really hard time just wrapping
their head around like what would that
look like on a daily basis for young
people to have so much choice
about what they learn and how they spend
their time well there’s a bunch of ways
to do it I’m gonna talk about the one
that I’m most familiar with which is an
organization I helped create called the
Princeton Learning cooperative which was
modeled after what they were doing at
Northstar
and it goes like this if traditional
school is not doing it for you for
whatever reason sometimes the best
solution is also the simplest just stop
going
you know if the medicine is making is
sick stop taking it and the way to stop
going to school in the United States is
through something called homeschooling
law anyone can just do this tomorrow you
register as a home schooler and voila
you have all the freedom and flexibility
you could ever want to design whatever
kind of life and education is gonna work
for you and by homeschooling you know we
don’t mean just taking school and doing
it at home you know we don’t mean your
mom teaching you algebra at the kitchen
table it’s simply the legal mechanism
that we have here in the United States
for young people and their families to
be in charge of your own education and
many families you know even if
traditional school is really not working
well for their child don’t feel like
they could make this jump to independent
learning without a lot of support and
help and this is where organizations
like PLC and North Star come in handy so
one way to think about it is that it
works a bit like a like a YMCA or a
health club right you become a member
and then they have all these resources
and opportunities and equipment that you
can use if you want to learn more about
something you could sign up for a you
know a class or work with a trainer or
coach but everything is offered
voluntarily you know it’s like when you
go to the YMCA it’s not like they force
you to get onto the treadmill for 45
minutes before you can go swimming right
it’s
to you based on who you are what your
fitness level is and what your goals are
all right so if plc for instance every
young person has a staff mentor that
they meet with individually each week
you know and initially those
conversations are just like all right
yeah you’re not gonna be in school seven
hours a day what do you want to do with
your time what are you interested in
where do you see yourself headed and
then supporting young people to find the
resources not only at PLC but out in the
wider community to help them get where
they want to go yeah and then at PLC you
know we’re open four days a week sort of
during school hours and there’s just a
lot of help and support that we give to
young people you know there’s classes
that you can sign up for there’s
tutoring there’s help finding volunteer
and work opportunities in the community
we hope kids apply to college and it’s
also just a safe and welcoming community
for teens to be a part of but everything
that we offer is optional you know
there’s no attendance requirements
there’s no grades there’s no you know
credits or diplomas it’s really just
learning for learnings sake you know but
it’s not for everybody
I wouldn’t left my high school to attend
a self-directed Education Center I would
have been like where’s the basketball
team right but for young people who feel
stuck in school and want something
different it can be a life-changing
option and it works you know for better
or worse a lot of people you know equate
the success of educational programs by
like college acceptance rates and every
kid who’s ever wanted to go to college
from PLC has young Northstars been doing
this a really long time it’s something
like 80% of their kids go on and do some
form of higher education now including
that quote-unquote top schools like MIT
and Brown and so just like there’s many
young people who feel stuck in school
there are many many teachers who feel
the same way and this is where the
teacher liberation part comes in for a
lot of frustrated teachers their first
impulse if they don’t you know leave the
profession all together is to want to
start their own school
I can do it so much better than these
idiots but I’m working for right I have
a little bit of advice for goodness
sakes don’t start a school I mean unless
that’s really really really what you
want to do if you’re just looking for
more autonomy and a better way to work
with young people you should start a
self-directed Education Center instead
and I’ll tell you why
right first this country is chock-full
of schools of all kinds it was not
inspiring to me to just start another
one and in fact starting another school
even a small progressive cool one you
know would not have solved the problem
for a lot of the young people that I
worked with who didn’t like school
public private charter they’re all still
schools right and the kids that I worked
with Yule wanted more control over their
life at a fundamental level and not just
sort of different choices offered by
somebody else a second it’s simpler I
mean has anybody in here ever looked at
the application to start a charter
school it’s massive there’s all this red
tape and hoops to jump through and at
the end of all that you still need
someone’s permission right with a
self-directed Education Center you’re
just setting up a nonprofit organization
like any other you know the process is
really straightforward and simple and
you don’t need anyone’s permission you
can just do the work no strings attached
financially these centers are way more
doable than starting a school you know
we started PLC in one tiny little room
with like four thousand dollars worth of
loans you know it’s really challenging
to make it work just like any other
venture but it’s not much more
complicated than managing a household
budget you know your financial statement
like if it’s on one piece of paper as a
teacher you have a lot more control over
the work that you do with young people
yeah I lead a couple classes it’s like
US history current events a class that I
call be more awesomer not because I have
to because I want to and the young
people are interested you can really
offer any kind of class or experience
you want and you don’t need departmental
permission if you want to do it the kids
want to do it just put it on the
calendar it’s as simple as that
and no grades means no grading I get
plenty of feedback but what it does not
involve is all night or all weekend long
grading marathons you know all that
pointless paper work that you deal with
just kind of wave it goodbye but the big
one as far as I was concerned it’s just
that the relationships that I can have
with young people are better you when I
was a teacher I was hired to have an
agenda and usually involved you know
teaching US history and enforcing school
policies whether I thought that agenda
was in the best interest of the young
people sitting in front of me or not you
know I had the authority and was often
you know required to make bad things
happen to young people they didn’t do
the homework they didn’t study for the
test they didn’t do the project even if
they had zero interest in any of that
beforehand I gave them bad grades
you know detentions demerit suspensions
you know it’s kind of crazy for me to
think about now but I was in charge of
telling seventeen-year-old humans when
they could eat a snack or wear a hat or
go to the bathroom these are not
decisions I feel like I need to be part
of and this role that I had really
colored the relationships that I had
with young people at a self-directed
Education Center you know my only agenda
ever is supporting young people where
they’re at right now and helping them
get to where they want to go that’s it
you know instead of a taskmaster I’m a
mentor I’m a coach I’m a cheerleader I’m
a supporter this is a better way to
relate to young people and really the
kind of adult that I think young people
need in their life the most okay so like
I said you know self-directed education
may not be for everybody but it should
be an option for every young person in
this country and I guarantee you that if
you were to close your eyes and just
sort of point at a map of the United
States in whatever town you landed on
there would be a handful of teachers who
don’t like working in school
and you know trust me to the nineteen of
young people who also don’t like school
for the ideas we just gotta put them
together there should literally be
thousands of these places all over and
it’s my mission in life to help support
their creation and look this is not
theoretical this is happening right now
on the ground all over the country with
real young people and their families and
so look you know if TED talks are
supposed to be about you know ideas
worth spreading
let me tell you this is one of them you
know self-directed education has the
power to not only improve the lives of
countless young people but also the
lives of the teachers who work with them
and because now on most days I really do
get to feel like this
thank you
[Applause]
I’m going to talk about liberating
teachers I’m actually from a family of
teachers my dad my wife my mother-in-law
are all teachers most of my friends are
teachers and I was a teacher for 11
years and if you hang around as many
teachers as I do you know that there’s
not that many of them that are thrilled
with the direction that education is
headed and like many teachers when I
first started I had a tremendous sense
of idealism and optimism about the power
of traditional schools like I went to
growing up to not only improve the lives
of young people but to make the world a
better place the picture I had running
through my head was this one the famous
Oh captain my captain scene from the
Dead Poets Society right I was gonna be
that guy you know leading my students up
the mountain of knowledge to the
pinnacle of wisdom or some such thing
however my view from the front of the
classroom was much more often like this
and this is a problem and at first I
thought it was my problem thought of new
at this I suck at teaching I just need
to get better and so I tried all the
innovative things I could think of and
you know some of the kids really got
into it but the overwhelming feeling was
much more like you know is this gonna be
on the test
and what I came to realize was that it
wasn’t just me but that there was a
systemic issue with the way that we’ve
chosen to educate young people yeah I
had always liked school growing up but
what I learned from my teaching career
is that many of my students did not and
that far from looking at high school as
an opportunity to learn and grow many of
them looked at it more like a four-year
sentence they just had to put in their
time and I don’t want to be overly
dramatic here but eventually you know I
came to feel a little bit like a prison
guard yeah I was making kids who didn’t
want to be there in the first place do
things they didn’t want to do and this
is not an inspiring way to spend your
days and certainly was not the reason
that I went into teaching in the first
place and so I knew I had to get out
small problem now if you’re a teacher
but you don’t like school
and what do you do I got pretty
desperate you know I was googling things
at night like jobs for teachers who hate
teaching and in all of that searching I
came across this place called North Star
and North Star is based on an idea
called self-directed education and as I
was reading their website and really
understood you know what they were doing
I got so excited I literally jumped out
of my chair into this little dance
around my office a little like an Irish
jig which I will not recreate for you
here today
because this was it this is how I had
always imagined working with young
people and really since that day I have
dedicated my life to making
self-directed education and option for
as many young people as possible so what
are we talking about here what
self-directed education why does it have
the power to liberate not only students
but teachers as well
well boils down to what author Blake
Bowles refers to as educational consent
this is a really simple and an obvious
idea when you think about it but it has
profound implications for the way that
we work with young people so when you’re
dealing with like medical professionals
for instance they have to get your
consent before treating you if doctors
don’t just strap you to a table and
start poking and prodding you they ask
like hey can I take a look at that thing
growing on your arm okay they give you
treatment options and ultimately you
have the right to say yes or no to
whatever they suggest if they don’t get
your consent it’s a violation an
actually consent is pretty central to
all of the positive and meaningful
relationships we have in our lives right
so why not in school yeah I probably
taught a little over a thousand kids in
my career and how many of them did I
ever actually ask if they were
interested to spend a hundred and eighty
days with me learning about US history
zero
yeah how many do you think would have
taken me up on it if they had the choice
or you brought the question a little bit
how many of you want to be here in
school at all I think we don’t ask kids
the question because we’re afraid of
what the answer would be right and we
adults don’t see any other path it’s
either you go to school
even if you don’t like it or it’s not
working for you or you end up a bum like
there’s your choices well fortunately
those aren’t the only two options and
what a lot of people what a lot of
people don’t know is that there’s this
whole world of wonderful opportunities
for young people who choose not to go to
school that you can learn independently
of the traditional public and private
school system and every door is still
open to you college career
entrepreneurship travel that everything
you can do later in life by attending
school you can still do without
attending school you know when I’m
talking to people about this for the
first time this is generally the point
in the conversation where the needle
makes that scratchy noise across the
record like earn what you can be
successful without going to school like
don’t kids need a high school diploma
you know the Act the answer is actually
usually no we’re here in Princeton New
Jersey for instance and you don’t need a
high school diploma to attend Princeton
University who know I mean you still
have to meet their admissions
requirements and do a lot of amazing
things with your time but graduating
from high school is just not on the list
you know some colleges some entry-level
jobs might require to have some kind of
piece of paper from the state you just
take a GED test sort of check that box
off and just get on with your life
obviously you don’t need a diploma to
start your own business or travel it’s
just generally a non-issue for whatever
path kids want to take next
but when we’re talking to people about
you know self-directed education or not
you know non-coercive education people
have a really hard time just wrapping
their head around like what would that
look like on a daily basis for young
people to have so much choice
about what they learn and how they spend
their time well there’s a bunch of ways
to do it I’m gonna talk about the one
that I’m most familiar with which is an
organization I helped create called the
Princeton Learning cooperative which was
modeled after what they were doing at
Northstar
and it goes like this if traditional
school is not doing it for you for
whatever reason sometimes the best
solution is also the simplest just stop
going
you know if the medicine is making is
sick stop taking it and the way to stop
going to school in the United States is
through something called homeschooling
law anyone can just do this tomorrow you
register as a home schooler and voila
you have all the freedom and flexibility
you could ever want to design whatever
kind of life and education is gonna work
for you and by homeschooling you know we
don’t mean just taking school and doing
it at home you know we don’t mean your
mom teaching you algebra at the kitchen
table it’s simply the legal mechanism
that we have here in the United States
for young people and their families to
be in charge of your own education and
many families you know even if
traditional school is really not working
well for their child don’t feel like
they could make this jump to independent
learning without a lot of support and
help and this is where organizations
like PLC and North Star come in handy so
one way to think about it is that it
works a bit like a like a YMCA or a
health club right you become a member
and then they have all these resources
and opportunities and equipment that you
can use if you want to learn more about
something you could sign up for a you
know a class or work with a trainer or
coach but everything is offered
voluntarily you know it’s like when you
go to the YMCA it’s not like they force
you to get onto the treadmill for 45
minutes before you can go swimming right
it’s
to you based on who you are what your
fitness level is and what your goals are
all right so if plc for instance every
young person has a staff mentor that
they meet with individually each week
you know and initially those
conversations are just like all right
yeah you’re not gonna be in school seven
hours a day what do you want to do with
your time what are you interested in
where do you see yourself headed and
then supporting young people to find the
resources not only at PLC but out in the
wider community to help them get where
they want to go yeah and then at PLC you
know we’re open four days a week sort of
during school hours and there’s just a
lot of help and support that we give to
young people you know there’s classes
that you can sign up for there’s
tutoring there’s help finding volunteer
and work opportunities in the community
we hope kids apply to college and it’s
also just a safe and welcoming community
for teens to be a part of but everything
that we offer is optional you know
there’s no attendance requirements
there’s no grades there’s no you know
credits or diplomas it’s really just
learning for learnings sake you know but
it’s not for everybody
I wouldn’t left my high school to attend
a self-directed Education Center I would
have been like where’s the basketball
team right but for young people who feel
stuck in school and want something
different it can be a life-changing
option and it works you know for better
or worse a lot of people you know equate
the success of educational programs by
like college acceptance rates and every
kid who’s ever wanted to go to college
from PLC has young Northstars been doing
this a really long time it’s something
like 80% of their kids go on and do some
form of higher education now including
that quote-unquote top schools like MIT
and Brown and so just like there’s many
young people who feel stuck in school
there are many many teachers who feel
the same way and this is where the
teacher liberation part comes in for a
lot of frustrated teachers their first
impulse if they don’t you know leave the
profession all together is to want to
start their own school
I can do it so much better than these
idiots but I’m working for right I have
a little bit of advice for goodness
sakes don’t start a school I mean unless
that’s really really really what you
want to do if you’re just looking for
more autonomy and a better way to work
with young people you should start a
self-directed Education Center instead
and I’ll tell you why
right first this country is chock-full
of schools of all kinds it was not
inspiring to me to just start another
one and in fact starting another school
even a small progressive cool one you
know would not have solved the problem
for a lot of the young people that I
worked with who didn’t like school
public private charter they’re all still
schools right and the kids that I worked
with Yule wanted more control over their
life at a fundamental level and not just
sort of different choices offered by
somebody else a second it’s simpler I
mean has anybody in here ever looked at
the application to start a charter
school it’s massive there’s all this red
tape and hoops to jump through and at
the end of all that you still need
someone’s permission right with a
self-directed Education Center you’re
just setting up a nonprofit organization
like any other you know the process is
really straightforward and simple and
you don’t need anyone’s permission you
can just do the work no strings attached
financially these centers are way more
doable than starting a school you know
we started PLC in one tiny little room
with like four thousand dollars worth of
loans you know it’s really challenging
to make it work just like any other
venture but it’s not much more
complicated than managing a household
budget you know your financial statement
like if it’s on one piece of paper as a
teacher you have a lot more control over
the work that you do with young people
yeah I lead a couple classes it’s like
US history current events a class that I
call be more awesomer not because I have
to because I want to and the young
people are interested you can really
offer any kind of class or experience
you want and you don’t need departmental
permission if you want to do it the kids
want to do it just put it on the
calendar it’s as simple as that
and no grades means no grading I get
plenty of feedback but what it does not
involve is all night or all weekend long
grading marathons you know all that
pointless paper work that you deal with
just kind of wave it goodbye but the big
one as far as I was concerned it’s just
that the relationships that I can have
with young people are better you when I
was a teacher I was hired to have an
agenda and usually involved you know
teaching US history and enforcing school
policies whether I thought that agenda
was in the best interest of the young
people sitting in front of me or not you
know I had the authority and was often
you know required to make bad things
happen to young people they didn’t do
the homework they didn’t study for the
test they didn’t do the project even if
they had zero interest in any of that
beforehand I gave them bad grades
you know detentions demerit suspensions
you know it’s kind of crazy for me to
think about now but I was in charge of
telling seventeen-year-old humans when
they could eat a snack or wear a hat or
go to the bathroom these are not
decisions I feel like I need to be part
of and this role that I had really
colored the relationships that I had
with young people at a self-directed
Education Center you know my only agenda
ever is supporting young people where
they’re at right now and helping them
get to where they want to go that’s it
you know instead of a taskmaster I’m a
mentor I’m a coach I’m a cheerleader I’m
a supporter this is a better way to
relate to young people and really the
kind of adult that I think young people
need in their life the most okay so like
I said you know self-directed education
may not be for everybody but it should
be an option for every young person in
this country and I guarantee you that if
you were to close your eyes and just
sort of point at a map of the United
States in whatever town you landed on
there would be a handful of teachers who
don’t like working in school
and you know trust me to the nineteen of
young people who also don’t like school
for the ideas we just gotta put them
together there should literally be
thousands of these places all over and
it’s my mission in life to help support
their creation and look this is not
theoretical this is happening right now
on the ground all over the country with
real young people and their families and
so look you know if TED talks are
supposed to be about you know ideas
worth spreading
let me tell you this is one of them you
know self-directed education has the
power to not only improve the lives of
countless young people but also the
lives of the teachers who work with them
and because now on most days I really do
get to feel like this
thank you
[Applause]
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