Momentum: Toward a Tipping Point in Transforming Education

Change is the end result of all true learning.
–Leo Buscaglia, Professor of Special Education, University of Southern California

In a conference center in Boston in mid-October, 15 young people stood in front of members of the Reimagine Learning network — a diverse group of more than 150 educators, nonprofit leaders, funders policy-influencers and thought leaders — to share their vision for the future of K-12 education in the U.S. Most of these young people had dropped out of school and sought out alternative education pathways; all had a tough experience with school and felt unsupported and unseen. What, you might ask, could they share that these education reform experts from across the nation might have missed?

These young people — members of YouthBuild USA’s Young Leader’s Council — had engaged in a multi-month learning journey with our team that took them on an exploration of neuroscience and the learning sciences, on a tour of some of the most innovative schools in the U.S., and on a reflective journey of their own experience in school and their own understanding of their own strengths and potential. What emerged for them was a simple truth: they hadn’t failed; the school system had failed them. The one-size-fits-all model was never designed with their needs, nor, frankly, with the needs of most students, in mind.

What also emerged was a clear vision for the future of learning: learning environments that offer mutual respect and love, an understanding and appreciation of student differences, and an ability to respond to and support the unique passions of students. These principles need to be at the heart of how we redesign schools.

The insights shared by these young people were supported and amplified by the entire Reimagine Learning network. Over the course of two days together, the members of the network reoriented toward their shared commitment to transform schools with a fundamental focus on equity — ensuring that learning environments across the country are able to support the diverse strengths and needs of ALL students, including and especially those who have been systematically under-served by schools to date. Christine Ortiz, from Equity Design Collaborative, noted that “inequity is a product of design, not an accident. And while that is a difficult truth to face, the good news is that if it is a product of design, we are in a position to redesign to get a different outcome.”

The community heard from innovators — nonprofit leaders, district superintendents, community leaders, and policy-influencers — who are involved in the messy, exhausting, and vital day-to-day work of bringing educational equity to life. And they reflected on how, together, the community can more powerfully align both language and action to drive powerfully toward a new normal. More importantly, the community reflected on how we can do so while ensuring that students and young people are at the center of this movement to reimagine learning in the U.S. in the role of designers and decision-makers.

As a part of this, network members took on a difficult but essential question: what will it take — at the local, state, and federal levels — to build on the small but important pockets of innovation and change cropping up in schools and communities across the nation to ensure that all schools have the capacity to adapt to meet the diverse needs of all learners?

Ron Walker — an education pioneer who has been lifting up the need to reorient how we see and support the potential of boys of color — reminded us that “school is for conformity; education is for liberation.” And he challenged us, asking: “Where are our dream-keepers? Where are our liberators?”

At New Profit, we have a credo that starts with this phrase: “We see promise in the fearless ones.” The power of the Reimagine Learning network is that it is composed of the fearless ones — those who refuse to accept a status quo that systematically disadvantages certain members of our community. They keep their eyes focused on the necessary dream of educational equity and their hands busy with the necessary revolution required to ensure our schools become engines of opportunity for all students.

As we close the first five-year chapter of Reimagine Learning and move into the next phase of our work, we are actively expanding our network of dream-keepers. Join us and help keep the momentum going.

Jody Cornish is Managing Partner of Reimagine Learning, an initiative of New Profit that exists to put the diverse needs of our most vulnerable K-12 students at the center of the national dialogue about the future of learning in the U.S. Reimagine Learning supports communities and schools to create teaching and learning environments that unleash creativity and potential in ALL students — including and especially those who have been systematically undeserved — enabling them to realize academic and life success.