What’s next?

Guild, trilogy and lambda

For a very long time, education was a terrible place to invest. Then founders started to figure things out. Coursera, udacity and Udemy took advantage of the web to create massive audiences. For many of us though, it wasn’t clear that ‘access’ to better education was the be all and end all.

Why Homeschooling is important…

I’ve been watching the homeschooling space for years. About 2 million children in the U.S. (3%) are…

The MOOC I would build

Here are some pretty rough ideas of how we could make MOOCs a lot better. I’m thinking about the way I would combine what I know works in education — coaching and interactivity — with what scales in education — static content and student to student learning.

Thesis — Synchronous College

I remember when MOOCs came out. I took one long sigh and hunkered down for a decade of student misery. Let’s unpack that. The compelling thing about MOOCs is that they require almost no behavior change from professors. They sit up there lecturing but now someone has a video…

We need to flip flop who pays for education and health care

Most people who have studied health care end up on the side of consumer pay or government pay. Very few end up on the side of employer pay, mainly because it hides real costs from employees. Healthcare is also only somewhat related to your job. So maybe having…

How to make US colleges free

Bernie Sanders made a lot of waves by advocating for free college for all. He was quickly shouted down as a radical and socialist (both of which are true). But it got me thinking, why not?

Five reasons I’m optimistic about the next 20 years in education

What if our schools were run by AirBnB

OK, the title is a little provocative, but after spending almost 20 years in the school system, I think we need to get off of our high horse. In the name of student safety and privacy, we are willing to run our school systems like factories from the turn of the…

My Trip to India Part 4 — Affordable Schools

It was very interesting to be in a country where over 50% of students attend non-government schools. Let me say that in my opinion this proliferation of school choice is probably the second best reason to have hope for India, right behind the fact that…