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The Future of Education: Daily Summaries Delivered
by Michael B. Horn
Interviews with the top innovators & changemakers so that you can stay on top of the trends transforming transform learning, education, and the development of talent worldwide so that all individuals can build their passions, fulfill their potential, and live a life of purpose michaelbhorn.substack.com
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- 2 days ago48 min
Tomorrow Schools: 7 Microschools Offering a Window Into the Future
Four of my former Harvard master’s degree students—Ruben Villarreal-Halprin, Matthew Millikin, Jaysan Shah, and William Wiltshire—joined me to discuss their independent study project exploring seven diverse microschools across the United States: the Village School, Elizabeth City-Pasquotank Public Schools microschool, NuVu, the Levitt Lab, Khan Lab School, Red Bridge, and Alpha School. Several of these I’ve featured here before; others are new. The conversation dove into the range of models, philosophies, and uses of technology and AI within each school to reflect on the spectrum of innovation in schooling, the challenges and opportunities of choice, and the importance of creating learning environments that both lift the floor and blow through the ceiling for students. I look forward to your thoughts and where you all want to learn more!Show Notes:Tomorrow Schools on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomorrow-schools-50881b3b6Michael HornWelcome to the Future of Education. I’m Michael Horn. You’re joining the show where we’re dedicated to creating a world in which all individuals can build their passions, fulfill their potential and live lives of purpose. And to help us think through that, today I’m, I’m really excited. I’ve got four of my former students. I say former because not only did I teach them several months ago at this point, but they’re all graduates now at, at Harvard. So congratulations to them. They all made it through the rapid fire year that is the Harvard Graduate School of Education experience.But welcome guys. We’ve got Jaysan, Matthew, William, Ruben, all just amazing. You’re all amazing. You all come from really cool different backgrounds with education. And, first, welcome. And then second, I, I’ll say the reason I wanted to talk to you guys is because in the second semester you chose to do an independent study with me for some, you know, inane reason of wanting to continue to work with me, but you did it around a series of microschools that are emerging that in your words, like start to allow us to question the principles of what is a school? What’s the purpose of schooling in this era of AI? What are the things that are most important perhaps, or how can we think about things perhaps differently from how we have? And you did these deep dives into these seven microschools around the country and got to visit and spend time in all of them and create some really cool rapport and reflections around them. And I wanted to dig deeper with you on the podcast about it. So welcome.Maybe let’s start, just go around, if you will, the proverbial virtual studio and, and just sort of give the thumbnail sketch of who you are, your background. Why this was an interesting conversation for you to do research in for an entire semester. And we’ll, we’ll start there. So William, why don’t you jump in first?William WiltshireSure, yeah. Thank you so much, Michael, for having us. I was a middle school math and history teacher in New York City before coming to the Harvard Graduate School of Education at a charter school. And charters were thought to be the innovation to traditional education when they kind of started gaining momentum. And in my teaching experience there, I enjoyed my time and loved working with the kids, but there was certainly nothing innovative about the role of a teacher in that school. State test was kind of the North Star and seat time regulations and requirements were super strict. And so as AI was coming on the scene in the world of education. I started kind of expecting change in my role, but not seeing anything meaningful.And so came to Harvard to try to better understand where the profession is moving and kind of where schools in general are shifting and evolving. And met these three great guys in your class in the fall. And we just kind of went 100 miles an hour on this school visits project. And it was incredible. So, really glad to be here. Excited to keep chatting.Michael HornYeah, let’s do it. So, Ruben, let’s go to you next. Tell us your background. We didn’t officially intersect pre Harvard, but we kind of did because you were at a school that an organization I was a founding board member had funded. So tell. Tell us a little bit about your background and how you jumped into this.Ruben Villarreal-HalprinYeah, we were awfully close to running into each other. I spent three years at that school as an assistant principal. It was in Richmond, California. I ran the humanities department there. Prior to that, eight years teaching humanities as well, all around the country. Memphis, Tennessee, San Francisco. Came back to my hometown of Cambridge in the Ed policy program. This project really excited me. My time in schools
- 2 weeks ago23 min
Inside Primer's Growing Network
Ryan Delk, the founder of Primer, an innovative K–8 private school network focused on accessibility, mastery, and student agency, sat down with me at a Primer school in Florida to help me learn about Primer’s schooling model. Ryan explained how Primer partners with passionate educators to launch flexible, community-focused campuses that prioritize affordability and transparency for families. Our discussion showcased how Primer leverages technology to personalize academics through regular assessment, supports teachers by reducing administrative burdens, and cultivates real-world skills and student empowerment through project-based “pursuits.” And we have clips throughout of teachers and students interacting in the school, as Ryan gave me a tour of the school. I can’t wait to hear all of your thoughts in the comments.Michael HornWelcome to the Future of Education. As I’ve discussed, for the last decade-plus, we’ve seen a wave of microschools and, more accurately in my view, low-cost private schools, emerge across the country. Many are local schools with one or two sites. But a few have scaling ambitions through different mechanisms—names like Acton Academy, Prenda, OpenEd, Wildflower, KaiPod arguably, Flourish, and a few others. And then there’s another school network with such ambitions called Primer. I had long heard about the Primer model from many folks and knew several of the team members. But I had never had the opportunity to visit a Primer School. Knowing I would have the opportunity to interview Gov. Jeb Bush and Primer’s founder, Ryan Delk, in Florida at a Primer School, I was also excited to visit and learn more about the model. What follows is some of the conversation Ryan and I had and a look into the school itself. For those listening, you’ll miss a lot of the video of the actual schools but you should be able to get the basic flavor. For those watching, I hope you enjoy and learn from the accompanying video of students and teachers.Creating a high-agency learning environmentMichael HornRyan, I’ve been wanting to see a Primer school for I don’t know how many years now. We’re here, we’re here at Coconut Grove. Tell us about the Primer model. That’s the first thing I always hear when I hear about Primer schools is you have to understand the Primer school model. What is it?Ryan DelkSo it’s, I’ll talk about it from the family, teacher and student perspective. So from an educator perspective, Primer exists to empower these great educators who have dreamed of starting a school or want to start a school and want to serve their communities. But that’s a quite arduous process if you want to get a school ground. And so we partner with these great educators, we help them open these schools across Florida, now Alabama, soon Texas. And these are sometimes former administrators, they’re sometimes longtime teachers, sometimes Teach for America alums. But they’re people that see that the traditional system is not meeting kids needs, not meeting the needs of their community. But they really care about figuring that out. And so they, they, they partner with us to open, to open these schools.From a family perspective. Most of our families are in some sort of school situation that they know is not meeting their needs. And they’re typically not the families that can afford to move to a private school. These are really mostly working class, middle class, sometimes low income families that really care about their kids’ education. They’re deeply passionate about this. They believe in education as a driver of upward mobility and the importance of it. But they know that the current setup is not meeting their kids’ needs. And so they seek out Primer.They’re able to attend Primer often for free or for a very low tuition cost per month. And then from a student perspective we really believe in this idea of taking kids seriously. That’s like our sort of North Star from a student experience. And so we’ll talk more about that and I think we’re going to go, go see some kids in action. But this idea of when you create a high agency environment for a student and specifically around academics, you give them transparency into exactly where they’re at. Are they above grade level, behind grade level? And so parents, teachers, students, everyone can see, okay, I’m a grade level ahead in math, I may be a grade level behind in reading. Here’s the game plan. You give them agency over, you sort of give them the opportunity to get, to either get farther ahead or to get onto grade level.And so all the software that we’ve built that powers the school day, is really sort of built with that in mind. And so you have this high agency environment for kids. You have teachers who are really excite
- 3 weeks ago21 min
An Explosion in Educational Choice: Reflecting on a Quarter-Century of Change in Florida
I hosted a conversation with former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Ryan Delk, the founder of the Primer micrschools network, about the evolution of educational choice in Florida and its broader implications for the nation. Our discussion explored the state's journey from the early implementation of school choice policies to the current landscape where over half of Florida's families have the ability to select their children's schools and other educational services. The episode delved into key issues like funding, regulation, accountability, and federalism.Michael HornGovernor, Ryan, welcome to the Future of Education. Thanks for being here.Governor BushGood to be at a Primer school.Michael HornYes, it is indeed. And the history, Governor, of publicly funded widespread universal school choice, educational choice in Florida really gets its start from your time as Governor. You have laws in 1999, 2001, I’d say 2003, with funding following the student to Florida Virtual. You have all these milestones. As you look back now, 2026 at the state of educational choice here, how would you describe where we are in Florida? Where in the movement, if you will, are we right now?Governor BushWe’re not completely there, but we certainly got to scale for sure. When we started, I think we had 80 kids in that, parents went to a private school with public money. And that’s expanded over time. One voucher program, another corporate tax scholar program. Today, over 50% of parents in Florida choose where their kids go to school. It could be we have universal public school choice, we have universal education savings accounts. And so we’re, we’re building what I think is the right way to educate our children by empowering parents. It’s really exciting.Michael HornAnd as you noted, we’re sitting in a Primer school, literally one of hundreds of microschools, low cost private schools throughout the state right now. I’m curious, did you envision this sort of education entrepreneurship that we’ve seen when you were Governor?Governor BushI didn’t envision anything. I hoped that it would happen. My personal belief is that parents deserve to have this power to choose where their kids go to school and if they do that, that there will be schools like Primer, more tools for homeschool kids. Charter schools will emerge. The religious schools that were in decline in terms of providing education to their students would see growth, all of that. I was hopeful it would happen and I’m proud that Florida has been a leader. But it’s also exciting to see it happen across the country.Michael HornRyan, you’ve been a direct beneficiary of really the foresight of these policies that I think it’s fair to say. And you also, as I understand it, have quite an intergenerational connection as well when it comes to microschools, educational choice in Florida. What’s your family connection to the story that’s unfolded here that started under Governor Bush?Ryan DelkYeah, it’s interesting. There’s a very personal connection, but then there’s also this sort of interesting macro connection. And the personal connection is my mom was a public school teacher, so she was very pro public schools. We were zoned for. She took me to kindergarten orientation at the school that we were zoned for. And she quickly realized that it was a failing school. It wasn’t going to meet, you know, her standards for us. We were living with, in my grandparents house at the time in a low income area outside Orlando.We didn’t have, you know, any choice to move. We couldn’t afford private school. And so she just took matters into her own hands. And so she ended up starting one of the first kinds of homeschool microschools in Florida. She got me and my siblings and then about a dozen other kids together and she just willed this thing into existence. And what’s interesting, and this is where it kind of connects to the macro. So I, this incredible education that frankly was like, you know, significantly higher quality than, you know, what I would have, you know, deserved, you know, relative to our socioeconomic status or what you would have expected. And what’s interesting is that she started that right before Governor Bush’s first term.Impact of Governor Bush’s PoliciesRyan DelkAnd so, we sort of experienced, you know, what I think of as the before times and it was very contrarian. We got a lot of questions. I think she was frankly judged by a lot of people, you know, for, for doing what she did. And then when Governor Bush took office, he, you know, sort of decided to, to go to the mat for, you know, a lot of these issues and make it a key priority. And so we, we actually sort of experienced the shi
- May 18, 20261h 14m
Alpha School, AI and the Reinvention of Education: A Conversation with Joe Liemandt & Michael Horn
In a live conversation at WHOOP headquarters in Boston moderated by Rags Gupta, I joined Joe Liemandt, the principal of the much-discussed and debated Alpha School, to talk about the hype and hope behind AI in K-12 education. Our discussion explored how AI, when paired with a redesigned learning model centered on student motivation and mastery, could unlock student growth along a number of dimensions. And we talked about why there’s never been a better time than now to be an education entrepreneur.The Future of Education is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Michael HornSeveral weeks back, the Massachusetts AI Coalition hosted me along with Joe Liemandt in a conversation about Alpha schools, the reinvention of learning in general, the role that AI could or may not play in reinventing education. All hosted at WHOOP headquarters in a conversation that was moderated by Rags Gupta. Fascinating conversation. We covered a ton and we have a recording of it, so we thought we would repurpose it for you here on the Future of Education. Enjoy the conversation that I had with Rags Gupta and Joe Liemandt of Alpha School at WHOOP headquarters.Rags GuptaWelcome, Michael Horn. And welcome, Joe LiemandtJoe LiemandtThank you.Redesigning the school dayRags GuptaWe’re going to kick it off. And Michael, we’re going to start with you. We’re two or three years into this AI wave. Where are we and how is AI best being deployed in education today? What are you seeing out there?Michael HornYeah, It’s interesting because I think there’s a couple answers to that question. On the one hand, education, when I started, when we wrote that book, it was thought of as the backwater of technology. It’s where you never saw it, if it was there, it was rarely used, and so forth.I think we are at a very different moment where, for better or worse, AI is ubiquitous in K12 schools across the country, meaning that if you think beyond just a chatbot, or if you do think of a chatbot, it’s embedded in almost every product. Chromebook, Magic School, various apps that are being used. The average school district has nearly 3,000 apps that are being used. AI is somewhere in there, to say nothing of the fact of how students and teachers are using it on their own time. So on one level, it’s everywhere, and on the other level, I would argue that what matters far more, and I think Joe’s going to agree on this, is not the technology per se, but the learning model itself or the model of schooling itself. And so on the reinvention question of how is AI being used, there are a handful of models, I think Alpha being one, that are putting AI at the centerpiece and creating truly new school models. And that is a significant minority of the action. I would argue most of the AI is being leveraged onto the traditional status quo to either reinforce existing processes and priorities, or, frankly, in some cases, the better verb would be to exacerbate them.Rags GuptaI’m going to pull on that thread a little bit, but Joe, you’ve been studying this for a while. Where are we in the cycle of deploying AI in education?Joe LiemandtWell, I believe we’re right at the beginning of it. I do believe it’s ubiquitous. But I believe, you know, I believe there is, in all the debates, I believe there is good screen time, there is bad screen time, there is good AI, there is bad AI. And all the concerns right now about it being deployed poorly are very well founded. You know, 90% of chatbot use in schools is for cheat bots, right? And its chatbots are designed for cognitive offload, literally the opposite of learning. And if used incorrectly, we literally are going to have a generation who knows much less than they need to. Now I also obviously believe there’s good use of it and using it correctly.And I believe part of that is, at least in our whole theory, is you have to re envision the whole school day from the ground up. It enables this totally new model. And that part of it is just at the start. I’ve spent a lot of time talking to a lot of schools all over the place and you know, I, the first question I ask of them is, you know, our first commitment to every kid is that you will love school, right? And three weeks ago when we did our last survey, 43% of our students said, I’d rather go to school than go on vacation, right? Like a high bar of loving school. 90 some percent said they love it. And my first question to everybody, and they say, oh, can I use this Alpha time back model? I’m like, are you willing to redesign your school day so that kids love school more than vacation? And my view is if the answer is no, then using AI to reinforce your exi
- May 11, 202635 min
Changing of the Guard at Virtual School Funded Only When Students Demonstrate Mastery
Steve Kossakoski, outgoing co-founder of the Virtual Learning Academy Charter School (VLACS), and Natalie Berger, its new CEO, joined me to talk about lessons learned over VLACS’s history and its evolution as a leader in virtual education, particularly in a world of AI. VLACS has one of the most important funding models in education; instead of receiving money based on enrollment or attendance, it only receives funds when students demonstrate mastery.Natalie also shared her vision for expanding career-connected and project-based learning, as well as deepening partnerships with New Hampshire universities to offer more dual-credit opportunities for students.Michael HornWelcome to the Future of Education. I’m Michael Horn. You’re joining the show where we’re dedicated to creating a world in which all individuals can build their passions, fulfill their potential, and live lives of purpose. And to help us think through that today, I’m really excited because it’s one of the schools that I’ve taken a lot of inspiration from over many, many years, written a lot about it, lauded it many times, but it’s at an interesting inflection point. It’s the Virtual Learning Academy Charter School, VLACs as it’s commonly known out of New Hampshire. And Steve Kosikowski, who of course is the co-founder and has led it for many, many years, stepping down as the leader. And Natalie Berger, you’re stepping into these shoes to lead the organization as the CEO. Natalie, Steve, welcome both.I’m excited to get the update from you both and hear all the things VLACs. So thank you so much for joining me.Natalie BergerThanks for inviting us.Steve KossakoskiThanks, Michael.Starting charter schools in New HampshireMichael HornYeah, you bet. So, Steve, maybe like round us and like where the organization is today, as you like, made this decision to step into your next act that does not involve shepherding children and so forth and tell us like, you know, give us a quick arc of like, for those that haven’t followed the Virtual Learning Academy Charter School over the years founding story, where it has evolved to, who are you serving today? How does the funding model work? Some of those sort of nuts and bolts of the school.Steve KossakoskiSure, yeah. So the founding story is, I think, an interesting one. I was assistant superintendent in the Exeter, New Hampshire area and I work for a very innovative superintendent, Skip Hansen. And when the charter school laws changed in New Hampshire, he was the first superintendent to step forward and say, I think there’s a great opportunity to create charter schools that could benefit our kids. And so he thankfully allowed me to do the design work on the Great Bay Charter School, which is still operating today. And then a few years later, he asked me about the virtual side and he said, do you think we could help another group of kids through a virtual charter? And again allowed me the opportunity to do the design work on that. And so it was just that simple, you know, interaction in his office one day that led to everything.Soon thereafter, he decided to retire. And I said, well, it’d be an opportunity for me to do something different. And I stepped into the role. And the first few years were really quite interesting. There were nights when I would go home and wonder if we were going to make payroll and where the money was coming from. And we were always following the policies available at the state level. But since we were doing things in a different way, there were just questions all the time and just always thankful for the commissioner, Lionel Tracy,and always finding answers for us or knowing the right person to ask and really helping us to get off the ground.And then I think the next piece that led to our success was the people we were able to attract and hire, one of whom is here with us today, Natalie, she was in our second cohort, or first. Natalie second. Came in as a teacher and for many, many years just continued to do exemplary work and kind of rose up through the ranks. And I think one of the cool things about Natalie is if there’s a job at VLAC, she’s probably been involved either directly in it or somehow in it. So she really has just a wonderful understanding and an understanding that I don’t have because I’ve never been a teacher at VLAC. I’ve never taught a kid, and, you know, she has. So I think she brings a lot of wonderful things.Serving diverse student needsSteve KossakoskiOver the years, we have grown to a point where now we serve regularly 10 to 12,000 students on an annual basis, you know, 98% or so who are from New Hampshire, the rest are from out of state. We come close to 1000 full time students each year, K through 12, and the rest are
- May 4, 202640 min
Anomalies Wanted: How to Do Continuous Science
Academic research is under serious fire right now. The suspects fueling a replication crisis include the peer-review system, academic journals, and the system of evaluating faculty for tenure. The questions are also not new. The challenges are structural, baked into the underlying incentives. There are no easy answers it seems to the challenges.My guest for this episode is Mathïs Fédérico, founder of the startup company Bycelium, which aims to rethink science with Bayesianism. Mathïs shared his personal journey through the traditional research pipeline and explained how the emphasis on publication count and narrative crafting distorts scientific progress. Our conversation explored Bycelium’s approach to measuring the credibility and impact of scientific hypotheses in real time by incentivizing the sharing of data and negative results and encouraging honest debate rather than just novel publications.As Mathis told me, “Science is never perfect. Science will never tell you that something is true or false. Science will just nudge the credibility of things thanks to evidence.”Will Bycellium work? It’s too early to say, but I find the ideas behind it intriguing and illuminating.Challenges in academic research trendsMichael HornAlrighty. Welcome to the Future of Education. I’m delighted because several months ago Mathïs Fédérico reached out to me somewhat on a whim, I think because he had seen something I had posted about the research challenges in academia and higher education. And my hypothesizing that actually, you know, a lot of my research and writing is about how we need to reinvent the teaching and learning model itself is broken. And I said, you know, there’s this whole other thing that’s also broken, which is the research model itself. And then since then he reached out and we’ll talk about why he did in a moment. But one of the things that’s happened since then is a lot more people are very dialed into the challenges that the research process has. We’ve had this Nature article coming out that said, you know, 3,900 studies published in 62 journals and half of them could not be reproduced.We’ve seen a lot of people realize, hey, actually a lot of the Nobel Prize winners are not coming from traditional higher education pathways. As of late. We have DeepMind, Google, pharma companies, a lot of researchers that are the most impressive breakthroughs aren’t coming from the universities we expect to produce the research. We have a lot of claims of not just reproducibility challenges or replication, but outright falsifying of research and the like. And then you have this other backdrop, which we know well, is that people, when they publish in research journals, increasingly to get published, not only do you have to have something that looks statistically interesting, you also have to have something that is unique. So by definition almost not replication. And that has caused many faculty to look at narrower and narrower and narrower questions that have less and less relevance to other people. And as a result I don’t have the stats in front of me.But very few peer reviewed journals, articles that get published are ever, ever read. Very few get more than say two or three citations ever out there. And so you have a bunch of challenges hitting all at once. And so my guest Mathïs Fédérico, he has started an entity called Biselium, which we’re going to talk more about to actually solve the root causes of this challenge. But first, Mathïs, welcome. Thanks for reaching out. I’ve been like, we had this conversation on the phone and I’ve been buzzing ever since and saying, I think we have someone who might have an answer actually. So first, welcome and thanks for being here.Mathïs FédéricoWell, thanks for having me. I’m very glad to be here, I guess. Yeah. All that you’ve said, which seems very diverse in a way, and seems like a lot of things are happening independently, but all linked to the same source, which is, we are not pushing for the right thing. The thing that academia is optimizing for is not the good objective. And so whenever you try to maximize an objective like this, well, what’s happening is you maximize the wrong thing. You have a lot of the wrong things. And for us the wrong thing is the number of publications.That’s what we maximize today. The number of publications is what we use to evaluate. It’s what we use to quantify breakthroughs, to quantify how good a researcher is. But it’s not what matters. It’s not what matters at all. What does matter though, is how much did you change the minds of others, what
- Apr 20, 202652 min
Why Computers Went Universal—but College Didn’t
Joe Ross, president of Reach University, joined me to offer an alternative take on where the “College for All” movement went wrong. His analogy? One that will be familiar to my audience—computers. Specifically, disruptive innovation in computing. Our discussion covered the historical cycles of higher education reform, the false dichotomy between liberal arts and career-connected learning, and the emergence of disruptive models like apprenticeship degrees that integrate workplace learning, reduce costs, and challenge traditional assumptions about who higher education serves and how.Show Notes:A Student’s Guide to Apple Computer Guide for Apple Computers by Simpson’s creator, Matt GroeningMichael HornWelcome to the Future of Education. I’m Michael Horn. You’re joining the show where we’re dedicated to creating a world in which all individuals can build their passions, fulfill their potential, live lives of purpose. And to help us think through that, today, I’m delighted we’ve got one of my favorite folks in the world of education joining us. He’s none other than Joe Ross. He’s the president of Reach University. You’ve seen me appear on his podcast, and I thought it was only fair play, Joe, that we had you on mine now. So welcome.Joe RossWell, really excited to be here to see you again, Michael. How’s it going?Michael HornGood, good. I’m. I’m excited for this conversation. You and I have been riffing on a few topics together a lot, asynchronously, a little synchronously. And so we’ll let people into our headspace here. But I want to pose a question for you. It’s sort of almost a riddle, if you will.Okay, so we’ll go back to the late 1970s. I think it’s 1977 or something like that. Ken Olson, he’s the CEO of this company called Digital Equipment Corporation. They make mini computers. And he has this quote that there’s no reason for any individual to have a computer in their home. And, I’m gonna share with you what a computer to him at that time looked like. We’ll share that up there for folks, this is what a mini computer looked like.It was like a very, very large file cabinet. Yeah, not particularly mini.Joe RossYeah, right.Michael HornCost quarter million dollars. And I think the mental thing in his head, Joe, was like, hey, computers for all. Everyone’s buzzing about this in the hobbyist circles and stuff like that. Are you crazy? We’re not scaling this thing to every single home. What’s wrong with the picture I just painted?Joe RossWell, it’s funny, just a couple years later, Microsoft was getting started, and the vision that Bill Gates put out there was a computer on every desk and in every home. So there was a rising tide of the sentiment that computers actually should be for all. And it took some time. But what’s striking today right now is I think well over 95% of households do, in fact, have a computer on a desk or in their household. And that is a huge turnaround. So, yeah, famous last words.Michael HornFamous last words. Right. And so it’s the power I think you’re pointing to is disruptive innovation. Right. People didn’t think of computers at that time as these small, dimpy little things that then Microsoft comes along and, you know, it’s a couple thousand dollars, it’s a toy for hobbyists and children. It’s radically more affordable, convenient, portable over time and so forth, and it. And it literally changes the world. And then you made the observation to me that there’s been this quote unquote, College For All movement.Questioning the necessity of collegeMichael HornThere’ve been a bunch of people like me questioning that movement as of late. But you said there’s like another possibility, which is we’ve gone about College For All in sort of the most backwards way you would go about it in any other sector of the world. So, maybe talk us through your thinking there and you have like a really interesting statistic that goes, I think, 10 years or so later, 1989, if I’m remembering correctly, about how many people had computers versus college degrees. If I’m remembering.Joe RossYeah. Right. So back in 1989. And we’ll come back to why that year is interesting, but other than the fact that it’s the year I graduated from high school but in 1989, just aged myself beautifully, didn’t I? Yeah. But back in 1989, 15% of households had a computer and bachelor degree attainment was about 21%. That is flipped. So today over 95% of households have a computer, including the small computer people have in their pocket.
- Apr 13, 202652 min
How Will You Measure Your Life?
In 2012, Clay Christensen joined with James Alworth and Karen Dillon to write what I think of as one of the most important books out there called How Will You Measure Your Life. It was based on a the last class that he did at the Harvard Business School every single year. And in this conversation that you’re about to hear, Karen Dillon, Scott Anthony, another of Clay’s acolytes, and me got together and were interviewed by Victor Zhao and Martin Ekiti, co-presidents of the Parents@Harvard Chan School of Public Health to think about how we measure our lives and things that we take from that—to really make sure that we’re living in concert with purpose and the progress we seek to make and not drifting off course. I hope you enjoy the conversation that I’m bringing to you here that was recorded live on April 3rd.The Future of Education is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Paid subscribers receive unlimited access to My Delphi as well—helpful when I’m choosing family over “one more call”!VictorFirst, I’d like to quickly introduce ourselves and then just set up the backdrop for today’s conversation. Thank you everyone. My name is Victor. I’m one of the co leads of the Parents at Harvard Chan community which is the Parents club of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Along with my co moderator Martin we are really grateful to bring this conversation together. And this conversation is a part of the whole life Leadership speaker series, a Harvard affiliated series exploring one central question. What are the pivotal mindsets, habits and tools needed to succeed both at work and at home? At its core, the series is built on a simple belief that leadership is not compartmentalized.Honoring Clayton Christensen’s legacyVictorHow we show at work and how we set up at home are deeply connected. And today leaders we have a very special session. We are gathering to honor the legacy of Professor Clayton Christensen, whose work reshaped how the work understands innovation, but who also challenged us to think more deeply about something even more important, which is how we measure our lives. In his well known framework, Clay encouraged us to think about three key questions. How do we find meaning in our careers? How do we build enduring relationships? And how we live lives of integrity. And today we’re honored to be joined by three remarkable individuals, thinkers and leaders who have engaged deeply with Clay’s work and ideas and they will help us explore how these principles apply in real life. First, we have Scott Anthony. Scott is a Clinical professor of Strategy at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and previously spent over two decades at Innosight, the forum co-founded by Clay Christensen, where he served as a global managing partner.He’s a leading thinker on innovation and disruption, a Thinkers50 award winner and author of several influential books including Dual Transformation and the most recently, Epic Disruptions. Scott brings both deep intellectual and practical perspectives on how Clay’s idea have evolved and been applied over time. Next we have Karen Dillon. Karen is a co author of How Will You Measure Your Life based on Clay’s work and teaching and served as the editor of Harvard Business Review. She worked closely with Clay for over a decade and has been instrumental in translating his ideas into guidance for individuals navigating life leadership and well being. Her current work focuses on helping people understand how everyday decisions shape long term outcomes, including her recent book the Macro Stress Effect. And finally, we have Michael Horn. Michael is a co-founder of the Clay Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation and a faculty member at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.He is a widely recognized author and thought leader in education and career development, including his recent new book, Job Moves. Michael’s work focuses on helping individuals build lives of meaning and fulfillment. He closely aligned with questions Clay challenged us to consider. And with that, we are very excited for you all to be here. Let’s dive into the conversation and Martin will open our conversation up with a question for all our panelists.MartinThank you so much, Victor, for passing the baton to me. Well, I am personally very excited to be part of this conversation. We’re going to talk about a few things over the next few minutes. I know we had some technical issues in the beginning, but we’re going to divide the talk into different sections over the next, I don’t know, 40 minutes and then have some time at the end for Q and A. But before we go into some of the specific sections, I just want to ask all t
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