Exquisite Compassion with Father Greg Boyle Father Greg Boyle has spent most of his adult years helping transform the lives of former gang members at Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles. In this conversation he applies his many lessons learned to how we can increase joy and reduce loneliness in schools through kinship, mercy, and meaning. We cover a lot of territory, including:  2:21 Greg’s childhood on Norton Avenue 4:23 How Bolivia turned Greg inside out 9:00 How Homeboy Industries came to be 12:26 Building a powerful culture 16:50 A powerful message from a Homie to teachers 19:02 T ..read more

Humans, young and old, share a basic need to have some authorship in our own lives. Dr. Russell Quaglia has built his entire career around how to bring students’ voices into focus in classrooms and schools across the world. The result is happier students who learn more. We cover a lot of territory, including: 2:55 The difference between hockey and school 7:40 Our basic human need  8:50 Russ’s definition of voice 11:21 The (often missing) factor needed for voice to thrive 14:50 Why surveys often fail (or worse) 17:30 Can kids really know what’s best for them? 22:24 The students we often ov ..read more

In our race to cover state content standards and prepare students for high-stakes tests, many educators are overlooking a powerful strategy for transforming students’ futures and making serious strides toward equity. Policy analyst and author Julia Freeland Fisher preaches the game-changing impact of expanding students’ social networks. Julia Freeland Fisher is the director of education research at the Clayton Christensen Institute. Her team educates policymakers and community leaders on the power of disruptive innovation, aiming to transform monolithic, factory-model education systems into st ..read more

Julie Kim is an L.A.-based college admissions counselor who helps young people gain entrance into America’s most selective colleges. In this conversation Julie pulls back the curtain on the college admissions process and shows young people how they can not only get into selective colleges, but how they can be happier and more excited as they do it. Julie Kim is the founder of Julie Kim Consulting. She has helped her clients gain admissions to the nation’s most competitive colleges, from Stanford to Yale, using her foundational strategy: the Passion Project. Julie developed the idea as a burne ..read more

Chad Hemmelgarn was an energetic kid for whom school just didn't work, until some visionary teachers found a way to identify and develop his creative gifts. Their utilization of experiential learning helped Chad develop into a beloved high school teacher who provides similar opportunity and inspiration to his students ..read more

Eric Acton has been a beloved teacher and coach for more than three decades. As an 18-year-old custodian at the Columbus science center, he could never have dreamed of the life he was about to lead. That all changed because of the Girl Scouts and a guy named Jarvis. Eric's story is an inspiring reminder of the immense potential locked inside every child ..read more

In the wake of George Floyd's murder, then 19-year-old Kaia Woodford headed to the Ohio Statehouse to join the protests. She began speaking at rallies, leading her to join other Bexley alumni in founding the Bexley Anti-Racism Project (BARP). She reflects on her journey to becoming a powerful voice in the fight against racism in her community ..read more

Episode 12: The Epiphany with Daniel Pink Daniel Pink’s book A Whole New Mind makes the case for why experiential learning is necessary in the 21st century. His book Drive explains why it is also so much more motivating for young people. The epiphany that led Dan to these ideas may have occurred when, as a 14-year-old freshman, he wrote his first story for his high school newspaper, The Bexley Torch. In this interview Dan digs up long-buried memories and relives the moment that experiential learning produced what he describes as a physiological change in his brain.  We cover a lot of ter ..read more

What happens when you unleash a band of 8th graders in a major city and tell them to design their own learning? Author & journalist Suzanne Goldsmith-Hirsch describes a groundbreaking middle school program where she and her classmates did just that. The results were remarkable ..read more

Stacy Bell was preparing to become a teacher when an experiential lesson in one of her education classes transformed her approach to teaching and learning. Her encounter with owl pellets has impacted countless elementary and middle school students during her nearly three-decade teaching career ..read more