Here Are 8 Things That Make a Good School

Educators have difficulty agreeing upon what makes a “good school.” My thoughts about this topic have continued to change as I progressed through K-12, earned…

The Discomfort of White Adults Should Never Take Priority Over the Success of Our Black and Brown Students

“I didn’t come here to teach those kinds of kids.” It’s alarming to think that adults charged with helping students of color succeed in school…

How Lewis Ferebee Is Shifting the Conversation Back to Students in Indianapolis

This is the fourth and final in a series stemming from a Chiefs for Change panel discussion at the National Charter Schools Conference hosted by…

Got Questions About Education Reform? I’ve Heard Them All.

As I travel around the country on a 24-city book tour, giving talks and meeting with education reform leaders and activists, I get a lot…

My Principal Saw I Needed Compassion Not Punishment, and That Made All the Difference

When I entered Mary Evelyn Castle Elementary School in second grade, it was my third elementary school in three years. We moved for a third time…

My Undocumented Students Have Invested in Our Country. We Should Invest in Them.

At the end of my first year of teaching, Maria, one of my sixth-graders, wrote this to me: Before you, school just wasn’t my thing.…

My Family Lived a Lie From First to Fifth Grade So I Could Go to a Better School

Before it was a rally cry, before it was used by politicians as a platform to win elections, before it was the mission statement for…

VIDEO: In Indianapolis, These Parents Are Standing Up for Children

In Indianapolis Public Schools, over 50 percent of children are in D and F schools, our children simply aren’t learning. As a graduate of Stand…

What Ed Reform Is Not Talking About: A Critique From Within

It’s time for the education reform movement to do some soul-searching. A new report and a fresh round of dismal national test results confirm the…