Listening to America Learn

As we traversed the country in the months before the pandemic, we looked for children and adults who could tell us about schools and about how change from traditions could ignite learning. We didn’t hear much about test scores or intervention programs or even gifted services. Instead, when we listened we heard stories grounded in school cultures in which young people are viewed through their strengths and assets. We heard about positive relationships binding communities together. And, we heard that adults who care, listen, and bend practices to the lived experiences of learners co-construct authentic learning opportunities alongside the young people they serve. 

From a small city outside East St. Louis (IL) to Florida’s Palm Beach County, from Western Wisconsin to the Gulf Coast of Alabama, from Boston suburbs to Kentucky’s Bluegrass country, we simply asked humans to talk about how they learned, and in the case of adults how their learning influenced their work with children and adolescents. 

A sixth generation Vermont dairy farmer told us how he had merged farming and technology in his K-12 school, and built a program for all kids while helping to move his family farm into the future. A Massachusetts physical education teacher sat in front of a massive climbing wall in the high school field house and described all the ways, and all the essential skills the climbing students were learning. In very rural southern Virginia, where tobacco dominated the economy until the 1980s, a middle school principal began crying as she described becoming a role model for the children, a role model that would allow them to choose to leave the county, or stay and connect to the world, or leave and come back, following her path.

What we hear in these stories is proof that schools, no matter the region, no matter the socio-economic circumstances, no matter the size, whether elementary, middle, high school, can become learner-centered places that thrive, and that allow all of their students to thrive and find ways to good lives. 

Our campfire stories are real accounts of adults and young people who are forging pathways as non-traditionalists who understand the equity divide in education because, for different reasons, they represent those divides. Their stories matter because they are the “what if” stories that show that we can design, create, and experience non-traditional paths to learning. We all can. By linking up the flames that rise from these stories, we can ignite campfires in communities across America, using the powerful voices, acts of agency, and the strong influence of storytellers everywhere.

At this Campfire where stories from Doug, Glen, Aisha, LaTishia, Norma, Dawn, Mark, Jarrett, Amanda, Gemma and so many others, are designed to create a multimedia experience where you can take pause and reflect on not just their stories but your own transformation stories, dreams, aspirations, and possibilities. 

If you are interested in sharing your own Campfire story, please reach out to us because we believe that sharing your story builds a context for the solution that advances what we must do  to create equity for all.