Why Developing Character In Schools Matters

What Covid-19's 'pause' on schooling should begin to enable

As we embark upon summer, schools everywhere are planning feverishly for the fall. Developments are dropping almost daily around what schools will or won’t do, with a myriad of options emerging. Parents’ and students’ reactions and opinions are highly varied depending on their own personal situation.

Against that backdrop, Diane Tavenner and I are continuing our Class Disrupted podcast to encourage school communities to use this time to build bridges to the schools we need in our future. Although I’m sure you’re supposed to love all of your podcasts equally, I confess that three of my favorites are now out in the world.

Episode 5 (listen here) of our series features Angela Duckworth, bestselling author of Grit, as we talk about the importance of using school for more than just academics—and address a complaint I’m hearing a lot from parents, even in districts where they didn’t lessen the academic load amidst Covid-19: how come my child is able to finish her schoolwork in just 3 hours? Listen to why using school time to develop children’s character—or what Diane and her team at Summit call “habits of success”—is vital.

After that, on episode 6 (listen here) we welcomed Todd Rose, bestselling author of The End of Average and Dark Horse, to our podcast to talk about how the “factory model” of education explains much of the dysfunction of our schooling system—and how there’s a better way forward that recognizes the individuality of each learner.

Then, in episode 7 (listen here), Diane and I talk about the chaos that ensued when schools abruptly shut their doors, as some moved to pass-fail grading systems while others gave A’s for all. We argue in the podcast that this grading chaos provides a window to dig into the deeper assumptions underlying the A–F letter-grade system that dominates American schooling—and imagine a better way forward that isn’t a zero sum game, but a positive-sum one.

Future U

In the world of higher education, Jeff Selingo and I wrapped up Season 3 of our Future U podcast with two episodes.

In the first, we welcomed Martin Van Der Werf (listen here) from Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce to talk about what’s become an even more important question in light of the recession and stretched resources for students and schools: understanding the return on investment from different education programs.

And in the second, Jeff and I wrapped up our season (listen here) by reflecting on our lessons learned over the course of our podcast interviews. I also grilled Jeff about how admissions might change with the news of so many colleges going test optional given the interruptions to the SAT and ACT. His upcoming book, Who Gets In and Why: A Year Inside College Admissions, is incredibly timely to help families make sense of it all. And Jeff interviewed me about my policy paper with Richard Price that we released in the wake of Covid-19, “Creating Seamless Credit Transfer.”

To that end, I also penned a policy brief that the American Enterprise Institute just published titled, “Third-Party Credentialing for Higher Education.” The brief is based on the insights uncovered in the “Creating Seamless Credit Transfer” paper and crystallizes the recommendations.

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Lastly, for those of you interested, I’ve launched a paid newsletter in addition to this free one you’re receiving. If you choose to subscribe here, you’ll enjoy a front-row seat into the future of education with special articles and transcriptions of conversations with the education change-makers and leaders bringing that future to life. I anticipate that these posts will be almost weekly, in addition to what’s become a bi-monthly free newsletter. The cost is $5 per month or $45 for a yearly subscription.

As always, thank you for listening, reading, and writing. Stay safe and stay strong.