Building the Future of Education

MUSEUMS AND THE LEARNING ECOSYSTEM

 Building the Future of Education
is made possible with funding in part from:

and collaborative support from:

Copyright Creative Commons

ISBN 978-1-933253-97-8
Building the Future of Education: Museums and the Learning Ecosystem
Copyright 2014 American Alliance of Museums
 Contents

Foreword | Michael Robbins, U.S. Department of Education 5

About This Convening | Elizabeth Merritt, Center for the Future of Museums, and
Paula Gangopadhyay, The Henry Ford 7

Setting the Stage | Elizabeth Merritt, Center for the Future of Museums 9

Glimpses of the Future of Education | Katherine Prince, KnowledgeWorks 14

Time for a Perfect Storm! | Paula Gangopadhyay, The Henry Ford 21

Igniting a Learning Revolution with The Henry Ford’s Innovation Education

Incubator | Paula Gangopadhyay, The Henry Ford 27

Communities of Innovative Practice

A City-Level Approach to Remake Learning | Gregg Behr, The Grable Foundation 30
Empowering Statewide Museums and Libraries as Integral Educational
Partners | Jeri Robinson, Boston Children’s Museum 33

Taking It National and Global: A Value-Driven, Project-Based

Learning and Innovative Credit-Earning Model
| Elliot Washor, Big Picture Learning 36

Needs-Based Systemic Change in the Learning Ecosystem: Students,

Teachers and Museums
One Size Does Not Fit All | Nikhil Goyal, Activist and Author 38

A Student Bill of Rights | Erik Martin, Game Designer and Student Leader 40

Lessons from a National Education Leader’s Journey | Rebecca Mieliwocki,

2012 National Teacher of the Year 42

The Challenge of Scaling Up

Museums in an Age of Scale | Michael Edson, Smithonian Institution 45

Every Child a Changemaker | Laura White, Ashoka 47

A Call to Action | Elizabeth Merritt and Paula Gangopadhyay 49

Dispatches from the Future of Education (Additional Reading) 52

Program Participants 57

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Word cloud of “In 2033 education will be…” thoughts contributed by attendees.

4
 Foreword
By Michael Robbins, Senior Advisor for Nonprofit Partnerships, U.S. Department of Education

I recently joined my 6-year-old niece for world-class curriculum standards and

a museum visit. As she combed through demonstrating that students can succeed in
exhibits, she discovered a drawer on a the classroom regardless of challenges
display wall, pulled it out and gleefully they might face outside school. But schools
exclaimed, “OOOOHH! More information!” can’t and shouldn’t go it alone.

Wouldn’t it be great if we heard this each Our students need more opportunities
day in classrooms across the nation? for inquiry-based learning that inspires
Museums can help us get there. curiosity and fuels their passions. Our
parents need to be better supported as
Dedicated teachers and school leaders co-learners and learning coaches with their
Children learn soldering
are advancing education success across children. Learning needs to better connect in MAKESHOP at the
the United States—turning around low- Children’s Museum
students to their communities, culture of Pittsburgh.
performing schools, implementing and history. We need more professionally Photo: Ben Filio

5
 trained teachers of all kinds who have the libraries and after-school programs) they
expertise and dedication to make all of can offer a broader range of experiences
these things work together. Where can we for students and build school partnerships
find all these things? Museums! with greater scale and impact. One such
example is the Hive Learning Networks
How can museums and schools collaborate (hivelearningnetwork.org) operating in New
to create this new future for education? York, Chicago and Pittsburgh.

Invest in the capacity to manage partner- Leverage digital learning and collab-
ships. Museum administrators (like school orative technology. The digital learning
principals) have endless to-do lists and revolution is more than trading textbooks
can’t be expected to be the day-to-day for tablets—it is an opportunity to accelerate
leads on managing external partnerships. collaboration among schools, families and
Dedicate full-time staff to develop and community organizations to propel student
sustain successful partnerships, and have engagement and learning. Museums can be
them work across schools and museums. community hubs that help expand Internet
access and digital literacy. Internet-based
Strengthen family engagement. Develop
resources and collaboration tools can facil-
resources for parents and students to
itate learning projects involving teachers,
connect the dots between learning in
students and museum staff. Digital
school and museum environments. Study
tools such as badges (openbadges.org)
guides and sample assignments that bridge
recognize and document student learning,
school curriculum to museum assets are
and can even be used to grant school credit
more than just education resources—they
for learning that happens in museums.
are tools for parents to advocate for more
and better education experiences that Students know that schools are only one
blur the lines between school-based and node in their broader network of learning,
community-based learning. and our education structures should reflect
this reality. Working together, schools and
Build learning networks across
museums can design learning experiences
community institutions. When museums
that are engineered from the student
join together and with other community-
perspective and create a better future
based learning organizations (such as
for education.

As the senior advisor for nonprofit partnerships at the U.S. Department

of Education, Michael Robbins works to strengthen partnerships among
schools, families and community organizations to propel student outcomes
and turn around the nation’s lowest-performing schools. He supports the
White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships, an
office within the Domestic Policy Council that forms partnerships between
the federal government and faith-based and neighborhood organizations to
more effectively serve Americans in need. Robbins focuses on how digital
learning transforms collaborations among schools, parents, communities
and youth to boost student engagement and learning.

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 About This Convening
By Elizabeth Merritt, Founding Director, Center for the Future of Museums, American Alliance of
Museums, and Paula Gangopadhyay, Chief Learning Officer, The Henry Ford

In September 2013, over four dozen They came at the invitation of the American 3D printing at the
Pittsburgh Mini Maker
educational policy experts, practitioners, Alliance of Museums’ Center for the Future Faire.
funders, education innovators, reformers, of Museums (CFM), and The Henry Ford, in Photo: Ben Filio

student activists and others shaping response to forecasts from CFM and other
the conversation about U.S. education futures organizations that America is on
converged on the National Building the cusp of transformational change in the
Museum in Washington, DC. Their goal: to educational system. The current structure
launch a national dialogue about the future has been destabilized by rising dissatis-
of education and how leaders from the faction with the formal educational system,
worlds of education and museums can work the proliferation of nontraditional forms
together to integrate the nation’s educa- of primary education and funding crises at
tional assets into a vibrant learning grid. state and local levels. Simultaneously new

7
horizons are being opened by technological White from Ashoka wrapped up the day
advances in communications, content with a look at the challenges and rewards
sharing and cultural expectations regarding of scaling up such experiments to meet the
access, authority and personalization. A needs of American students. The morning
new era is beginning, characterized by of the second day, attendees assembled
new learning economies based on diverse into small groups to brainstorm next steps.
methods of sharing and using educa- We challenged them to address: What
tional resources. can we do at the national, state, city and
neighborhood level to shape the future of
The CFM and The Henry Ford see this education? How can we integrate museums
transition as an opportunity to ensure into a network of learning resources?
museum resources are used to their fullest
advantage in 21st-century education. What This white paper summarizes the content
role can museums play in this new era? How and shares some of the ideas coming out
can they help their communities under- of the convening. The staff and leadership
stand and navigate the coming changes? of the Alliance and The Henry Ford hope
Can museums help forge a common vision this report will inspire you to become
of a preferred future for education and play involved in this process as well: building
a leadership role in its creation? bridges among museums, schools and
other learning resources, including libraries,
For a day and a half, convening partic- archives, makerspaces, learning labs and
ipants grappled with how to start a others. As you read the contributions of
national dialogue on the future of learning those who presented at the convening,
and expand the educational impact of think about your assumptions, hopes and
museums. The first day set the stage with dreams for the learning landscape, and
short presentations. CFM’s Elizabeth Merritt decide what actions you will take to build a
and KnowledgeWorks’ Katherine Prince bright future.
presented forecasts on educational change
and potential scenarios of the future. Paula Our deepest thanks to the Robert & Toni
Gangopadhyay, from The Henry Ford, Bader Charitable Foundation, whose
led panels of educators and innovators support made this convening possible,
presenting examples of museums and and to the National Building Museum for
other educational innovators exploring ways serving as our gracious host.
to structure new learning platforms. The
Smithsonian’s Michael Edson and Laura

Yours from the future,

Elizabeth Merritt Paula Gangopadhyay

Founding Director Chief Learning Officer, The Henry Ford
Center for the Future of Museums Member, National Museum and Library
American Alliance of Museums Services Board

8
 Setting the Stage
By Elizabeth Merritt, Founding Director, Center for the Future of Museums, American Alliance of
Museums

Forecasting a New Era of • Museums create educational programs

Education in math, science, art, literacy, language
arts, history, civics and government,
Museums are educational powerhouses.
economics and financial literacy,
Did you know:
geography and social studies, often
• Museums spend more than $2 billion a tailored to the needs of state and local
year on education. The typical museum curriculum standards.
devotes three-quarters of its education
budget specifically to K–12 students. • Each year, museums provide more than
18 million instructional hours for
• Museums receive more than 55 million educational programs such as guided
Children explore the
Carnegie Museum
visits every year from students in tours for students, staff visits to schools, of Natural History in
Pittsburgh.
school groups. school outreach through science Photo: Joey Kennedy

9
 vans and other traveling exhibits, and the new paradigm. Eventually this growth
professional development for teachers. peters out, as the innovation that fueled the
era becomes obsolete, no longer suited
You’d think, given these stats, people
to the needs of a changing world. An era
would consider museums as kin to schools,
ends when the next great innovation takes
colleges and universities. Yet museum
off, leaving the old dominant technology
people find themselves having to explain,
gasping in the dust.
over and over, that museums are fundamen-
tally educational institutions, with learning We see signs that the U.S. is nearing the
embedded at the heart of our missions. end of an era in formal learning charac-
terized by teachers, physical classrooms,
Maybe in the future we won’t have to
age-cohorts and a core curriculum—what
explain. I say that because it looks like
some people call the era of industrial-age
the U.S. is headed into a century in which
learning. The signals presaging this
museums, as experts in immersive, experi-
transformation include the rapid increase in
ential, self-directed, hands-on learning, will
nontraditional forms of primary education
be sailing in the educational mainstream,
such as homeschooling; near record dissat-
rather than eddying at the fringe.
isfaction with the existing K–12 education
system; funding crises for schools at the
I’m a professional museum futurist, and one
state and local levels; growing gender
major goal of futures studies is to observe
imbalance in higher education; and prolifer-
and interpret the pattern and pace of
ation of digital content and digital delivery
change that will shape our future. Typically
platforms designed to transform the nature
any area of endeavor (e.g., transportation,
of classroom learning.
medicine, manufacturing) is characterized
by “eras” that start and end with trans-
There are strong indicators, which we will
formative, innovative change. Within an
explore throughout this report, that the
era, people riff on that era’s “dominant
next era of education will be characterized
technology,” which might be a physical
by self-directed, experiential, social and
invention, a philosophy or an organiza-
distributed learning that is designed to
tional paradigm. Change comes slowly at
foster the 21st-century skills of critical
first, then in a great soaring arc of progress
thinking, synthesis of information, innovation,
Youth Radio. as people discover ways to capitalize on
creativity, teamwork and collaboration. In
such a future, museums can play a critical
role, both as resources for learners, and as
teachers of teachers, sharing what they have
learned from their last century of education.

The disruptive shift between eras is a time

of challenge and opportunity: challenges
to the existing power structure and to
those prospering under the old paradigm;
opportunities for new players to emerge
and for previously underserved groups to
come into their own. A fundamental shift in

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the paradigm underlying America’s educa- school time. These opportunities are built
tional system would rock the foundations around the growing evidence that anywhere,
of our society, holding out the promise of anytime learning can reinforce and extend
redressing long-standing inequities that formal learning, resonate with learners who
stratify our society and hobble economic don’t thrive in the traditional classroom and
mobility. Right now—this decade—is our prevent the “summer slide” that is partic-
window of opportunity to influence the ularly damaging to low-income students.
direction we take in coming decades. We Notable examples:
need to envision the potential futures that • The Providence After School Alliance
could arise from the ashes of the old era as operates the AfterZone for middle
it flames out, choose the future we want to schoolers, and the Hub for high school
live in and take action to make it real. students—citywide systems that
serve over 2,000 young people with
Drivers of Change: Forces experiential, community-based, after-
Shaping the Future of Education school learning programs.
To understand our options—potential
• Learning Labs in Libraries and Museums
bright and dark futures that might come to are being created throughout the
pass—we need to understand the forces country with the support of the Institute
influencing our path forward. So our of Museum and Library Services and
convening started with an exploration of the MacArthur Foundation. The labs
these drivers of change. engage middle and high school youth
in mentor-led, interest-based, youth-
Three major forces shape the path we take
centered, collaborative learning using
into the future:
digital and traditional media, at sites
• Trends exert their influence steadily over that include the New York Hall of
time, as something becomes more or
Science; Oregon Museum of Science
less common and has a greater or lesser
and Industry; Da Vinci Science Center in
effect on the world.
Allentown, Pennsylvania; and Museum
• Events, occurring at a specific place and of Fine Arts, Houston.
time, can reinforce, accelerate a trend or
work against it. The End of the Neighborhood School:
communities have long been fiercely
• Choices are the actions individuals and
organizations take to consciously shape protective of the schools in their own back

the world. yards, valuing the way these schools keep

their children close to home, in their own
Here are several examples of trends neighborhood, with the support of their
exerting a significant influence on the world peers. Now the economic crisis and state
of education, assembled in collaboration and local funding crunches are driving a
with my co-presenter, Katherine Prince wave of school closures and consolidations
of KnowledgeWorks: in New York City, Philadelphia, Detroit,
Chicago, Washington and elsewhere in the
Inside-Out Urban Schools: The rise of nation. This may increase the willingness
after-school, summer and other expanded of parents, already unhappy with school
learning opportunities creates learning performance or school options, to opt
outside the traditional school building and out of the public school system and into

11
independent charter schools, private In 2011 the HASTAC/MacArthur Foundation
schools, homeschooling or unschooling. Digital Media and Learning Competition,
supported by the Mozilla Foundation
The Decline of FTE: Traditional schools are as well as the Bill & Melinda Gates
designed to prepare students for traditional Foundation, announced Badges for Lifelong
jobs—which are increasingly rare. We are Learning, providing 30 development
seeing the decline of full-time, long-term grants for platforms and projects related
employment and the rise of the “gig to “digital badges”—an assessment and
economy”—one in which more and more credentialing mechanism housed and
people are freelancers, piecing together managed online. In our rapidly evolving
bits of work. Online services like oDesk, educational environment, digital badging
TaskRabbit and Gigwalk facilitate matching has emerged as an alternative creden-
workers with employers more quickly and tialing system that enables learners to
efficiently than the old fashioned temp assemble their own curriculum from a
agency, providing tools for anyone to patch wide variety of resources—some online,
together an income from diverse bits of some face-to-face—and get credit for what
work. If, in the future, more of our children they know and what they’ve achieved. In
grow up to be TaskRabbits, that may a 2011 speech, Secretary of Education
affect the kind of education, training and Arne Duncan identified digital badging
real-world experience they need to succeed as an important emerging educational
in the odd-job workforce. technology that “has the potential to
propel a quantum leap forward in educa-
Mind-reading technology: The devel-
tional reform.” The HASTAC/MacArthur
opment of technology that can tap into
competition jumpstarted the development
human brains will tell us what is really going
of open-source resources capable of
on in there—both conscious and subcon-
supporting this quantum leap.
scious responses. Teachers are already
deploying tools, such as Khan Academy’s
In 2013, former New York Schools
learning analytics, that give them real-time
Chancellor Joel Klein helped launch
feedback on where students are stumbling
Amplify, a free Massive Open Online Course
and what kind of help they need. NeuroFocus
(MOOC) offering AP credit for computer
has already deployed portable, wireless
science, adopted by 3,000 schools, with
electroencephalogram (EEG) scanners for
the goal of increasing the number of
market research. As the hardware becomes
women and minorities represented in
even smaller and less intrusive, how long
computer sciences. MOOCs are another
before it is harnessed to track learners’ atten-
game-changer for education, enabling
tiveness, concentration and mood?
thousands or tens of thousands of students
If trends are like rivers, slowly carving at a time to access the best instructors and
channels through the sands of time, instructional content, at little or low cost.
disruptive events are like storms, leaving While the majority of MOOCs are aimed at
their imprint on the landscape in a single college-level and adult learners, Amplify
stroke. The past few years have been demonstrates that MOOCs are moving into
crowded with events that, in a few decades, K–12 learning as well.
we may believe have left a significant mark
on the future.

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Both digital badges and MOOCs are year. Such a camp could set a precedent
disruptive in part because they provide for restructuring the relationships among
alternatives to the status quo. If a student is schools, teachers and students.
not doing well on traditional tests, that may
not matter so much if their digital backpack Sometimes an event can take the form
is filled with evidence of successfully of a statement or report recognizing and
completed projects and real-world accom- validating the importance of a trend. In
plishments. If a given school district is not 2012 the National Governors Association
providing high-quality STEM training or has released a report documenting that 36
cut arts education, MOOCs may provide states have disconnected “seat time” (time
a way for students to supplement those spent in the classroom) from the awarding
gaps. But what if a school fails entirely? One of educational credit. States are waiving
of the most interesting events of 2013 is seat time many different ways (by basing
something that didn’t, in the end, actually credits on mastery of material, allowing for
happen, but the mere fact that it almost individual seat-time waivers, basing credit
happened sheds light on this question. In on performance-based assessments, etc.)
spring 2013, the Buena Vista School District and for individuals with many different
in Michigan fired all of its teachers and needs (students who have fallen behind,
closed its schools because it had run out students who excel, students who don’t do
of money. About 400 students were faced well in traditional academic environments,
with the prospect of a truncated school year. etc.). As states formally validate learning
Rather than accepting early closure, parents that takes place outside the classroom, this
and teachers banded together to propose paves the way to educational networks that
the Buena Vista Skills Camp as a voluntary encompass a range of place-based experi-
substitute for school, focusing on math and ences (including museums), as well as
reading, with instructors receiving an hourly online resources.
wage. While many people questioned
In the next section of this report, Katherine
whether a skills camp would constitute
Prince paints a picture of two very different
a “proper education” or an “adequate
potential futures that could be created by
substitute” for school, it was clearly
these trends and events.
preferable to no school at all. In the end, a
compromise was negotiated and the school
reopened for the remainder of the school

Elizabeth Merritt is founding director of the Center for the Future

of Museums, an initiative of the American Alliance of Museums.
Before launching CFM in 2008, she led the Excellence programs
at the Alliance (accreditation, Museum Assessment Program, peer
review, research). Before joining the Alliance, she was the director
of collections and research at Cincinnati Museum Center. She
believes her most educational K–12 experience was her volunteer
work at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, which laid the
groundwork for her career in museums and public speaking.

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 Glimpses of the Future of Education
By Katherine Prince, Senior Director, Strategic Foresight, KnowledgeWorks

KnowledgeWorks Forecast 3.0 which many right solutions intersect and

adapt to meet learners’ needs.
A Glimpse into the Future of Learning Learning will no Learners and
MUSEUM

longer be defined by their families will

Given such a disruptive
time and place — create 10-year forecast,
individualized
unless a learner wants learning playlists
those
to learn of us who care
at a particular about
reflecting theirlearning have a
Those learning
time and in a particular interests,
“School” will take
tremendous
particular opportunity not just to
goals, and values. create
playlists might > cell structure
include public schools > french verbs
place.
In the future... MUSEUM
many forms.
Sometimes
more great learning experiences for kids
but could also include a > geography

wide variety of
it will be but also to create breakthroughs around
digitally-mediated or
self-organized. place-based learning
some of the intractable problems experiences. that have
plagued education despite many people’s Whatever the
A detail of a Since 2005, KnowledgeWorks has studied
Work will evolve
so rapidly that bestThese
efforts.changes path, radical
We have the opportunity— personalization will
KnowledgeWorks
infographic on the future the trends shaping our worldcareer
continuous and has point the way toward
and also, I believe, the responsibility—tobecome the norm, with
readiness will become learning approaches
of learning. For the worked with education leaders
the norm. around a diverse learning
redesign the whole system, transformingand supports tailored
complete infographic go
to tagoras.com. the United States to develop visions and ecosystem in which
our current public education system and its
to each learner.

strategies for using those trends

forms to create
learning adapts to each
Diverse many intersecting nodes from the current
ideal outcomes for learners.
of credentials, child instead of each child
certificates,Our
and third industrial-era design into a new design Educators’ jobs
reputation markers will
full forecast, Recombinant Education: trying to adapt will diversify as many
reflect the many ways consistent with the emerging partici- new learning agent
in which people
Regenerating the Learning learn
Ecosystem,
to school. roles emerge to
For KnowledgeWorks’ full
and demonstrate patory economy. support learning.
forecast on the future of
learning, see Recombinant published in October 2012, forecasts a
mastery.
Education: Regenerating As more
the Learning Ecosystem decade of deep disruption forpeople
education of
take it upon Two Potential Futures A wide variety of
digital networks,
knowledgeworks.org/ themselves to find
strategic-foresight the scope that Amazon brought to retail
solutions, and
a new wave Our forecast suggests that the learning platforms, and content
of social innovation will resources will help
that iTunes brought to the music industry.
help address resource At the same
ecosystem is going to diversify, learners
and and learning
constraints and other time, geographic Some of those tools agents connect
challenges. and virtualhas already
indeed started
will use to do so.and
rich datato Atlearn.
the
Such profound change reflects the communities will take provide insight into
ownership of learning
American Alliancelearning of Museums’
and convening
continuing reverberations of the digital in new ways, blending suggest strategies
onother
it with the kinds
future of education
for success. in September, I
revolution and the social and cultural of activity.
had the pleasure of sharing two plausible
changes that have accompanied it. We have
scenarios for how the future may take
already seen teaching and learning become
shape. We could find ourselves living in:
unbundled from traditional education
institutions. Next we expect to see learning • a vibrant learning grid in which all of us
agents, learners and other stakeholders who care about learning create a flexible
put together a wide array of innovations— and radically personalized learning
along with long-established solutions—in ecosystem that meets the needs of all
multiple ways to create a resilient and learners, or
learner-centered learning ecosystem in

14
 • a fractured landscape in which only Vibrant Learning Grid Fractured Landscape
those whose families have the time,
money and resources to customize or learning organization(s) many choices, little guidance

supplement their learning journeys have unbounded learning widening gaps

access to learning that adapts to and
meets their needs. learning playlists learning profits

radical personalization continuing marginalization

While all the attendees at the Building the
Future of Education convening preferred learning analytics autoimmune responses
the prospect of our children and grand-
new learning agent roles educator burnout
children living in a vibrant learning grid to
a fractured landscape, only a few of them new learning landscapes community patchworks
found this future to be more likely to come
DIY credentialing uncertain pathways
about, absent our intervention.

How Equitable Will the Future Be?

A critical uncertainty is whether the richness Creating Our Desired Future
of the new, expanded learning ecosystem
As my colleagues and I wrote in
will be available to all learners. The heart
Recombinant Education, “The future is
of the distinction between the scenarios
not a fixed point. It is ours to create.”
outlined here is whether we make equity
KnowledgeWorks engages education
a critical design variable as we create the
stakeholders around the country in
future of learning or whether we let those
strategic foresight because we see the
with relatively few means fall even farther
importance and urgency of steering future
behind. Put another way, are we going
trends toward the positive outcomes for
to allow for widening gaps and learning
all learners.
deserts that correlate all too closely with
low-income communities, or are we going That focus—on bringing the best of future
to re-imagine how learning flows across possibilities to all learners—will make the
and supports all communities and create critical difference between taking the path
rich learning landscapes that are accessible toward a vibrant learning grid instead of
to all? a fractured landscape. Creating a vibrant
learning grid that is accessible to all
We face a decade of tremendous oppor- learners will take distributed and concerted
tunity that will also demand hard decisions. effort. It will require pursuing sustained
To create a vibrant learning grid, we must systemic transformation from multiple
reconfigure entrenched systemic structures, vantage points, some of which sit within
many of which benefit the adults who work today’s K–12 public education system and
in the education system more than they some of which extend far beyond its bound-
benefit young people, and truly design aries. Museums, libraries and other cultural
for all learners. The future of learning will institutions and community-based learning
not be equitable unless we decide that it providers promise to serve as exciting nodes
must be. within the expanded learning ecosystem
and have much to offer in enriching public

15
educators’ visions of what is possible education system, providing alternatives for
for learners. at least some learners who might otherwise
have access to few good opportunities.
In the vibrant learning grid scenario, all
learners would be able to move seamlessly In either scenario, museums and other
across many kinds of learning experi- cultural institutions should see themselves
ences and providers, with learning agents not just as critical stakeholders in creating
from a variety of backgrounds supporting the future of learning, but as agents of
them in customizing and carrying out their change that could steward the charge of
learning journeys. In the fractured landscape equity and advocate for interest-driven
scenario, museums and other cultural insti- collaborative learning as a key feature of the
tutions could help fill gaps left by the public expanded learning ecosystem.

Scenario 1: A Vibrant Learning Grid

What if learning adapted to each child instead of expecting each child to
adapt to school?

As highlighted in the infographic that accompanies the full KnowledgeWorks forecast, it

looks possible to channel the trends shaping learning over the next 10 years to create a
flexible and radically personalized learning ecosystem that meets the needs of all learners.
Some potential characteristics of such a “vibrant learning grid” are listed below, along with
current examples that serve as signals, or early indicators, of a move in this direction.

Learning Organization(s): Reflecting our changing relationships with formal institutions

and the rise of social production, the ways in which we organize learning will diversify, with
“school” taking many forms.
Signal: Quest to Learn, a New York City public charter school teaching grades 6 through 12,
organizes its entire approach around gaming and systems thinking. We also see a significant
rise in the percentage of learners engaging in homeschooling, free schooling, unschooling,
democratic schooling and other self-organized approaches to learning that reject or
redefine learners’ relationships with formal institutions.

Unbounded Learning: Learning will no longer be defined by time and place—unless a

learner wants to learn at a particular time and in a particular place.
Signal: Boston Day and Evening Academy shows how it is possible to remove constraints
around learning for at-risk students and to make new design decisions appropriate to a
particular situation. Its population of over-age and under-credited learners are organized
into cohorts every 11 weeks based on their levels of mastery.

16
Learning “Playlists”: Learners and their families will create individualized learning
playlists reflecting their particular interests, goals and values. Those playlists might include
public schools but could also include a wide variety of digitally mediated or place-based
learning experiences, including learning experiences at museums.
Signal: The LessonPaths website suggests learning playlists in relation to specific learning
objectives, such as understanding what it would take to climb Mt. Everest or mastering a
particular English language arts or math standard.

Radical Personalization: Whatever learning experience(s) a learner chooses, radical

personalization will become the norm, with learning approaches and supports tailored to
each learner. It will be enabled by quick-cycling formative assessments that help learners
and learning agents understand what is happening with learning and tailor appropriate next
steps and supports.
Signal: School of One focuses on middle school math instruction, using a learning
algorithm to serve up daily lesson plans for each student based on his or her previous
accomplishments and preferred learning modalities along with teachers’ availability and
preferred instructional formats.

Learning Analytics: Digital tools will use rich data to provide insight into learning and
suggest strategies for success. Such data could go far beyond academic performance to
include social and emotional factors.
Signal: Leadership Public Schools, a consortium of high-poverty schools in the East San
Francisco Bay Area, developed ExitTicket, a free app that shows each student how close
he or she is to having mastered the day’s learning objectives and shows the teacher a
classroom dashboard reflecting all students’ performance. This feedback enables teachers
to adjust instruction the next day and helps students know where to probe deeper.

New Learning Agent Roles: Educators’ jobs will diversify as many new learning agent
roles emerge to support learning. Learning agent careers may diversify in ways that not only
provide richer support for learning but also offer more satisfying careers reflecting learning
agents’ strengths.
Signal: In 2010 the Center for Teaching Quality coined the term “teacherprenuer” to
describe its vision for hybrid roles that enable teachers who want to develop their leadership
to stay in the classroom part of the time while being trained and paid as change agents
who might specialize in any number of areas, such as policy, peer mentoring or community
partnerships. Each school year, it supports a cohort of six teacherpreneurs and teachers in
residence in bringing this vision to life.

New Learning Landscapes: Geographic and virtual communities will take ownership of
learning in new ways, blending it with other kinds of activity. Learning will become part of
a seamless community infrastructure across which learners can move as their needs and
interests evolve.

17
 Signal: Inside Out Community Arts, a theater-arts and media-based education program
operating throughout Los Angeles County, engages middle and high school students in
a free, research-based, after-school curriculum. Having started as a violence prevention
program, it brings the expertise of arts professionals into the school district via its artist
leaders, who are trained in youth development, and brings students’ productions into the
community through free public presentations of their work.

DIY Credentialing: Diverse forms of credentials, certificates and reputation markers will
reflect the many ways in which people learn and demonstrate mastery.
Signal: The University of Wisconsin is developing a Flexible Option that will allow learners
to demonstrate degree equivalency without having to take any classes from the university
(except for a few majors requiring practical lab experience). It is leading the way in
separating the delivery of instruction from its credentialing.

Left: Hannah Brown, a

student at a Big Picture
Learning school in San
Diego, at a robotics Scenario 2: A Fractured Landscape
internship where she
tests circuit boards used
to automate the flight What if only those with means had access to a rich array of learning
paths of hobby drones.
Photo: Vanessa Carr
experiences beyond traditional public schools?
Right: Students engage It seems equally plausible—and perhaps more likely—that future trends will result in an
in embodied learning
experiences at Elizabeth even more fractured educational landscape in which only those whose families have the
Forward Middle School
outside of Pittsburgh.
time, money and resources to customize or supplement their learning journeys have access
Photo: Ben Filio to learning that adapts to and meets their needs. Some potential characteristics of such a
“fractured landscape” are listed below, along with current examples that serve as signals, or
early indicators, of a move in this direction.

Many Choices, Little Guidance: Learners without strong support at home have trouble
navigating the vast array of learning options.

18
Signal: New Hampshire Virtual Academy requires parents to assume a “learning coach” “
Even for
role. With students who enroll in the school full time, spending an average of four to six highly skilled
hours on schoolwork each day, parents are advised to plan for 80 percent direct partici- workers,
pation in the early grades, 50 percent in middle school and 10 percent in high school. It full-time
seems challenging for even a well-educated and highly motivated parent to carry out this
employment
learning coach role while working full time.
is on the
Widening Gaps: If today’s public education system fails to respond constructively to decline as
disruption, other organizations will create alternative value webs that might not be acces- global ‘talent
sible to all. clouds’
Signal: Cities around the country continue to close neighborhood schools (for example, increasingly
Chicago closed 50 schools during 2012–13; see more detail on this trend elsewhere in this broker
white paper). Low-performing schools prove far too persistent despite the intense attention short-term
and investment of the education reform movement. Yet education innovations continue to employment
proliferate, either in formal institutional settings or in the hands of learners and parents who to meet
are fed up with institutional options.
specific
Learning Profits: As learning diversifies and new stakeholders enter the learning
needs.
“
ecosystem, student learning takes second place to profit.
Signal: As noted in a Huffington Post article, between 2001 and 2009, “the number
of students enrolled at for-profit colleges more than tripled, increasing from fewer
than 500,000 students to more than 1.8 million. About 10 percent of college students
nationwide are enrolled at for-profit colleges, yet the sector takes in more than a quarter of
federal student aid dollars and is responsible for nearly half of student loan defaults.”

Continuing Marginalization: To the extent that automation correlates with lower cost,
children in low-income communities will get less support from live learning agents.
Signal: Projo, a 2-foot-tall robot, has been developed by Sandra Okita of Teachers College,
Columbia University, to serve as a personalized learning partner. Projo “learns” along with a
student, failing at his or her knowledge edge in an effort to assist the student’s learning by
making the student the teacher. Okita is finding that students engage more fully with Projo
than with similar activities on a computer because they can personify the robot.

Autoimmune Reactions: Fear-based reactions to change limit the development of shared

infrastructure and keep attention focused on limited accountability measures.
Signal: During times of systemic change, any system is prone to engage in “autoimmune”
responses whereby “brittle hierarchies continue to act in ways that seem institutionally
rational but which further destabilize weak, inflexible systems.” With the profound
disruption that education faces, the public education system in particular risks engaging in
such reactions. For example, the move to implement statewide teacher evaluation systems
that are tied to high-stakes testing systems could serve to limit creativity and learning rather
than to ensure that every learner has appropriate support from highly qualified teachers.

19
 Educator Burnout: Educator attrition rates and stress levels continue to rise as account-
ability demands constrain creativity and tie pay to performance.
Signal: The 2012 MetLife Survey of the American Teacher found that teacher satisfaction
has declined to its lowest point in 25 years: teacher satisfaction has now dropped 23
percentage points since 2008. The survey also found that stress levels among teachers and
principals are on the rise and that, while about half (51 percent) of the teachers responding
to the survey want to combine classroom teaching with other roles or responsibilities in
their school or district, most (69 percent) are not at all interested in becoming a principal.

Community Patchworks: Access to high-quality, community-based learning experiences

depends on where a child lives, not what he or she needs and is interested in.
Signal: The Free Library of Philadelphia is building off the success of Chicago’s YOUMedia
project by creating multimedia learning labs for middle and high school students; so far,
24 libraries and museums are engaged in establishing creative spaces for young people in
Philadelphia. Funding for this endeavor comes from grants from the John D. and Catherine
T. MacArthur Foundation and the Institute of Museum and Library Services. But what
happens in communities without such funding and without an inventive lead organization?

Uncertain Pathways: Amid new and varied credentials and continuously changing
demands, identifying essential knowledge and skills will be increasingly complex. Even
for highly skilled workers, full-time employment is on the decline as global “talent clouds”
increasingly broker short-term employment to meet specific needs.
Signal: The Lumina Foundation is focusing its efforts to improve education on achieving 60
percent higher education attainment nationwide by 2025. In doing so, Lumina is advocating
for a redesigned higher education that cultivates the systemic conditions necessary to
prepare the American population for such an employment climate while also correcting
the current trend toward “separate and unequal degree pathways” that correlate all too
well along racial and ethnic lines. Those conditions include creating new models of student
financial support, creating new higher education business and finance models, and creating
new systems of quality credentials.

Katherine Prince is senior director, strategic

foresight, of KnowledgeWorks. In leading
KnowledgeWorks’ examination of trends
shaping the future of learning, Prince supports
education stakeholders around the country in
creating transformative visions for learning
and strategies for bringing those visions to life.

20
 Time for a Perfect Storm!
By Paula Gangopadhyay, Chief Learning Officer, The Henry Ford

Various trends, forecasts, events and

successful innovations as shared by
Elizabeth Merritt and Katherine Prince
underscore the fact that major transfor-
mative changes are occurring rapidly in
the learning arena. In the United States,
K–12 education has faced harsh criticism
in recent decades, especially compared
with its counterparts in countries such as
Finland, Singapore, Australia, China and
South Korea. Yet if we look at the issue
from a glass-half-full perspective, the
environment and resources for adoption
and adaptation of transformative changes in
American education have never been more stakeholders, we can change education for Formal and informal
conducive than they are now. I truly believe education should make
the better. more room for creativity
that it is the time for a perfect storm—the and innovation in their
offerings.
perfect opportunity for museums and other All great innovators are dreamers who Photo: Gary Malerba
nontraditional educational institutions explore uncharted territories. But they also
and catalytic players to gather speed and are realists who put action plans together,
power with stronger, tighter collaborations experiment with ideas, are tenacious,
to bring about a tsunami of transformative learn from failures and, in the end, launch
improvement in education and make it innovations that can change our lives
more focused on learning. forever. They also embrace and respond to
unintended consequences that emerge in
This section of the report focuses on the the process of innovation. They think about
role of museums in the learning ecosystem. the “what ifs” and “why nots.”
Colleagues from museums and formal
education further shed light on this topic Henry Ford’s passion for collecting artifacts
and talk about their game-changing work. was inspired by his deeply held wish to
Though some of us are trying to “walk the make education “functional” and his belief
walk” and have not yet found the answers in students’ ability to “learn by doing.” He
to all of our challenges, we are witnessing realized his dream in 1929 by starting the
positive change. We firmly believe that Edison Institute, an innovative school, and
with insights and participation from other Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Michigan,

21
“
long before it became the multi-site a world of education where teachers teach
destination we know today as The Henry less, yet students learn more! That is the
Museums
Ford. One of today’s education innovators, definition of 21st-century teaching and
need to be
2013 TED Prize winner Sugata Mitra, is learning. We need to recognize the innate
recognized as working on realizing his radical “School in power and proclivities of this generation—the
real-world a Cloud” concept with similar passion and iGeneration—and change how we teach. The
contextual commitment. These examples from the central issue is that children are not engaged.
experts in the past and present tell us that innovators in Tamar Lewin’s August 8, 2009, New York
education education have the power to make radical Times article, “In a Digital Future, Textbooks
sector. It’s time and long-lasting impact. Are History,” quotes Sheryl R. Abshire: “Kids
to make the are wired differently these days. They are
The National Innovation Initiative and digitally nimble. They multitask, transpose
implicit more
“ Council on Competitiveness back in 2004 and extrapolate. And they think of knowledge
explicit. talked about “thriving in the world of as infinite. They don’t engage in textbooks
challenge and change.” The importance that are finite, linear and rote. Teachers need
of “thriving” is as applicable today—and digital resources to find those documents,
actually more feasible—with the explosion those blogs, those wikis that get them
of communication and technology innova- beyond the plain vanilla curriculum in the
tions. Innovation still remains key to textbooks.” We cannot prepare students to
determining this country’s success. succeed in today’s world if we don’t change
our learning environments, our teaching
Critical Questions for Reflection methodologies, our juxtaposing examples,
Today: our tools of engagement and lastly
• How can museums ride this perfect our mindsets.
storm of rapid transformation and
innovation in education and learning and I want to share the story of Caine to demon-
carve a different role for themselves? strate what can happen if we empower
learners to learn in their own defined ways.
• How can we move from being
considered just an optional resource in Caine is a 10-year-old California boy whose
education to playing a more central role innate entrepreneurial spirit and desire for
in influencing how learners learn and self-directed learning allowed him to build a
contribute in the 21st century? cardboard game arcade in his father’s used
auto parts garage. A short documentary
If education is on the cusp of transformation,
film on Caine’s arcade, made by Nirvan
so are museums. I believe museums can
Mullick and posted on YouTube, garnered
gain much more traction and visibility by
millions of views on Facebook, spurred a
focusing on three core strategies:
national movement and a global challenge,
and led to the inception of the Imagination
Be proactive: Catalytic leaders are
Foundation with the goal of inspiring many
proactive. If museums want to play a signif-
more Caines. As a poster child for the
icant role in the transformation of learning,
21st-century learner, Caine shows us how
we must prove our leadership value.
we need to change our teaching methods
One huge leadership opportunity lies in and learning environments.
directing the power of the learner. Imagine

22
If we want to change education and learning,
we need to acknowledge and respect today’s
To make education relevant, more and
more forward-thinking schools are opting “
Learning is
youth as “knowledge creators” versus for the “blended” and “flipped” classroom
a seamless
“knowledge recipients” and redefine the models where students are encouraged to
continuum,
role of teachers as facilitators of learning. use resources outside the classroom and
and museums
We also need to focus more on learning learn in a self-directed manner. But the
versus education, which is perceived as content has to be high quality and authentic.
should be
K–12 in-school experiences, and recognize More and more museums should grab this accepted as
that learning can happen anytime, anyway, opportunity, get their collections digitized unique
anywhere and at any pace. So a related and launch innovative partnerships with area ‘learning
paradigm that needs to shift to bring about schools where they become accepted and activators’
the desired change is that learning cannot direct “digital content partners” to activate in that
be shoehorned—or in my word, “chunk- the new classroom models versus providing “
continuum.
atized”—into 9 a.m.–3 p.m. (in-school) and 3 these assets as optional resources. This is
p.m.–9 p.m. (out-of-school) blocks. more of an outcome-oriented approach than
an output-oriented approach. Museums can
Be relevant: Today more than ever, also play a transformative role in teacher
everyone in formal education is advocating preparation and professional development.
for and welcoming contextual interdisci-
plinary learning. Rigor is no longer just Be “top of the mind” in education:
related to mastery of content. Rigor now The education sector and after-school
is all about adaptation and application of providers have always considered museums
content in real-world scenarios. This is and libraries eager community partners.
also at the core of the changes advocated Museums spend a significant percentage
by the standards movement with the new of their budgets on developing and
Common Core State Standards and Next offering supplemental resources. But if
Generation Science Standards. we have been such well-wishing partners
in education for decades, why are there
The shift to relevance offers a great still relatively so few museum voices in the
opportunity for museums to contribute current education reform dialogues? Often
unique content and multidimensional when I am at state and national education
problem-solving methodologies. I debates and dialogues, educators have
use the Four A’s of Learning model to asked me, “So … you are from a museum?
design relevant learning experiences: What brings you to this conference?” Have
Acquisition, Association, Application and we thought about why teachers, who are so
Assimilation of knowledge. Museums pressured to increase student engagement
have the distinct advantage of offering all and achievement, aren’t talking to policy
four A’s. Collections-based museums can makers and other stakeholders about
do that with their “artifactual” stories, and the tremendous value museums bring
science and children’s museums, zoos, to the table? It is for this reason that I
nature centers and aquariums can do that invited two student leaders and the 2012
with their unique methods of exploration, Teacher of the Year to join the conversation
engagement and play. and tell us firsthand what their needs
are and how museums can work toward
becoming integral partners in education.

23
“
Museums need
These individuals have already begun
their revolutionary work. Maybe museums
forced on them. This has translated into
a “this-too-shall-pass syndrome,” which
can join hands with them and lead with a unfortunately makes valuable solutions,
to push the
shared vision. models and partnerships go untapped
boundaries and
or underutilized.
become To become “top of the mind” in education,
stakeholders a radical paradigm shift needs to happen in Pull-versus-push syndrome: Most reform
instead of just the learning landscape, in which we are able initiatives are mandated as top-down “push”
partners. It is to question and change the accepted archi- methods, which leave educators without a
time for tecture of formal education—preschools, feeling of ownership to activate change. The
museums to K–12 schools and post-secondary insti- common result is “push back.” The “pull”
tutions like colleges and universities. method empowers educators and serves
become drivers
Museums have the potential to become the as a shot in the arm in which they become
of educational
“ fourth element of that architecture in the champions of change and we remain
change.
21st century or the common denominator the catalysts.
as centers for lifelong learning.
It’s ironic that even though everyone is
Education Reform Inhibitors to talking about innovation being the most
Be Reckoned With desirable 21st-century skill, educators
To be successful with any systemic change, and students are still held captive in the
one has to be cognizant of critical factors least innovative teaching and learning

that can compromise the effort, process environments. Most museums are eager
to align their educational offerings with
and results. Many of these factors restrict
the ever-evolving standards rather than
the rate of education reform and innovative
advocate for change in the curriculum
ideas. If museums want to be a catalyst in
itself. It is time to ask: Is more really more,
education, it is important for them to be
or should we make room in the existing
empathetic to sensitive issues such as:
curriculum for creativity and innovation?

Ever-evolving standards in education: If this change happens, museums

In an attempt to rise to meet interna- will fit into the education and learning

tional standards and testing of student equation seamlessly.

achievement, new standards have come and

gone, yet the desired outcomes have not
Communities of Innovative
materialized. The U.S. curriculum is still an
Practice and Voices from
inch deep but a mile wide, with little or no
Education
room for creativity and innovation. So are all of these strategies a thing of
the future or more aspirational? I would
This-too-shall-pass syndrome: With the like to share a few examples of visionary
rapid influx of third-party “problem fixers” leadership in which organizations and
in education, many of whom are transient in individuals have made the choice to push
nature or dependent on short-term funding, traditional boundaries and define a different
front-line practitioners—educators—have leadership role for themselves, and are
developed apathy for solutions that are having an impact on education.

24
The Henry Ford’s Innovation Education are happening in American schools, and
Incubator is a national initiative that aims that other countries still look up to our
to empower teachers to teach innovation system for producing confident, articulate,
using stories and collections of American creative thinkers.
innovators designed to help youth think and
act like innovators. All of these examples show that we can
steer the new learning revolution toward
The Remake Learning initiative, led by what we all desire: more power to the
The Grable Foundation, is galvanizing an learner; holistic and real-world knowledge
entire city to solve problems creatively and to learn from, apply and adapt; a new cadre
inspiring a generation of lifelong learners in of innovators and entrepreneurs; and a
the Pittsburgh area. strong economic future for the U.S., where
self-directed learners not only learn in new
The Boston Children Museum’s Race ways but also teach and enlighten us in
to the Top—Early Learning Challenge new ways.
Grant initiative, in partnership with the
Massachusetts Department of Education,
is mentoring museums and libraries across
the state to develop skills and proficiencies
for early learners.

Big Picture Learning works with over

200 innovative schools across the nation
and world, where museum assets and
experiential learning are included as core
elements of the curriculum.

Author and activist Nikhil Goyal’s book

One Size Does Not Fit All and his revolu-
tionizing leadership voice are challenging
Dean Kamen, an innovator most known Dean Kamen talks about
the test-based model of education and how empathy inspired
for the Segway and initiator of the First some of his innovations.
asking for radical changes to better suit
Robotics competition, tells the amazing
learners’ needs.
story of how empathy and his desire to
meet a real-world need for his brother,
Erik Martin’s personal life experiences
who was at Harvard Medical School, led
from middle school led him to conceptu-
him to develop tiny needles for babies with
alize a National Student Bill of Rights.
cancer, which then led him to develop the

Rebecca Mieliwocki became the 2012 insulin pump used to treat diabetes for

National Teacher of the Year from among millions of people. Dean’s story gives us

3.2 million teachers in the U.S., and in hope that small innovations and grassroots

her role visited educational systems in 30 movements can be scaled up to cater to

states and eight foreign countries. She the needs of millions. That’s what American

concluded that the most amazing things education needs today.

25
 Time to Harness the Power Museums have to become a force to be
of the Whole reckoned with so our collective wisdom
can steer the ship of learning. The good
Hundreds of museums, libraries and
news is that, even though it may seem like
nontraditional learning spaces are devel-
an indomitable task, there are ways we can
oping innovative models and exemplary
streamline our efforts. But we cannot do it
partnerships to impact learning. They
alone. I leave you with the following quote,
are well known and respected in their
which I found appropriate to the work we
communities. But on the national map,
have gathered here to initiate and sustain:
these efforts still seem fragmented, even
though they have powerful elements that “Coming together is the beginning,
can benefit all. Lack of a system of infor- Working together is progress,
mation distribution amounts to museums Staying together is success!”
reinventing the wheel over and over until —Henry Ford
the “aha” moment when someone connects
those of us doing similar work.

Paula Gangopadhyay is the chief learning officer for The Henry Ford,
which includes the Henry Ford Museum, Greenfield Village, Benson
Ford Research Center, Ford Rouge Factory Tour, IMAX and Henry
Ford Academy. She brings more than 19 years of experience from the
cultural, education, policy and business sectors. She is heavily involved
in several state and national professional organizations and serves
as a thought-leader and speaker on innovation-related dialogues
and forums. President Barack Obama appointed Gangopadhyay as a
member of the National Museum and Library Services Board in 2012
for a four-year term.

26
 Igniting a Learning Revolution with
The Henry Ford’s Innovation Education
Incubator
By Paula Gangopadhyay, Chief Learning Officer, The Henry Ford

The Henry Ford includes Henry Ford Brian Zevotek and Mark
Rogers, 2013 PBS-
Museum, Greenfield Village, an IMAX® THF Teacher Innovator
theater, the Benson Ford Research Center, winners, learn how to
teach innovation at
the Ford Rouge Factory Tour and a public The Henry Ford’s
Innovation Immersion
charter high school, Henry Ford Academy. It workshop.
is America’s largest indoor-outdoor history
destination, with more than 1,500 full- and
part-time employees, 600 volunteers
and an annual attendance in excess of 1.5
million people, including over 200,000
school group visitors.

At the outset of 2008 and in the midst of an

economic downturn, The Henry Ford made
a strategic decision to become a catalyst
and make a positive impact on American
education. With its collection of 26 million
artifacts that tell the story of American
In close collaboration with education
innovation, ingenuity and resourcefulness,
partners, The Henry Ford used the “co-
The Henry Ford felt uniquely positioned to
creation” approach and launched over 220
unlock the potential of one of the world’s
new and paradigm-changing educational
greatest collections of content, stories and
curricula and resources aimed at changing
experiences about American innovation and
how teachers teach and students learn. The
to address the issue of the nation losing its
new resources not only support national
global competitive edge.
and state standards in social studies but
also in STEM, 21st-century skills, English
The institution adopted a 10-year strategic
language arts, and career and technical
plan to better fulfill its mission of inspiring
education. They are aligned with Common
people to learn from America’s traditions of
Core State Standards and are now being
ingenuity, resourcefulness and innovation
to shape a better future. The Henry Ford
also adopted a new vision to “be a nationally
recognized destination and force for fueling
the spirit of American innovation and
inspiring a can-do culture.”

27
Innovation curricula
offer educators tools
to develop innovative
mindsets in K–12 youth.

aligned with the Next Generation Science critically, to communicate and collaborate,
Standards. The common strands running and to develop a problem-solving mindset
through the new curricula are innovation that they can apply in any scenario.
and creativity, which The Henry Ford is
encouraging teachers to make room for in The Henry Ford conducted a pilot testing
the curriculum. of the innovation curricula through the
Innovation Education Incubator (IEI)
In 2010, The Henry Ford launched initiative. Forty teachers, representing
OnInnovation.com, a dynamic educa- public, private and parochial schools
tional website with oral history interviews across the nation, tested the material with
with some of today’s leading innovators, over 1,000 students. A third-party evalu-
including Bill Gates, Steve Wozniak, Dean ation conducted by the national research
Kamen, Will Allen and others. The insti- firm Moore and Associates highlighted
tution also added unique content in the the following:
form of curator interviews about legendary
innovators like Henry Ford, Thomas Edison,
• The Innovation 101 materials could be
integrated in several subject areas,
George Washington Carver and Rosa Parks.
including English language arts,
health and fitness, entrepreneurship,
To offer an explicit digital tool to K–12
history, technology, social studies and
educators, The Henry Ford created
visual arts.
a game-changing digital curriculum,
Innovation 101, which is designed to • Teachers felt these materials were an
inspire the next generation of innovators important curriculum support tool.
and thinkers with stories of today’s
innovators, told in their own words and
• Most teachers reported that there were
no other materials like this available.
juxtaposed with stories of legendary
innovators. The curriculum seamlessly • Virtually all of the teachers indicated the
integrates 21st-century skills development Innovation 101 module promoted critical
in the methodology of instruction. Each thinking and creativity and helped
lesson allows learners to reflect on real-life introduce students to the concept
stories of innovators, to think creatively and of innovation.

28
 • Students felt the materials helped them The Henry Ford is pursuing this project to
“a lot” to learn new things, change how give every child in America access to the
they thought about things and learn critical ideas, content and problem-solving
things they will need in the future. skills that will enable him or her to be the
innovator or STEM practitioner of tomorrow
With the success of the pilot testing and and to help create substantive change in
the enthusiastic adoption by educators, the American education system for a better
The Henry Ford has now commenced a work force.
major next-phase effort to increase the
distribution and ongoing evaluation of its The Henry Ford’s carefully designed efforts
curricula to make a large-scale educational around teaching innovation showcase an
impact. The Henry Ford was invited to make example of how a traditional museum
a “commitment to action” at the Clinton made the national education agenda its
Global Initiative, America and through the top institutional priority, redefined a vision
Innovation Learning Accelerator plans to: to become a force for change in education,
realigned its resources to augment and
• train and empower 5,000 innovative deploy its assets in new and innovative
teacher-leaders to teach innovation with
ways, and is now scaling up its efforts for
The Henry Ford’s innovation curricula
national impact.
• ignite 125,000 students to “think and
act” like innovators

• continue to gather qualitative and

quantitative evidence that The Henry
Ford’s innovation curricula and teaching
and learning tools are effective,
compelling and inspiring for teachers
and students.

High school students

from Henry Ford
Academy, Dearborn,
Michigan, listen to
interviews of famous
innovators and
learn about traits
of innovators and
processes of innovation.
Photo: Rudy Ruzicska

29
Communities of Innovative Practice

 A City-Level Approach to Remake

Learning
By Gregg Behr, Executive Director, The Grable Foundation

How do we prepare our children for a And we’re doing it in a new way: through a
future we can’t even imagine? Today we deliberate network of citywide partnerships
live in a world where our children can that knit together the expertise of hundreds
video chat with loved ones across the of educators, artists and innovators. This
globe, where robots perform cutting-edge hub of learning innovation is one of the first
surgical techniques and where 3D printers of its kind in the nation.
“print” food. It’s fair to say the future,
thanks to technology, will be beyond our With leadership from our Kids+Creativity
wildest dreams. Network, led by the Sprout Fund, hundreds
of people, projects and organizations are
So how do we prepare our future citizens to working together to remake learning in the
live, work and play in the cities and commu- greater Pittsburgh region. They represent
nities of the future? What tools will they schools, museums, libraries, afterschool
need? What competencies? What infor- programs, community centers, higher
mation? And how do we, the adults in their education institutions, the private sector
lives, the leaders of their communities— and the philanthropic community. We’re
mere mortals who grew up back in the day also lucky enough to work closely with the
before e-vites, e-books, and e-commerce— Allegheny Intermediate Unit (AIU), part of
prepare them? the local school government structure in
Pennsylvania. The AIU is leading the charge
In my hometown of Pittsburgh—known for imagination and innovation within our
for innovations in industry and children’s schools by providing crucial professional
media, thanks in part to Fred Rogers—an development support. We also work
educational revolution is taking place. with the Pittsburgh Technology Council
And it wouldn’t be possible without (PTC) to support and connect our region’s
leadership from all sectors of our region, creative entrepreneurs.
including museums.
Together the Sprout Fund, the AIU and the
Here in Pittsburgh, new pioneers—gamers, PTC—supported by R&D in local higher
roboticists, technologists and designers— education—are working across disciplines to
are working alongside educators in and out forge partnerships with the goal of creating
of schools to inspire and provoke creativity a thriving ecosystem that will support kids’
and curiosity among children and youth. learning where and however it can happen
for years to come.

30
Although we can’t predict the future, we environment for children to make “stuff”
understand that to meet the challenges of alongside artists and technologists. It’s a
tomorrow, what takes place in traditional place for hands-on, project-based learning.
brick and mortar classrooms, time-honored Kids can sew, tinker with woodworking and
exhibit halls and typical out-of-school create circuitry, as well as work on computer
spaces needs to change. We need to move programming, stop-motion animation and
from an industrial-era approach of one laser cutting.
educator imparting information to many
students, to one that allows students to Community partnerships have been an
place inquiry at the center of their own important part of MAKESHOP’s work. In
learning and be nurtured by caring adults addition to hosting field trips and profes-
and mentors. sional development for educators, they
work regularly with a Head Start classroom
We know that kids spend only 14 percent in the museum. They’ve also taken
of their time in school. And we understand MAKESHOP on the road to regional schools
that learning doesn’t start and stop at the and parks, and have plans to establish
school door. In Pittsburgh we’re focusing satellite sites at West Liberty University and
on principles of connected learning the Wheeling Children’s Museum.
that link academic achievement, social
networks and personal interests with smart “You can’t flunk at a museum,” the
mentors to spur young people to learn museum’s executive director, Jane Werner,
anytime, anywhere. said recently. Werner sees museums as
labs that can inspire the next generation
Hands-on, self-directed exploration is so of artists, scientists, engineers and their
important to kids’ understanding of their teachers. Werner always reminds me that
world and their place in it. To this end, in museums can work at the edges of educa- The Children’s Museum
Pittsburgh we’re focused on expanding tional innovation and help inspire more of Pittsburgh’s
MAKESHOP is a
opportunities for kids to engage in digital formal learning spaces to grow and change space for children and
families to make, play
platforms, “maker” culture and learning in new ways. and design using “real
that is STEAM focused (science, technology, stuff”—materials, tools,
To that end, also in Pittsburgh, the Carnegie processes and ideas.
engineering, art and math). We are ensuring Photo: Anthony
that kids can use new digital tools along Museum of Natural History will soon Musmanno

with traditional hands-on learning to

develop key skills and global competencies
of the future, such as critical and systems
thinking, collaboration, facing adversity and
diversity, and finding solutions to problems
on their own.

Museums are a key part of this work in

our region.

For example, educators at the Children’s

Museum of Pittsburgh’s MAKESHOP
have created a rich informal learning

31
 be home to one of four local classroom Factory, the Pittsburgh Glass Center and the
simulators, an immersive learning ToonSeum—to design, create and manage
environment where visitors have to work their own exhibition spaces.
together to solve complex problems.
The simulator—part video game, part As future citizens of the global world,
classroom—is equipped with embedded today’s students must learn how to
iPads for each visitor to control, and is learn. They must learn to develop their
specifically designed to build kids’ interest own interests, find creative solutions to
in STEAM subjects and to help hone problems, experiment, fail and start over
teamwork, critical thinking and problem- with new ideas. No one organization should
solving skills. or can shoulder that responsibility alone.
Organizations in Pittsburgh recognize that
Another example of innovation, this today’s youth are navigating technological,
time in the classroom, is the great work cultural and scientific innovations that
going on at the Elizabeth Forward School demand fresh thinking on our part about
District. There, students can bring algebra how we prepare them for futures we can’t
and other abstract concepts to life in yet imagine.
SMALLab, a Wii-like mat with projectors
and motion-sensing cameras. Students The citywide networks of learning that
can physically move molecules together we’ve established here in Pittsburgh are
to watch their reaction or map a graph by cementing those opportunities. We can’t
pacing out the points on a mat. The district wait to see what’s next.
has transformed the school’s library into
a digital space for teens modeled on the
cutting-edge YOUmedia spaces. In these
new spaces, classes are tackling project-
based learning, as they did recently in
creating apps for the Andy Warhol Museum
and murals for their own school buildings.
Across town, students in Avonworth High
School are working with artists from five
museums—the Warhol Museum, the
Carnegie Museum of Art, the Mattress

In his eighth year as executive director of The Grable Foundation,

Gregg Behr manages a grantmaking portfolio advancing high-quality
early childhood education, improved teaching and learning in public
schools, and robust out-of-school time support. From 2002–2006,
Behr served as president of The Forbes Funds, a Pittsburgh-based
foundation that supports nonprofit capacity-building, research
and leadership development. Nationally, Behr is a trustee for
GreatNonprofits.org and Grantmakers for Education. He is a former
board chair of Grantmakers for Effective Organizations.

32
 Empowering Statewide Museums
and Libraries as Integral Educational
Partners
By Jeri Robinson, Vice President, Early Childhood Initiatives, Boston Children’s Museum

Founded in 1913, Boston Children’s While many of our original goals and values
Museum just celebrated its 100th remain the same, the demographics of our
anniversary. The “children” of 1913 were audience and admission fees have drasti-
neighborhood youth between the ages of 8 cally changed. Our audience consists mainly
and 18. In the first year of operation, 65,000 of families with children between the ages
children—individually and in school and of birth and 10, with the majority being
community groups—attended, all for free. children under the age of 5. Now all visitors
BCM’s goal at that time was to train children over the age of 2 pay a $14 admission fee.
to observe accurately and think logically An array of affordable options include $1
as a way to make them better citizens. Friday nights, $2 Electronic Benefit Transfer Looking through a
Outreach programs focused on serving (EBT) cardholder admission, sponsored magnifying glass at
the Boston Children’s
low-income and immigrant children. visits and library passes. Last year we hosted Museum.
Photo: © Paul Specht

33
 play a stronger role in early learning for
all children. The experiences, resources
and interactions provided by libraries and
museums build brains and fuel a love of
learning.” BCM’s Race to the Top—Early
Learning Challenge Grant—Museums and
Libraries Partnership for Parent, Family and
Community Engagement (M/L Project)
is building brains and fueling a love of
learning. While we originally planned
to collaborate with 17 institutions, as of
September 2013 we are working with over
300 museum and library educators across
the commonwealth.

Boston Children’s over 550,000 visitors, including 65,000 We are grateful for the volunteer advisory
Museum celebrates
cultural diversity and children under the age of 3. participation of Shelley Quezada from
creative play in Boston the Massachusetts Board of Library
neighborhoods.
Photo: © Megan Education, families and children have Commissioners (MBLC) and the
Dickerson changed over the past century, and so Massachusetts Library System (MLS). The
must museums, if they want to remain vast M/L Project is currently working with 56
relevant. BCM has had a robust early public libraries including the five libraries
childhood program for a number of currently funded by the Department of
years and has been very engaged with Early Education and Care to hold the early
the Boston community regarding school childhood collections of the state.
readiness initiatives. In 2012 BCM partnered
with the Massachusetts Department of We are also working with 67 Coordinated
Early Education and Care (MA EEC) and Family and Community Engagement
submitted a proposal, based on our school (CFCE) specialists who are contracted
readiness work in the Boston area, to by the MA EEC and work in commu-
share those ideas and to provide materials nities across the entire commonwealth.
and training to museums and libraries Many CFCEs already had strong working
across the commonwealth as part of the relationships with their local museums
Massachusetts submission to the Race to and libraries, and welcomed the oppor-
the Top—Early Learning Challenge grant. tunity to expand on their relationships
The grant was funded, and we were off and collaborate.
to spread our work statewide and, most
important, to meet and collaborate with In the western parts of Massachusetts,
many museum and library colleagues. where museums and libraries are scarcer,
the CFCEs have become the way to
The recent report from the Institute of distribute the kits and train the trainers
Museum and Library Services (IMLS), so that they can go out and deliver these
Growing Young Minds: How Museums and resources to smaller libraries whose
Libraries Create Lifelong Learners, begins limited hours and staffing prevented them
by saying, “Libraries and museums can from participating.

34
What We Have Learned from Our Unexpected Connections and
Partners: Happenings: Seeds in the
Museums already offer educational and Greenhouse
engaging activities and programming The foundation of our Race to the Top work
every day. The challenge is that not is our relationships. Over the past two years,
everyone can afford museum admission we have found new partners with common
prices. While BCM admission is $14 per goals and worked together towards some
person, alternatives to regular admission new outcomes. We like to think of our grant
are growing. By subsidizing admission at as a “greenhouse” where we can plant
certain times of day or by honoring EBT and seedlings and see if they grow.
WIC cards, many museums are working to
become affordable to all. Still, resources BCM received the IMLS National Medal for
are constantly needed to help subsidize Museum and Library Services and partic-
admission fees or travel assistance and pay ipated in the researching and publishing
for necessary staff. of Growing Young Minds. The full report
features BCM’s Race to the Top, lending
Many CFCEs are collaborating with their credibility to our work.
local library. CFCEs often fill in the gaps
when libraries don’t have staff for story hour Much of our work needs to take place out
or special programs. CFCEs bring family in our communities, listening, observing
engagement activities to the library. and responding to issues facing schools
and families, and determining how we can
More ways to reach families are needed. be of service. To do this we need to look at
The United Way is experimenting with a our internal culture. Who is on our team?
new online “Resource Locator” that could How do we reflect our community? What
help families locate museums, libraries and is our responsibility? If we want different
other family-friendly institutions. We also outcomes, then we need to be sure our
need a commitment to intentional outreach inputs are the best they can be.
programs that invite families into museums
and libraries for the first time. As we begin our 101st year, BCM is working
to re-envision who we are in our community,
not just in our education department, but
throughout our institution.

Jeri Robinson is vice president, early childhood

initiatives at Boston Children’s Museum (BCM). She
has more than 40 years of experience in teaching
and consulting in the fields of early childhood and
museum education. Robinson received her B.S., M.S.
Ed. and an honorary doctorate in education from
Wheelock College, and serves on numerous boards
dealing with family, community, multicultural and
early childhood education issues.

35
 Taking It National and Global:
A Value-Driven, Project-Based Learning
and Innovative Credit-Earning Model
By Elliot Washor, Co-founder and Co-director, Big Picture Learning

apply what they know. It is through such

applications that students understand
the messiness and uncertainty of making
things work in the real world. Such oppor-
tunities allow students to develop tacit
understandings and heuristics. There are
few substitutes for the learning that results
from delivering a product or service that
others value.

Over the years, museums have shown in a

variety of ways that they are very good at
Noah Thoron, a student “One of the most remarkable things getting students to deepen the learning
at a Big Picture Learning
school in San Diego at about us is also one of the easiest to process. When young people take day trips
his internship at San overlook: each time we collide with
Diego CoastKeeper.
to museums with their families and friends,
He designed an auto the real, we deepen our understanding they explore their vast resources. Some
sampler that tests rivers of the world and become more fully a
and streams during the of these students linger and become an
rainy season. part of it. While we’re wrestling with a
explainer of exhibits or just spend loads of
Photo: Vanessa Carr difficult task, we may be motivated by
time wandering through the place. There is
an anticipation of the ends of our labor,
also a sector of students who get involved
but it’s the work itself—the means—
in after-school programs that museums
that makes us who we are.”
offer around exhibits and themes. All of
—Nicholas Carr
this allows students to interact on their own
terms with the world outside of their homes,
Schools must provide students with oppor- computers and schools.
tunities to learn and work on projects that
Some students attend one-day museum
are nested in the real world of museums,
events where they are inspired and
businesses, organizations and commu-
then do some work back at school with
nities. Such projects are not prepackaged
museum-provided kits, or go online and
around simple problems, but reflect the
continue a project. But even the best work
dynamic complexity of those settings.
coming from museums or schools can be
The world outside of schools provides better and deeper. We at Big Picture believe
abundant settings and contexts in which that if both places started at the outset with
students can “collide with the real” and the student’s interests—allowing enough

36
sustained time to really go deep—then do (and could do) outside. The learning
we would have very different outcomes. in both settings and contexts must be
Students need to develop relationships with seamlessly integrated. We call such
objects and with adults who spend their learning “leaving to learn.”
lives studying and presenting their work in
a world full of problems and uncertainty. Recently Richard Elmore quipped, “It is
This builds the kind of social capital that a great time to be learning, especially if
lasts a lifetime. Museums and schools you are out of school.” We get his point. It
typically teach with way too much certainty is not difficult for schools and museums
to engage students over any length of time, to work together to ensure that learning is
or in ways that matter to them and hold connected both in school and out of school.
deep meaning. What it takes is an innovative approach
to develop deep learning where, as Carr
In our Big Picture schools, every student suggests, the means are not cut off from
is engaged with objects and adults around the ends.
their mutual interests. Students leave the
school building and do projects with adult At the conference, I started my talk with an
mentors in their work places. Teachers image of a Möbius strip. One way to make
credit students’ work as authentic, deep a Möbius strip is to start with a two-dimen-
and sustained learning. Our students are at sional piece of cashier’s tape, add a half twist
museums all over the country, from Newark to it and apply glue or tape the ends. This
and New York to San Diego, Los Angeles brings the strip into the three-dimensional
and Oakland. Whether they are in maker- world. We have to do the same thing with
spaces, developing exhibits in the natural our schools and museums. When schools
history section of a museum, conducting and museums put the ends together, we
experiments on chamber music or studying engage students through their interests in
mollusks, their work looks different, deeper deep and sustained ways. They are credited
and better than any work that a museum or for work that matters to them, their school,
a school can do alone or in distant collabo- the museum and their community. Instead
ration on or off line. of doing the same thing we have always
done, we need to forge those connections
Schools must take down the walls that to create a new ecosystem for each and
separate the learning that students do (and every student.
could do) in school, from the learning they

Elliot Washor, Ed.D., is the co-founder

and co-director of Big Picture Learning—a
nonprofit transforming education one
student at a time—and the co-founder of
The Met Center in Providence, Rhode Island.
He is also the co-author of Leaving to Learn:
How Out-Of-School Learning Increases Student
Engagement and Reduces Dropout Rates.

37
Needs-Based Systemic Change in the Learning Ecosystem:
Students, Teachers and Museums

One Size Does Not Fit All

By Nikhil Goyal, Activist and Author, Reclaiming Our Freedom to Learn (forthcoming)

“
In the summer of 2010, I went on a family not necessarily going to come from within
trip to India. Looking at the school system the system but from outside. Educational
I realized that
there, I was really intrigued by some of reformer Ivan Illich, in his book Deschooling
the biggest
the experiences students were having and Society, says that he wanted to move away
change in
noticed a lot of parallels between the Indian from schooling, which he believed was
education is and the American systems. At the same damaging the minds of young people, and
not necessarily time, I was reading a book by Tony Wagner towards a self-directed, community-based
going to come entitled The Global Achievement Gap, which approach. Interestingly that was back in the
from within opened my eyes to a lot of the problems I 1970s when we did not have the Internet
the system was noticing in my own school. and a lot of the other resources we have
but from now that can propagate change. Today
“ After I came back from India, I moved from I see the biggest changes in education
outside.
Bethpage, New York, to Syosset, New York— happening in makerspaces, hacker-
going from a middle-class school district spaces, libraries, museums and informal
to one that’s very wealthy and compet- learning spaces.
itive, where a lot of kids are admitted into
Ivy League institutions. Once I got into A few years ago in San Francisco, for
that school, it was a disaster. Many of the example, there was something called “100
problems that I had been reading about Days of Spring.” Two activists converted
were unfolding before my eyes. Kids were an old boutique shop into a learning
stressed out, very competitive, cheating environment for people of various ages,
and uninterested in anything beyond backgrounds and skills. On a bulletin board,
getting into college. I wondered: Is this people would post, “I can teach pottery,
just happening to me? Or are other kids sewing and computer programming, and
experiencing the same thing? I went around these are the hours I’m available,” all free to
the country and started to talk to students. people who wanted to learn those things.
I conducted research and interviews with They had an extraordinary exchange of
people in education: teachers, students, skills and knowledge for a brief period
administrators and entrepreneurs. of time. Unfortunately it closed down,
but there have been many other similar
Based on this research, I wrote a book, spaces, such as the Brooklyn Brainery and
which was published in 2012. I realized [freespace] in San Francisco, that embody a
that the biggest change in education is very egalitarian notion of learning. In these

38
 “
environments, it doesn’t matter whether rules or guidelines on you. It’s just like real
you’ve graduated from Harvard or whether life.” John Holt likes to say that learning is Today I see
you are a college dropout. What matters is just like living, and there shouldn’t be any
the biggest
what you bring to the table, and what you separation between the two.
changes in
want to learn and what you’re really inter-
ested in. I think that the biggest potential for education
changing the educational system is when happening in
This harkens back to 17th-century English people push from the boundaries, from makerspaces,
coffeehouses, where people came almost outside to the inside, making sure that hackerspaces,
every day to learn the latest gossip and places like museums, libraries and maker- libraries,
news about what was going on in the town. spaces become instrumental parts of this museums and
These coffeehouses were extraordinary change. A lot of people are opting out of
informal
places for innovation, collaboration and, formal institutions (for example, I decided
learning
most important, the mingling of people not to go to college right out of high “
with different ideas and from different school), and a lot of people are starting
spaces.
fields. In today’s society, we are so detached to question the value of higher education
from one another that most of us don’t and college. People are questioning the
even know our next-door neighbors. Most traditional norms of society and seeking out
of us don’t talk to people in our community places of egalitarian spirit where it doesn’t
or neighborhood unless there’s an absolute matter what credentials you have—what
need to do so. There’s huge potential for matters is the knowledge you bring to the
cities and communities to address this table. We’re seeing that communities, cities
detachment, and I think museums, libraries, and people want to collaborate with one
makerspaces and community centers are another. We want to know our neighbors, we
going to be a part of the solution. want to know people in our communities,
we don’t want to be detached in our homes
Imagine if school were noncompulsory, and and in our schools. I think it’s time to under-
we created the city as the school itself. What stand that this change doesn’t necessarily
if we opened the floodgates and said to happen in formal institutions. It’s going to
children, “You can learn however you want happen when we realize, as Holt did, that
to, wherever you want to, with whomever learning is just like living.
you want to, and we’re not going to put

At age 18, Nikhil Goyal is an activist and author of the

forthcoming book, Reclaiming Our Freedom to Learn. He
is currently working on the City as the School exper-
iment and a Student Bill of Rights. He has appeared as
a commentator on MSNBC and Fox and has written for
the New York Times, MSNBC, NPR and Forbes. An interna-
tional speaker, Goyal has spoken at Google, The Atlantic,
Fast Company, NBC, MIT, Stanford University, Barnard
College, SXSW and others. He lives in New York.

39
  A Student Bill of Rights
By Erik Martin, Game Designer and Student Leader

“
I am a student. As a student, I will admit and say what you will about the millennial
I have gotten a little tired of being left generation, the fact remains that according
We should
out of the education reform movement to the National Institute of Mental Health,
reward schools
and conversation—a movement meant we are the most depressed generation in
and institutions
to empower my generation and those U.S. history. Mental illness is a complex
that show following. For that reason, I want to applaud beast, and I won’t try to capture all of its
progress the American Alliance of Museums’ factors here, but I would hypothesize that
towards a commitment to engaging student voices school plays a major role when whole
learner-centric in this process. AAM is doing what many generations are concerned.
style of other groups are failing to do: engaging
educating. “ my generation and recognizing that we It seems likely that the more we
standardize, structure, belittle and pressure
are the ones who are most subject to
coming change. Furthermore we will be the students to do what they’re told, a feeling of
eventual inheritors of the system, and will depression is only a natural reaction. Under
judge how effective change really was. If the immense stress of high-stakes testing,
we want meaningful education reform now, and the low expectation for teachers to
those pushing education reforms must start be creative in their classrooms, students
listening to students more seriously. increasingly bear a misguided burden.
Raising a school’s test scores does not raise
Certainly it isn’t only AAM that is listening to the student’s ability to succeed in today’s
student voices; many of the organizations modern world. We have become fixated
that were present at the Future of Education on filling in bubble sheets when we should
convening held in September are doing be fostering creativity, critical thinking,
their part to listen to students as well. Other teamwork and each individual’s passions.
students and I are thankful for those groups, This is about more than just education
and hopeful that others will follow suit. reform; it is about correcting mistakes that
are harming children and their futures. That
First, though, I want to share a bit of my own might be a strident statement to make, but I
story, because I believe it highlights many feel it is an important one to recognize.
of the fundamental flaws within our current
education system. In the later part of my 8th I do not mean to paint a doom-and-gloom
grade year in middle school, I found myself picture, however. I think positive change in
grappling with severe anorexia nervosa, the system is not so hard to create, but we
largely as a result of an education system do need to be strategic if it is to be large-
that felt more like a cage than a haven. The scale change (which it must eventually be).
feelings of helplessness and depression In many ways, what we face is a challenge
I faced in school were not unique to me, of value: schools are often stretched thin on

40
resources, and entirely redesigning how an
institution allows students to learn can seem
as they say, are cheap. What we need most
of all is pragmatic incentive to change. We “
I implore
like an extravagance rather than a priority. need to shift where the system dictates
everyone to
What’s more, the funding mechanisms for money should go, even if it is only a small
reach out to
most schools in the U.S. revolve around shift at first. Admittedly I am discussing
students as we
standardized test performance, so achieving more “cheap” ideas here, but for my part,
higher scores to receive more funds takes small as it is, I am working to solidify some
work forward
precedence over serious reform. I believe of these ideas. for change.
that if we change this dynamic, even a little, Together we
we can shift the goals of our education Currently I am organizing students across can build
institutions. We should reward schools and the United States to form a cohesive task something
institutions that show progress towards a force called “We the Students.” We are
better, one
learner-centric style of educating. working on a National Student Bill of
school,
Rights, informed by what I hope will be
museum and
This shift in value for rewarding innovation thousands of fellow students and kids to
also extends to the museum community. clearly define the rights learners should
library brick at
Museums that actively extend their institu- have in the education system we desire. We a time.
“
tional borders to merge with the traditional will then transform this document into the
education space should share the oppor- foundation for a new certification process
tunity to benefit from doing so. It would be a for schools, museums, libraries, etc., that
symbiotic relationship: schools that innovate shifts where value is placed in our system
by providing students experiential learning to where it should be: helping all children
opportunities outside of the classroom fulfill their passions and be the masters of
(like at museums) would be rewarded and their education.
highlighted, and the museums, libraries
and other actors would also benefit from I am optimistic about the future of
providing new educational outlets. education. Maybe that is because I’m
young and naive, but I do see signs of
Many, if not most, people want to see a shift improvement. I implore everyone to reach
in education towards a learner-focused out to students as we work forward for
system. But wanting change and changing change. Together we can build something
are two very distinct things—especially better, one school, museum and library
when we talk at the institutional level. Ideas, brick at a time.

Erik Martin is a game designer and a sophomore at the University

of Maryland. He currently works as a consultant with the inter-
national development agency FHI 360 to create games that
promote peace and civil society, co-leads the ScienceOnlineTeen
unconference in New York City and is developing the National
Student Bill of Rights initiative. He has worked for the Federation
of American Scientists and the U.S. Department of Energy, and
served as a page in the U.S. House of Representatives and the
Maryland General Assembly. Most important of all, when he has
the time, he co-leads the online guild Vanguard Gaming.

41
 Lessons from a National Education
Leader’s Journey
By Rebecca Mieliwocki, 2012 National Teacher of the Year; Teacher, Luther Burbank Middle School

“
I want to start by telling you about Mr. and the jury will determine how much he
Callison, and about Adam Braunstein, my has to pay you.” So we moved the desks all
The average
nemesis. When I was in 6th grade in Napa, around, and I had to quickly come up with
American
California, we were out on the playground my arguments and Adam had to come up
teacher feels during recess and Adam Braunstein called with his defense.
pretty glum, me a name. It must’ve been a really bad
battered and name—I’ve blocked it out completely at There I was, standing there, just minutes
beaten up. this point—because I fled back into the later, making a case for why Adam
We walk classroom and fell weeping into the arms Braunstein was a horrible human being.
of Mr. Callison, demanding that he do In the middle of making this case, I had a
around with
something about the insult. I was hysterical, kind of out-of-body experience—which is
our heads
saying, “He called me a name, you have to really weird because when you’re 11 and in
hung low
punish him!” I was wailing and crying and 6th grade, you’re trying to figure out your
because we body and how to be in it, much less have
rending my garments, and he said, “Why
feel so don’t you do something about it?” I thought, an out-of-body experience. There I was
lousy that we’re “Oh, he’s giving me permission to beat hovering over myself, going, “This is so cool,
not number
“ him up. If you want me to beat him up, I’ll I like this, I like talking to them about big
one. beat him up! You want me to hit him in the ideas and this is good. I wonder if I could
knees?” But he said, “Not at all, not that at do this for a living?” I tell this vignette when
all. Why don’t we take this to the class and I’m giving speeches to five or 10 thousand
solve this constructively?”  people and I step away from the podium
and go, “Look where I am now!” Because
On the fly, from out of right field, here came when I was 11 years old, out of nowhere, a
a student asking the teacher to solve a teacher gave a young girl a chance to argue
problem for her, and he put it right back on for herself and to engage in a classroom
my shoulders and said, “Let’s help you solve activity that was not standards based, would
it for yourself.” We had this cool class setup not be tested and on which the teacher
called the Game of Life where we all lived in himself wouldn’t be evaluated. 
“neighborhoods” in the classroom. We each
held jobs, earned income; basically we were In that exact moment, I discovered what I
playing at being grownups. Mr. Callison said, wanted to do with the whole rest of my life.
“We will create a courtroom, and you will It’s been 34 years since then, and I’m so
sue Adam for defamation of character and thankful for that moment when Mr. Callison
you will argue your case in front of the court saw what I could do to become the person I
of your peers. If you win you can fine him was meant to be. That’s what he did: shoved

42
aside convention and created an oppor- Japan, China, Singapore, Australia, the
tunity for a student. I think all the students Netherlands, Guam, Saipan—to look at their
in that classroom were changed by that educational systems. I also went to 30 U.S.
moment because it was out of the ordinary, states, visiting classrooms and colleges to
but it was highly personalized to me.  see what’s going on. They sent me overseas
to generate some context for the conversa-
I was recognized as the National Teacher tions about international competitiveness
of the Year because I sought to become an and global comparisons. 
educator like Mr. Callison, to give kids the
space and the quiet for them to discover I’m so glad that they did that, because
what they are supposed to be when they here’s how I started out: I went to China and
grow up. I had to push back against the Singapore to find out what their secret for
pressure in the classroom to get good test education is, because they always best us on
scores and against everybody else’s need to these international rankings. The average
get something out of my kids. I had to push American teacher feels pretty glum,
back against what society felt was right for battered and beaten up about that. We walk
students to know—which is really to choose around with our heads hung low because we
“C” on multiple choice tests—and instead feel so lousy that we’re not number one. So
say, “What do you want to know? What I thought, “I’m going to go there, I’m going
do you need to learn?” I had to become to be quiet and listen, I’m going to observe
the biggest learner in the classroom. everything and I’m going to discover what
That’s what I spent my time doing—being the ‘secret sauce’ is, I’m going to bring that
a seeker, looking deep within each kid to back and share it with every teacher I meet
hear what is a really quiet cry (even though this year and everyone that I happen to
they’re 11, they’re really loud) about what’s interact with for the rest of my career.” And
important. What matters? What am I into? before I left, people said to me, “Rebecca,
What do I need? And then, what can you they’re testing factories. You’re going to see
give me to optimize that? How can you set them just teaching kids how to ace tests and
them clearly, carefully and with as much get into great colleges.” And I said, “No, no,
tenderness and fiduciary responsibility as no, right away that’s way too simplistic of an
possible on that path?  answer.” Things are usually more compli-
cated than that. I went with a really open
I think that’s why I was selected as National mind to look for the greener grass. 
Teacher of the Year by the Council of Chief
State School Officers (CCSSO) in 2012. I But I saw exactly what people told me I’d
know I’m not the best teacher—there are 3.2 see: rote instruction, kids going to school
million of us! I’m not even the best teacher from sunup to sundown, academics from
in my building and I’m pretty sure about morning until night. I didn’t see enrichment:
that because I’ve stolen all of the best art, music, dance, field trips—the things
ideas from my favorite teachers, anyway. that round out a human being and put them
(Thank you, Mr. Callison.) CCSSO takes in touch with their humanity. I did not see
the National Teacher of the Year out of the happy kids, I did not see happy teachers.
classroom and they send you everywhere. I When I said to my hosts (because I was
swear I was in airports more than anywhere still impressed by their accomplishment
else. I went to eight nations—Russia, and embarrassed about ours), “It must

43
 just feel so good to be number one! of us in America, and that blew me away.
Congratulations. I’m so excited to be here Every single place I went, they wanted to
and honored to get to learn at your feet, you know how we do what we do. That is the
are the masters,” I was quickly and loudly good news that I bring to you today from
shushed everywhere I went, especially overseas. There are other things to emulate
in Shanghai, at the number one and two in other systems, but what we have here
schools in the world—shushed! Don’t talk in this country is one thing that they don’t
about that, they said. They said their ranking have, and that’s the ability to create incuba-
was a hollow victory.  tional space where we say, What do you
want to know? How do you want to learn
They said: We know that our number one it? How do we know that you’ve gotten it?
status does not mean that we are the best. When will we be done? 
It just means we can get kids into college,
we can get them to pass tests, we can give In the best schools, we let kids drive that
them knowledge that they then can regur- conversation. In some of the greatest class-
gitate to us, but we do not create kids like rooms in this country, I saw that happening.
you create them in America. How do you Everywhere I went in this country, from
that? How do you create such innovative, California to Connecticut, from Orlando to
creative and nimble thinkers? How are your Minnesota, I saw what I didn’t see overseas:
kids so confident about trying and failing amazing creative things happening in
and trying again? How do your kids commu- classrooms, where teachers are pushing
nicate like crazy, so much that you can’t back against the pressures of testing and
keep them from talking to each other?  standardization and assessment, and saying
instead, “Who do I have with me? What do
Have you been in an American classroom they need to know? What do they want to
lately? It’s a noisy place; it’s a beautiful, know, and how do I facilitate and optimize
chaotic, stimulating array. It’s wonderful, that experience for them?” I went looking
and in classrooms elsewhere in the world for the greener grass and found that our
that just doesn’t exist. They wanted to own grass is a spectacular, highly coveted
know how we foster that chaos. How did we and beautiful shade of green all its own.
do what we do? They were envious of all

Rebecca Mieliwocki is a 7th-grade English teacher with over 14 years of teaching

experience at Luther Burbank Middle School in California. She holds a B.A. in speech
communication from California Polytechnic State University and her professional
clear credential in secondary English education from California State University
Northridge. In 2012, Mieliwocki was honored as the National Teacher of the Year.
She is the 2005 California League of Middle Schools Educator of the Year for
Southern California, a 2009 PTA Honorary Service award recipient and a Beginning
Teacher Support and Assessment mentor, and has also served as a teacher expert for
a CSUN College of Education Panel titled “The ABCs of IEPs.”

44
The Challenge of Scaling Up

Museums in an Age of Scale

By Michael Edson, Director of Web and New Media Strategy, Office of the CIO,
Smithsonian Institution

My message to the Future of Education way, zero percent audience growth and
convening was simple, even stark: if we incremental improvements in facilities,
want to take on the challenge of improving collections and staffing over 35 years reveal
education in America, we’ve got to get big a question about whether we are using
or get out. Half-measures won’t cut it. the best dreams to shape and implement
our missions.
Every organization, every discipline,
dreams. When we close our eyes, we picture The TED conference has served over a
ourselves practicing our craft at the peak of billion videos since 2006, the year they
excellence: teaching, provoking, spreading started a small experiment to put videos
joy, having profound impact in our commu- online. They tried it, it seemed to work, so
nities. But even dreams have limits, based they tried some more, and now they have
on our experience of what is possible. delivered a billion videos. The TED team
Dreams come in different types and sizes. didn’t do anything that a museum couldn’t
Different scales. have done—no aspect of TED’s strategy,
tactics or operations requires huge teams
Our industry, museums, forged our dreams or huge budgets, and even the TED motto,
in the 20th century when being successful “Ideas worth spreading,” is hauntingly
meant having impressive buildings full of museumesque. But their vision, their sense
experts, big collections and visitors through of their role—their responsibility, their
the doors. That was our reality. There was no obligation—in the world of the 21st century
Internet yet, and we could imagine no other is clear, as is their understanding of scale.
type of success. In that world, we dreamt
about things like bigger, better buildings, The National Gallery of Art would have
rock-star curators, preeminent collections to operate for 217 years to have a billion
and more visitors. visitors, but is a TED talk as good as a
museum visit? Is any online experience
The East Wing of the National Gallery of as good? There’s a lot of doubt among
Art in Washington, DC, opened in 1978 with museum leaders that online experiences
4.6 million annual visits. It has roughly can be as authentic, as impactful, as a visit
the same level of visitation today. Is that to a museum. But try Googling “TED talk
the fulfillment of a big dream? How you made me cry” and then read Art Museums
answer that question depends on what and the Public, a 2001 report by the
you think the mission of that institution is Smithsonian Institution Office of Policy and
and how you think about scale, but either Analysis, which concludes:

45
 One of the most striking results of Beth Harris, and her collaborator, art
this generation-worth of museum historian Steven Zucker, attended the
audience studies is that the explicit Future of Education convening. Beth and
aims of exhibition planners are rarely Steven reach 200 students a semester
achieved to any significant degree. In through the traditional practice of teaching
study after study ... researchers found art history in their classrooms, but this
that the central goals of the exhibition semester they’ll reach 2 million learners
team (which are usually learning goals) from 200 countries through their open
were rarely met for more than half of educational resource, Smarthistory. The
the visitors, except in those cases where Khan Academy, a free, online educational
most visitors entered the museum website of which Smarthistory is a part,
already possessing the knowledge that reaches 10 million learners a month. MIT’s
the museum wanted to communicate. Open Courseware project served 100
million people in its first decade, and their
Art historian Beth Harris told me her own goal is to reach 1 billion learners in the next
feelings about the reality of museum visits: 10 years.

It isn’t this amazing, contemplative, Our dreams drive us forward. Museums

aesthetic, transcendent experience. It’s accomplish wonderful things in society, but
jostling crowds, it’s feeling hungry, it’s a billion learners—that’s the kind of dream
being annoyed by the people you’re we need to have.
with sometimes, it’s feeling disap-
pointed that you can’t have the reaction
that the museum wants you to have—
that you don’t have the knowledge and
the background to get there. I mean, it’s
a whole range of complicated things.

Michael Edson is the director of Web and new media strategy in

the Smithsonian Institution’s Office of the CIO. He has worked on
numerous award-winning projects and has been involved in practi-
cally every aspect of technology and new media for museums. Edson
helped create the Smithsonian’s first blog, “Eye Level,” and the first
alternative reality game to take place in a museum, “Ghosts of a
Chance.” He is an O’Reilly Foo Camp veteran and serves on the Open
Knowledge Foundation’s Open GLAM advisory board. He was named
a “Tech Titan: Person to Watch” by Washingtonian magazine.

46
 Every Child a Changemaker
By Laura White, U.S. Changemaker Schools Manager, Ashoka

The world is changing faster than ever rethink the experience of growing up and
before. Our success—as individuals, the substance and process of education to
institutions and a society—increasingly ensure young people are equipped with this
depends on our ability to be changemakers, new set of skills. Ashoka has learned from
equipped with the skills and mindset to see its Fellows that empathy is a foundational
through problems to solutions. capacity that children must develop to
prepare them to then master other critical
Over 30 years, Ashoka has identified and skills of teamwork, leadership and change-
supported 3,000 leading social entrepre- making. With the guidance of these fellows,
neurs around the globe. These Ashoka we have been searching for Changemaker
Fellows are innovating new solutions to Schools across the United States that
entrenched social problems, creating cultivate students as empathic leaders
systemic change for the good of all in every who can work in teams to solve shared
area of need. Being at the center of this problems. However, schools are not the
network provides us with a deep under- only institutions that must support these
standing of the key levers for bringing about skills in students. In order for all children to
structural social change in society, across master these changemaker skills, museums
industries and sectors, and a prime vantage must play a critical role in transforming the
point to spot key patterns and trends. youth years.

The most significant trend today is the Fortunately, there are already innovative
shift away from a world where power was examples to look to in the museum
concentrated in the hands of an elite few, ecosystem. Schools like Opal Charter
and success for everyone else depended on School, chartered by the Portland
their ability to perform repetitive function Children’s Museum, are modeling school-
work. As change accelerates in the world, museum partnerships that enhance
everyone increasingly has a powerful role to students’ mastery of both changemaker
play, and success depends on a new set of skills and academic content. They are
skills that allow one to collaborate and lead, also sharing their knowledge with other
see beyond silos to adopt new perspectives, schools through innovative efforts like the
problem-solve quickly and creatively, and Museum Center for Learning. Museums
drive change. like the Phillips Collection are partnering
with schools to improve student learning
How do we prepare children and young
through creative programming both
people to thrive in this world? We must
inside and outside the museum’s doors.

47
 Our critical task now is to identify innova- Join us in collecting these innovative
tions that work and scale them to more ideas. Submit a museum practice or story
museums, schools and learning commu- to Ashoka’s Start Empathy Initiative by
nities around the country. e-mailing me at [email protected], and
it may be featured in our toolkit or on our
To promote the spread of empathy innova- Start Empathy blog. We also encourage
tions, Ashoka has designed an “empathy you to tell us about innovative elementary
roadmap” to evaluate and describe best schools that work with museums and other
practices at schools, museums and community partners to promote empathy
other institutions. To ensure every child and changemaker skills in students.
becomes a changemaker, we must identify
the creative programs and practices
at museums that create a learning
environment that inspires students,
engages students in investigating the
world’s biggest questions, and challenges
students to reflect and act on their insights.

Laura White manages Ashoka’s Changemaker Schools Network, a

community of outstanding elementary schools that cultivate their
students as empathic and collaborative leaders. White has been dedicated
to creating an “everyone a changemaker” world since high school,
when she started an organization to provide free swimming lessons to
low-income children with the support of Ashoka’s Youth Venture. As an
undergraduate at Tulane University, White worked with the university’s
Ashoka U team to start a social venture incubator, build the university’s
minor in social innovation and incorporate social entrepreneurship into
the introductory teacher certification class. She has researched change-
maker education and is passionate about ensuring every child masters
empathy—the most fundamental of changemaker skills.

48
 A Call to Action
By Elizabeth Merritt (Center for the Future of Museums, American Alliance of Museums)
and Paula Gangopadhyay (The Henry Ford), Co-conveners, Future of Education symposium

Participants at the convening unanimously We conclude with steps that convening

preferred the optimistic scenario presented participants and readers of this white paper
by KnowledgeWorks’ Katherine Prince—a can take, individually and organizationally,
“vibrant learning grid”—to the depressing to scale-up the conversation about educa-
prospect of leaving our children and tional reform and drive change in the
grandchildren to navigate a “fractured learning ecosystem.
landscape” of education. Their challenge,
on the second day of the gathering, was Spreading the Word:
to generate ideas about how to guide our • Create a national database of
future towards this preferred vision. museum resources that directly
support educational goals and
In this summary, we present a selection of learning objectives.
these ideas. These suggestions encompass
practical, short-term steps needed to • Maintain comprehensive documentation
of how museums are serving
sustain this conversation about the future
education now.
of education, as well as big, transformative
ideas that would need considerable effort, • Identify existing, high-performing
energy and funding but could create radical digital platforms (e.g., Khan Academy,
change and redefine the role of museums Gooru) that can aggregate and distribute
in the learning ecosystem. We have grouped museum educational content.
the ideas under the following headings:
• Unite museums with the entire
educational community using a
Spreading the Word: compiling and
“Collective Impact Model” approach and
sharing information needed to guide
include their contributions in the metrics
planning and decision making
used to track student learning.
Disrupting Conventional Dialogue:
promoting ideas that disrupt conventional
Disrupting Conventional
thinking about education and expand our
Dialogue:
conception of the educational landscape • Launch a national campaign to
reenergize the notion of “museums”
Creating Systemic Change: imple- as educational resources (like the
menting radical experiments that National Parks Centennial campaign,
could increase the role museums play or the National Arts Education public
in education awareness campaign).

49
 • Foster student activists at each level of museums could get certified as PEECH
learning—grade school, high school, (Providers of Experiential Educational
university—empowered to incorporate Challenges). Working together,
out-of-school learning into their certified institutions would create
personal learning plans. networks of accessible, experiential
educational opportunities.
• Improve museums’ communication
pathways with local schools—for • Create a national or state-based
example, creating an intranet or school system in which personalized learning
district “plug in.” This would enable advisors help elementary and middle
museums to push their content on school students and families explore
educational programming, collections the variety of learning opportunities
options, etc., to teachers. available to them—in school, online and
community based—that they may not
Creating Systemic Change: otherwise know about or have access
• Recruit and support brokers in each to. This would help integrate museum
community whose role is to connect programs, volunteer opportunities and
local museums with local schools and internships into personal learning plans.
alternate learning networks (such as This network could also match teachers
homeschoolers), as well as to help with opportunities to participate in other
museums integrate their resources into learning environments.
aggregation sites like Gooru, Learning
Registry, Reimagining Education and Six Strategic Imperatives
Connected Educators. The American Alliance of Museums,
The Henry Ford and participants at this
• Foster educational systems in which
students are encouraged to connect convening pledged to contribute to the
to adult mentors, including museum following next steps, as appropriate to their
staff, with expertise related to each organizations’ missions and resources:
student’s areas of interest. Capitalize • Disseminate this white paper to foster
on the role museums can play in discussion, generate more ideas and
fostering communities of interest-driven encourage individuals and organizations
learners, and serving as connectors to take action.
and brokers of information, resources
and relationships. • Strengthen the connections among
convening participants, including the
• Establish a certification system for exchange of news and research.
education that recognizes schools
for their support of self-directed, • Expand the network of convening
participants to include other
experiential learning. Supported by an
stakeholders in museums, education,
education policy that gives every student
research and civic activism.
the right to access experiential learning
provided by all kinds of institutions, • Mobilize additional convenings, small
schools could get certified in REECH and large, to gather more input,
(Rights to Experiential Educational generate more options and recruit
Challenges), and organizations like partners in our efforts to shape the

50
 future of education. • Organize a convening in your
community or sector of practice to
• Find funding to prototype and test explore how museums can work with
some of the ideas coming out of
their communities to build the future
the convening.
of education.
• Distribute information to museums,
schools and learners about exemplary • Contribute examples of innovative
projects and partnerships that
and scalable communities of practice
demonstrate how museums can
(e.g., Rethinking Learning, Big Picture
contribute to the educational landscape.
Learning, Race to the Top—Early
Learning Challenge, THF Innovation • Identify potential funders to
Education Incubator) to increase the support prototyping and testing
impact of these existing initiatives. educational innovation.

How You Can Become Involved Please contact Paula Gangopadhyay

([email protected]) and Elizabeth
• Distribute this white paper to museum Merritt ([email protected]) to let us
professionals, educators, policy makers
know of your interest in taking any of these
and funders. Host discussions of the
steps, or other actions, to help build the
content and its implications.
next era of education.

Additional trends identified by convening participants as

important drivers of change:
• the growing gap between training provided by K–12 • schools as community centers integrating all kinds
education and employment opportunities of community services—academics, health and
social services, youth and community development,
• how decentralization/specialization options for and community engagement
learning are creating a social divide as well as a
digital divide (disadvantaging students and parents • the rise of the maker movement fostering
not prepared to seek out or access nontraditional hands-on, experiential learning in community
learning opportunities) spaces and homes

• expanding access to high-speed Internet, projected • the increase in student-driven activism and push for
to be universal by mid-century choices regarding learning

• rising trend of fear of failure, leading to avoidance • adoption of Common Core standards and testing
of risk-taking in curricula, teaching and organization
of schools
• the proliferation of education-related technology
and its impact on teaching and learning
• increasing personalization and customization of
learning experiences

51
 Dispatches from the Future of
Education

A selection of recent articles, videos and software that adapts to their strengths
news items illustrating the trends and and weaknesses. In other words: aided
events shaping the landscape of learning: by emerging technology, the teacher-
student relationship—and the classroom
Sugata Mitra: The child-driven education itself—will be remade. That is the coming
[Video] education revolution.
TED talk
July 2010 Museums at School
Education scientist Sugata Mitra tackles ASCD
one of the greatest problems of education— February 2013
the best teachers and schools don’t exist When students design in-school museums,
where they’re needed most. In a series of they enhance their knowledge and their
real-life experiments from New Delhi to creativity. Such projects can work in any
South Africa to Italy, he gave kids self- school, with students of all ages. Students
supervised access to the Web and saw can successfully address many topics of
results that could revolutionize how we importance to a school and community,
think about teaching. Mitra’s “Hole in the anything from an intriguing facet of local
Wall” experiments have shown that, in the history to alternative energy sources. Such
absence of supervision or formal teaching, projects provide opportunities for students
children can teach themselves and each to construct and showcase their knowledge
other if they’re motivated by curiosity and as they call forth creativity.
peer interest.
Children’s museum turns focus to school
The future of the classroom readiness with science exhibit
CNN Money Poughkeepsie Journal
January 10, 2013 February 8, 2013
Despite all the hoopla over gadgets and The Mid-Hudson Children’s Museum is
new software, the future of education really shifting its focus to kids preparing for
hinges on the shifting roles of teacher school, and its new permanent exhibit,
and student. “The main shift is away from “Fun 2, 3, 4!” highlights that with stations
what I’ll call a teacher-in-classroom- on early science and math education.
centric model,” explains Scott Benson, a “This exhibit was chosen and brought to
program officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates the museum specifically to support a new
Foundation. Instead, Benson says, students school-readiness initiative we have,” says
will learn at their own pace, using Lara Litchfield-Kimber, the museum’s

52
executive director. “We’re shifting a little GradFly is a platform for young students
bit more in terms of our content and really to build an online portfolio of their science
embracing the educational aspect of a projects, in order to attract colleges
children’s museum.” and employers when they leave school.
Young people taking science, technology,
How Teachers Are Using Technology at engineering and mathematics courses and
Home and in Their Classrooms participating in computing and robotics
Pew Internet clubs at school can often mention these on
February 28, 2013 CVs and application forms, but they don’t
A survey of teachers who instruct American really tell the full story behind the projects
middle and secondary school students they’ve actually worked on. Much like
finds that digital technologies have become Behance does for creative students, GradFly
central to their teaching and profession- enables users to upload multimedia
alization. At the same time, the Internet, galleries of their previous high school or
mobile phones and social media have college initiatives to showcase their talents
brought new challenges to teachers, and in one place. As well as benefiting from
they report striking differences in access the support of a community of peers,
to the latest digital technologies between GradFly also acts as a place for education
lower- and higher-income students and institutions and companies to scout out
school districts. The full report, and interesting and groundbreaking work,
the original survey questions, can be which would otherwise be hidden behind
downloaded from the Pew Internet site. school walls.

Will.i.am launches education scheme at Students Want, But Aren’t Getting,

Science Museum 21st-Century-Skills Training
Attractions Management Education Week
March 12, 2013 May 30, 2013
A new scheme to engage disadvantaged A new Gallup poll shows that young adults
youth with science and technology has been recognize the value of 21st-century skills,
launched by international pop star will.i.am, such as problem solving, global awareness
in collaboration with The Prince’s Trust, at and communication, but say they didn’t get
the Science Museum in London. Funded enough of an opportunity in high school or
by a £500,000 donation from the Grammy- college to develop them. Those who did,
winning artist, the scheme will deliver however, reported higher job satisfaction.
workshops aimed to inspire 13–19-year-olds
in science, technology, engineering and Museum education gets innovation
mathematics (STEM). It will be delivered recognition
by Science Museum outreach staff at the U-T San Diego
trust’s xl clubs, which help young people June 3, 2013
struggling at school and at risk of exclusion. It seems like a uniquely San Diego notion:
an aircraft carrier at the center of classroom
Platform showcases students’ STEM skills innovation. Each year, nearly 50,000
to future employers and colleges students, parents and teachers take field
Springwise trips to the USS Midway Museum to study
May 28, 2013 math, physical sciences, social studies and

53
other subjects in a one-of-a-kind learning (Re)Mapping the Learning Ecosystem
laboratory. Taught by a staff of a dozen World of Learning
educators, the students spend part of their July 6, 2013
time in specially designed classrooms on A proposition: let’s remap our under-
the massive ship in spaces that used to standing of our learning ecosystem to
house a mess hall, bunk rooms and other include the nation’s more than 140,000
military functions. The rest of their visit museums and libraries. These highly
takes them out onto the flight deck and trusted institutions, representing almost
to other areas of the ship to find practical every academic discipline and present in
applications to the lessons. almost every community, are too often
absent from our conversations about the
New middle school set to open in Museum future of learning. Yet many of them provide
District this fall those meaningful, personalized and
Memorial Examiner accessible lifelong learning experiences
June 25, 2013 that fit the bill—often even better than the
Houston’s 6th graders will possibly have classroom—for what John Seely Brown and
a new school to attend this fall. Houston Douglas Thomas describe as “a new culture
A+ Challenge is establishing A+ Unlimited for learning,” one that cultivates “the imagi-
Potential, a tuition-free, open-application, nation for a world of constant change.”
private middle school in the Museum
District. The school will have 40 6th graders Is Public Education on Its Death Bed?
the first year under the instruction of two Should It Be? Seven Points of Argument,
learning coaches and is accepting appli- Leverage and Change
cations through July 1. A+UP will take kids Education Week
of all levels, demographics and socioeco- July 23, 2013
nomic status to create a microcosm that One could easily make the case that public
best reflects the city of Houston, says Cicely education doesn’t work well, is stuck in
Benoit, one of the learning coaches. a previous century, is cumbersome and
inequitable, and failing lots of kids. It
Why It’s Time to Stop Talking And Start deserves to die, because it’s not doing its
Acting to Make Change [Video] job consistently. The question is: What
KQED Mind/Shift will replace it? One could also make a
July 5, 2013 passionate case that a free, high-quality,
Schools aren’t good at innovation, said Grant fully public education for every child is one
Lichtman in a TEDx talk given to teachers of America’s best ideas—and that some
in Denver. They are big, bureaucratic, risk things should not be subject to market
averse and affected by politics more than pressures. If we’ve ever laid claim to being a
smart education policy. Instead schools great nation, it’s certainly public education
need to teach students to be self evolving, that built the framework for that greatness.
so they can adapt to change as it comes. The question is: How do we build on the
That means schools need to become values and pieces of the current system that
self-evolving institutions themselves, work well?
embracing change and preparing kids for
their future, not looking back at the past.
His challenge to all educators: stop talking
about it; start doing it.

54
Youth Turn to Tech, “Interest-Driven” Arts Redesigning education to prepare young-
Expression as Schools Trim Arts Education sters for changes ahead
Budgets, Report Finds Southwest Michigan’s Second Wave
Philanthropy News Digest August 22, 2013
July 25, 2013 At the annual meeting for the Kalamazoo
As arts education budgets in districts across Community Foundation, Katherine Prince
the country shrink, young people increas- from KnowledgeWorks in Cincinnati
ingly are exploring their creativity outside presented the highlights of some of the
the traditional school environment, helped changes her organization sees ahead and
in part by new technologies that make it urged the community to design educational
easier for them to create and share their systems that would address those changes.
art, a report from the Wallace Foundation
finds. The report, New Opportunities for School 2.0: Meet the technology experts,
Interest-Driven Arts Learning in a Digital teachers and administrators who are
Age (104 pages, PDF), examines “inter- changing the way kids and young adults
est-driven” arts learning—the exploration learn
of creativity that emerges from children’s USA Weekend
and teens’ own creative passions—and August 8, 2013
how new technologies such as animation, A profile of six innovators who offer a fresh
video game design and music composition perspective on how to re-energize learning,
software are expanding the possibilities for including Sandra Okita’s “peer learning”
arts production. robot, Projo; Seth Andrew’s Democracy
Prep charter schools; and Nichole Pinkard’s
The Nature of the Future in Education pioneering work on teens and social media,
Education Week resulting in the creation of digital media
July 28, 2013 labs in public libraries nationwide.
Education researcher Justin Reich takes a
closer look at future-of-education scenarios How Video Games and Social Media Fuel
developed by the Institute for the Future Students’ Passion for Art
and concludes that “our social systems of KQED Mind/Shift
education are extremely resistant to change, August 8, 2013
especially at the level where students and The trend of interest-driven art creation
teachers interact. But the utility of futures comes at a time when public schools are
thinking is not just about making predictions cutting art programming, and it offers a
that are correct. It’s about expanding our promising new way to reach and mold
imagination, giving us new visions of what budding artists. “A lot of times we think
learning spaces might look like, challenging we need to have programs that cultivate
educators to look outside the sector for learning in the art form, but what we are
inspiration and tools for change.”  finding is that through the continued
production of art, and reflection on it, the
kids are actually improving their skills over
time,” says Kylie Peppler, assistant professor
of learning sciences at Indiana University.
She wrote a report for the Wallace
Foundation called New Opportunities for

55
Interest-Driven Art in a Digital Age. The study the long vacation. This story features one
finds that even without formal training, family’s use of the exhibits at the National
self-driven youth are developing the same Museum of Mathematics to prevent the
habits of mind that they would under formal “summer slide.”
instruction—they just don’t realize they’re
doing it. Their creation is spontaneous, self When Good is Not Good Enough
taught and often quite good. Stanford Social Innovation Review
Fall 2013
School is a prison—and damaging our kids Leaders of two of the most successful
Salon nonprofit organizations argue that the
August 26, 2013 sector needs to shift its attention from
The unfortunate fact is that one of our most modest goals that provide short-term relief
cherished institutions is, by its very nature, to bold goals that, while harder to achieve,
failing our children and our society. Longer provide long-term solutions by tackling
school years aren’t the answer. The problem the root of social problems. This article is
is school itself. Compulsory teach-and-test pertinent to the issues of “scale” raised by
simply doesn’t work. It’s no wonder that Laura White and Michael Edson at Building
today, even the “best students” (maybe the Future of Education.
especially them) often report that they are
“burned out” by the schooling process.
Research has shown that people of all ages
learn best when they are self-motivated,
pursuing questions that are their own real
questions and goals that are their own
real-life goals. In such conditions, learning
is usually joyful.

Museum makes learning fun, helps stop the

“summer slide”
CBS News
September 2, 2013
The National Summer Learning Association
(NSLA) says that if students don’t consis-
tently practice math and reading skills
over the summer, they will start the school
year at a loss. Many will have forgotten up
to 2.6 months’ worth of material, or 22
percent of what they learned the previous
school year. The nonprofit’s website cites
studies from as back as far as 1906 showing
that when students are given the same
standardized tests at the beginning and the
end of the summer, they score lower after

56
 Program Participants
Museums and the Learning Ecosystem: Building the Future of Education
September 16 and 17, 2013  

Carylann Assante, Executive Director, Student and Youth Travel Association

Philip Auerswald, President and Founding Board Chair, National Center for Entrepreneurship
and Innovation
Robert Bader, Robert & Toni Bader Charitable Foundation
Toni Bader, Robert & Toni Bader Charitable Foundation
Gregg Behr, Executive Director, The Grable Foundation
Jamie Bell, CAISE Project Director, Association of Science-Technology Centers
Henry Berman, Chief Executive Officer, Association of Small Foundations
Betsey Bowers, Deputy Director of Museum Education, Smithsonian Early Enrichment Center
Carole Charnow, President and Chief Executive Officer, Boston Children’s Museum
Michael Edson, Director of Web and New Media Strategy, Office of the CIO,
Smithsonian Institution
Shauna Edson, Astronomy Education Specialist, National Air and Space Museum
Karen Elinich, Director of Science Content & Learning Technologies, Franklin Institute
Michael Feder, Senior Program Officer, Board on Science Education, National
Academy of Sciences
Anna Forgerson Hindley, Washington, DC Liaison, Museum Education Roundtable; Education
Specialist, National Museum of African American History and Culture
Gordon Freeman, President, National Laboratory for Education Transformation
Laela French, Collections Manager, Lucas Cultural Arts Museum
Paula Gangopadhyay, Chief Learning Officer, The Henry Ford
Margaret Glass, Program Manager, Association of Science-Technology Centers
Nikhil Goyal, Activist and Author
Nancy Green, Executive Director, National Association for Gifted Children
Beth Harris, Dean of Art and History, Khan Academy
Susan Hildreth, Director, Institute of Museum and Library Services
Deborah Hurtt, Senior Program Officer, National Endowment for the Humanities
Scott Kratz, Vice President for Education, National Building Museum
Christine Kuan, Chief Curator and Director of Strategic Partnerships, Artsy
Jay Labov, Senior Advisor for Education and Communication, National Academy of Sciences
Janice Lachance, Chief Executive Officer, Special Libraries Association
John Laughner, Legislative and Communications Manager, Magnet Schools of America
Max Marmor, President, Samuel H. Kress Foundation

57
Erik Martin, Game Designer and Student Leader
Rebecca Mieliwocki, 2012 National Teacher of the Year; Teacher, Luther Burbank Middle School
Norma Miller, Director, Global Workplace, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Katherine Prince, Senior Director, Strategic Foresight, KnowledgeWorks
Nathan Richie, Chair, EdCom (Education) Professional Network, American Alliance of Museums;
Director, Golden History Museums
Michael Robbins, Senior Advisor for Nonprofit Partnerships, U.S. Department of Education
Jeri Robinson, Vice President, Early Childhood Initiatives, Boston Children’s Museum
Robert Russell, Program Director, National Science Foundation
Sara Schapiro, Director of the League of Innovative Schools, Digital Promise
Marsha Semmel, Senior Advisor, Noyce Leadership Institute
John Sirek, Director, Civics Program, Robert R. McCormick Foundation
Gerald Solomon, Executive Director, Samueli Foundation; Chair, National STEM
Funders Network
Carol B. Stapp, Director, The George Washington University Museum Education Program
Martin Storksdieck, Director, Board on Science Education, National Academy of Sciences
Samuel Taylor, Director, Science & Engineering Ambassadors, National Academy of Sciences
Troy Thrash, President and Chief Executive Officer, Air Zoo
Luba Vangelova, Principal, Catalyst Communications LLC
Elliot Washor, Co-founder and Co-director, Big Picture Learning
Laura White, U.S. Changemaker Schools Manager, Ashoka
Steven Zucker, Dean of Art and History, Khan Academy

American Alliance of Museums Staff

Ford W. Bell, President
Susan Breitkopf, Director of Business Development
Ben Kershaw, Assistant Director, Congressional Relations
Elizabeth Merritt, Founding Director, Center for the Future of Museums
Brent Mundt, Vice President of Development
Gail Ravnitzky Silberglied, Vice President of Government Relations and Advocacy

58
Students completing a quest to earn a “Collect & Classify” badge in the Smithsonian’s Tree Hugger badge series. Courtesy of the Smithsonian
Quests Program.

59
 Ford W. Bell,
President
[email protected]
T 202.289.9110

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