You’ve Got the Power
Remember Monica Lewinsky?
The plagued Washington, DC intern-turned activist is teaming up with the fashion brand Reformation and Vote.org to encourage people to vote this year.
It’s called You’ve Got the Power. It’s a noble goal, and it could just as easily be the theme of this year’s education revolution. It’s been playing out in states more quietly for decades but in the past 14 months has surged in trendiness. It’s even cool to talk about “parent power” these days!
So let’s join the campaign and actually use your voting power to vote for people who agree that parents, not bureaucracies, should control in what manner and where their kids are educated.
How about that, Reformation? We’ve got some parents happy to model your clothing, too! 😁
The Parent Power! Index is Back
In 1995, with a few small children myself, we kicked off the parent power revolution with the School Reform Handbook, and unleashed a new activism that Time magazine once called a grassroots revolution. A few years later, we inaugurated the newsletter Parent Power! Making Sense of Your School, and were covered in Family Circle, Parent Magazine and other parent-friendly pubs at the time. As the internet got cranking and policy battles over things like charter schools, choice and standards became more contentious, it was time for a new tool to help parents - and policymakers- understand what it takes to actually give parents real power. This was before any of the “parental rights” battles that emerged over the last several contentious years. And very different.
You see, parent power in education should be defined as whether you have the freedom to drive your own child’s education - where they go to school, namely, and how your education dollars are used in the provision of that education, which these days doesn’t have to be the same brick & mortar or steel & glass that costs millions to build without impact on a student’s learning.
What does it take to ensure public education serves the student and not the other way around? Simple! Laws and policies that provide for opportunity and innovation.
And how does one actually know what those are if one does not read education policy news and newsletters ad nauseam?
It’s called the Parent Power! Index - or PPI for short - and it gives parents an interactive tool to discover to what extent their state affords them real power over their child’s education– and if not, what they can do to get it.
It draws from the best and most up to date data on how a state’s efforts to provide opportunity and embrace innovation are doing. And the 2024 edition is almost ready! Bookmark this space.
Exploring Education Freedom, at Freedom Tower
I don’t know about you but I get chills when I see the Statue of Liberty, and something that feels like pure resolve when I see the spot once occupied by the Twin Towers. 🙏But thanks to the American can-do spirit and relentless pursuit of liberty, we have new structures that tower above the rest, commemorating those we lost, that which we stand for, and a sky-high commitment to freedom.
It’s that same commitment that drives the Yass Prize and CER, anchored in the new Yass Center for Education, to hold its second annual Summit at Freedom Tower, September 12, 2024.
The theme is Freedom and we’ll explore those making it, those keeping it from our families, and we’ll even put Education Funding on Trial. It promises to be an impactful day and space is limited so mark your calendars and watch for registration to open early next month!
Modernizing Makerspaces and CTE
St. George Municipal School Unit in coastal Maine is making a splash for its innovative efforts to personalize public schooling that’s connected to its community and the students’ futures, first in the Wall Street Journal earlier this month and then on Fox Business.
As Superintendent Mike Felton told “The Big Money Show,”
"Our dream is we want all kids - Pre K through 12 - to have access to hands on, minds on technical learning tha’ts connected to career and community. We're working to create the nation’s first Pre K through 12 CTE - Career and Technical Education - program, and construct a CTE maker-space building next to our school. We want all kids to be able to follow their passion and find the career path that works best for them, and from a very early age expose them to the possibilities."
Mike’s one of the Tenacious Ten - the 2023 Yass Prize Cohort making waves throughout their communities, states and even the nation, as we witnessed last week as they gathered to brief state and national leaders and talk to media. Learn about their activities of late, and consider joining them by applying to the Yass Prize and help us spread and expand Sustainable, Transformational, Outstanding and Permissionless Education, the nation over!
Hope your days are filled with boundless hope for our kids and for their future. Jeanne