A lawmaker, advocate, businessman, and even celebrity (he did a cameo on the Emmy’s in 2016), Governor Jeb Bush has done it all! But what makes him most compelling is his command of the most important issue of our day -- education. Jeb --  as he’s often known -- is also Honorary Chair of the CER Summit on October 26th in Miami, Fla. (For more info, visit www.edreform.com.) In this Episode 42 of Reality Check with Jeanne, Governor Bush discusses what it takes to make all lives better -- and why innovation in all of education is essential.

Reality Check

Governor Jeb Bush

Steve Klinsky, head of New Mountain Capital, conceived of the “Freshman Year for Free” which is the focus of the Modern States Education Alliance. Students can earn a year of college – or more -- without tuition or textbook expense. This podcast is a must listen for anyone concerned about the cost of higher ed. Episode 28 of Reality Check with Jeanne Allen

Active Philanthropist and Education Reformer, Steve Klinsky

Eva Moskowitz is known as the CEO of Success Academy Network. With 50 campuses throughout New York City and more in development, she’s regarded as a charter school crusader, innovator and the architect of a revolution but it’s been a long contentious road. “I never felt before I got into education that I was living a Godfather movie,” says Eva – only half joking. Success Academy has been sued more than twenty times by unions. Union battles and political roadblocks have been a part of the landscape since she started her very first school with 150 kindergarteners and first-graders in 2006. But her passion is boundless and her commitment to educating not only her more than 100,000 students but parents and the general public through her book The Education of Eva Moskowitz. “We need everyone to be informed because the stakes are so high.”

Reality Check with Jeanne Allen

#SummertimewithCER: A Conversation with Eva Moskowitz (originally posted 5/7/18)

This week's Episode 8 of Reality Check with Jeanne Allen features a discussion with Gerard Robinson, whose career includes running the education departments of not just one but two states, and a passion for focusing on the nexus between criminal justice reform and education. From Historically Black Colleges and Universities and his work at the Thurgood Marshall Fund, the American Enterprise Institute, and the Center for Advancing Opportunity, there are probably few education experts in America who have a broader understanding of the challenges and opportunities that await education reformers today than Gerard Robinson.

Gerard Robinson

The major tax reform law that passed Congress in mid-December 2017 included a provision expanding the use of so-called 529 plans—tax free savings accounts that allow parents to put away money for their children’s college education. Now, they can be used for elementary and secondary education too. In this week’s Episode 6 of Reality Check with Jeanne Allen, Thomas Carroll, a leader in the effort to include the measure in the tax bill, explains why it’s so important: “it’s the first time that a national school choice measure has been adopted [at the federal level] in the past 20 years.” Carroll knows what he’s talking about—he helped create New York’s charter school law and founded a network of high-performing urban charter schools.

Tom Carroll

Every teacher knows that children all learn differently, and yet our schools are designed to teach them all the same way. In this week’s Reality Check with Jeanne Allen, one of the world’s leading experts in Adaptive Learning explains how it’s changing training in the workplace, and how it can help schools too. Ulrik Juul Christensen, medical doctor and entrepreneur, explores the way computer science is meeting cognitive neuroscience at the cutting edge of educational theory.

#SummertimewithCER: A Conversation with Ulrik Juul Christensen (originally published 12/26/17)

On the inaugural episode of Reality Check in 2017, Jeanne talked with Howard Fuller, a professor of education at Marquette University in Milwaukee, and a former Superintendent of the Milwaukee Public Schools who’s a pioneer in school choice. He is the author of the 2014 book, No Struggle, No Progress: a Warrior's Life from Black Power to Education Reform. Among other things, they discuss the “re-segregation” of American schools, and whether that really matters or not; the true intent of Brown v. Board of Education; the power of giving educational choices to low income families.

#SummertimewithCER: A Conversation with Howard Fuller (originally posted 12/12/17)

Jeanne sits down in Episode 60 of Reality Check with two stalwarts on the front lines of the battle to defend  choice and freedom for teachers and other public employees, Harmeet Dhillon and Bob Bellafiore.  Though Dhillon is in California and Bellafiore in New York they are fighting remarkably similar battles to force unions to obey the law that was codified by the Supreme Court’s “Janus” decision.

Harmeet is representing California teachers who had to go to court to get their union dues refunded – dues they have been owed for months. The unions erected a Rube Goldberg style obstacle course that needs to be navigated in order for teachers choosing freedom to receive the refunds now legally required by Janus.

Bob is involved in “New Choice New York”, which reaches out to public employees in New York and elsewhere to explain how they can opt out of paying union dues or agency fees, and how to fight the inevitable foot dragging and intransigence of the unions. Harmeet and Bob are walking the walk. Their stories are both alarming and encouraging  giving an up close and personal look into the fight for workers’ freedom.

NCSW edition: Bob Bellafiore and Harmeet Dhillon

Dr. Ashley Rogers Berner, Deputy Director of the Institute for Education Policy at Johns Hopkins School of Education, joins Reality Check to discuss educational pluralism and more: her 2016 book, Pluralism and American Public Education: No One Way to School, educational choice in America and around the globe, international communities’ attitudes toward the biggest domestic educational issues, the history of religious schools and their resurgence in the States, educational models we can learn from, and how teachers are using their freedom as educators and what they can do to continue to improve schools. These topics and more on this week’s Episode 62 of Reality Check.

Guest Ashley Berner: No One Way To School

Talk about HOPE! Well it’s out there, and this Episode 64 of Reality Check is all about it.  Learn how an education group is tailoring education to the needs of students - 40,000 of them - and not the other way around.  Learn4Life  and its’ program called HOPE (learn4life.org/programs/hope/)allows new mothers to have their children in the classrooms with them - which turns out to be good for both mother and child. Girls who would otherwise be high school dropouts graduate - often quite literally with “babes in arms” - to new horizons and life opportunities. Give a listen and hear first hand experiences from Staci Roth the HOPE program coordinator, Lenor Miranda who just graduated in May, and current student Fabiola Ceritos.

HOPE for Life, a Conversation with some special students

Episode 78, this week's special "Veteran's Day Week" edition of Reality Check, Jeanne is joined by Jim Roberts, president of the American Veterans Center (@AVCupdate). Jeanne and Jim discuss the profound and powerful stories of America's men and women in uniform, that shaped so much of our country's history, our values, and our ideals. Listen to this great podcast about how military history brings so much of America's history to life, and why it is so important to remember the sacrifices of our men and women in uniform over the years.

Honoring America's Vets, with Jim Roberts

On this week's episode, episode 80,  of Reality Check, Jeanne talks with best-selling author John O'Neill about his latest book, The Fisherman's Tomb, a taut theological thriller about the quest to solve one of the  greatest archeological mysteries of all time: where was the tomb of St. Peter? O'Neill, a Naval Academy graduate, and former law clerk to Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, has spent much of his life visiting and researching early Christian sites. Join Jeanne in celebrating the beginning of the Holiday Season with this inspiring tale of intrigue, passion, and the thrill of uncovering the hidden secrets of history.

The Thrill of Discovering History, with John O'Neill

Scott Cheney, executive director of Credential Engine, joins Reality Check to talk about the burgeoning marketplace of credentialing, and how policymakers, entrepreneurs and educators can work together to further streamline the pathways between high school, higher education and the workforce.

The World of Credentialing, with Scott Cheney

Need Internet access but don’t have broadband? Schools wrestling with how to help their students during this unprecedented crisis will want to hear Daniel Neal, Kajeet (@Kajeet) Founder & CEO, on another remote edition of Reality Check. Learn what he and Kajeet are doing now to “bridge the digital divide” and what you can do to respond to or get help during this challenging time.

Internet in a Box?

This episode is a segment of the third CER ACTION series webinar that took place on April 21, with ASU Digital Prep CEO Julie Young, who joined Jeanne along with hundreds of listeners from all over to discuss her work in virtual education, now, in this serious time of global pandemic, and, for her students, during the regular schoolyear. If you want to know more about The Future of School, visit & bookmark edreform.com, follow us on Twitter @edreform, and don’t miss upcoming CER webinars, events and resources you can use right now! Hope to see you there. Stay safe, and remember, we’re in this together.

Special Release: The Future of School

Kevin P. Chavous, President of Academics, Policy, and Schools at K12, Inc., joins CER ACTION Series Webinars to talk about how his company is responding to students’ and families’ needs in this critical time for education, how educators and advocates in the space can support substantive changes for good in their own systems, and what we can expect in the future for schools across the country. Listen on for more! If you like what you heard, join CER for the next episode in the ACTION Series on June 2: edreform.com/covid-action/events

Learning Keeps Going

Seth Andrew (@SethAndrew) founder of the Democracy Prep charter school network and the social venture incubator Democracy Builders, joins Reality Check remotely to discuss newest endeavor, a college called Degrees of Freedom (degreesoffreedom.org), providing a hybrid late high school, early college experience for students who are low income and the first in their families to attend college. Listen for more!

Seth Andrews on His New College, Degrees Of Freedom

Back to School season is usually filled with hope and promise and excitement over another milestone. But this year, Covid has created disruptions in how we do school and many districts and schools still have not finalized their opening plans. While stories abound about parents and their travails, few are asking the big question – What do parents want? Covering that question and more on this special edition of Reality Check are Colleen Dippel, Founder and CEO of Families Empowered (familiesempowered.org), Houston, TX, Janelle Wood, Founder, Black Mothers Forum (blackmothersforums.com)and Microschool Partnership, South Phoenix, AZ, and Keri Rodrigues, Co-Founder and Founding President of National Parents Union (nationalparentsunion.org), Boston, MA.

Watch this and more of CER's ACTION Series at https://edreform.com/covid-action/videos/

Special Back-to-School ACTION Series Edition: 'What Parents Want'

A look at Chicago, unions, kids and the future of schools post Covid.

A well-known former Superintendent of major city school systems, the wonderfully outspoken Paul Vallas (@Paulvallas) joins Reality Check to discuss what to do in today’s unprecedented education environment — including where and whether parents should have a say, what the unions are doing and how he thinks other districts educators behave. Not an episode to miss!

The Stakes are Too High

Social worker, author and professional psychoanalyst Erica Komisar (@EricaKomisarCSW) joins Reality Check to discuss the latest findings on the condition of schoolchildren and their emotional, social and mental well-being throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, and how parents and others can best support their young ones in these trying times. Thanks, doctor!

How to Help Parents and Students Cope As Education Changes

Kicking off the 4th season of Reality Check, Jeanne Allen talks with the leading pioneers of education opportunity whose work inspired the many transformative changes happening today about having a new president, new legislators, new everything. Listen to the inspiration of these five leaders who made choice famous, from AZ to DC, from the Badgers to the Wolverines: Lisa Graham Keegan, Kevin Chavous (@kevinpchavous), Howard Fuller (@HowardLFuller), J.C. Huizenga (@nhaschools), and Mickey Revenaugh (@mickeyrevenaugh)

Now What? Podcast with the Pioneers

Robert Woodson (@BobWoodson), Founder and President of the Center for Neighborhood Enterprise and Jeffery Sikkenga (@AshbrookCenter), Executive Director of the Ashbrook Center join Reality Check to talk about the state of our nation, civics and education across America, why it’s important that we do better in and out of the classroom and how the Constitution and First Amendment need to be read and understood more widely, especially in this unprecedented season of unrest around the world.

History, Wisdom and Hope for America’s Future

Get to know the real people, ideas and practices at work across the globe that are transforming the way we learn and live. Whoever you are and whatever you do, you won't want to miss a show! Subscribe now to catch the buzz on kids, policy, technology, and all of the latest in education.

CER

Pinned to spotlight

Popular tracks