Publications

For three decades now, the course of action has been to accept the system as it stands and to push its schools and teachers to deliver ‘better performance’. Perhaps not surprisingly, that effort to get an inert system to do-better has not proved an outstanding success. The theory of action should instead be to turn public education into a self-improving system.

A description of areas of autonomy, assembled while consulting literature and visiting schools during the writing of the book Trusting Teachers with School Success. And, examples of how schools have used those autonomies.

In November, 2014 the U.S. Department of Education proposed a set of priorities, requirements, and criteria for the federal charter grants to state education agencies. Here is the response of three senior E|E associates, to that proposal.

All known teacher-powered (i.e. teacher-led) schools, both in list form and plotted as pins on a map. A resource of the Teacher-Powered Schools Initiative.

To get innovation in K-12 we need to free those closest to the action—the teachers—to innovate and meet the needs of their students. Ted Kolderie draws lessons from World War 2 to make this argument, in a commentary in the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

"The Futures of School Reform" is a project of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, coordinated by Jal Mehta. In October 2013, E|E invited Mehta to Minnesota to talk about the five alternative futures. Here are notes on the project from E|E's Ted Kolderie, and on what he thought was most significant for the education policy discussion in Minnesota.

Kolderie raises some questions about the one-dimensional definition of 'achievement' currently accepted essentially unquestioned. Challenging un-stated premises—though likely to upset people—is a 'must' for good decisions and successful policymaking. A commentary by Ted Kolderie in the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

Nina Rees, president of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, invited Ted Kolderie to discuss "The Role of Innovation in the Charter Movement" with the heads of state charter associations and resource centers. These are his remarks; edited to include some of the points made in the hour-long discussion that followed.

Lately, our nation’s strategy for improving our schools is mostly limited to “getting tough” with teachers. Blaming teachers for poor outcomes, we spend almost all of our energy trying to control teachers’ behavior and school operations. But what if all of this is exactly the opposite of what is needed? What if trusting teachers, and not controlling them, is the key to school success?