Why School Fails Most Kids | Mike Goldstein

What if schools are measuring the wrong things? Mike Goldstein built a charter school with 42 tutors living in a dorm above the classrooms, proving that one-on-one attention changes everything—but that's just the beginning of what's broken in education.Mike founded Match Charter School in Boston in 2000, revolutionizing education with high-dosage tutoring and unconventional approaches that actually work. After scaling his model internationally with Bridge International Academies (serving 1.4 million students across Africa), he's now focused on helping parents understand why so many "average" kids are struggling. His insight: every child needs to discover something they're genuinely good at—not for college applications, but for the confidence that comes from earned excellence.Mike Goldstein Education: https://www.mikegoldsteineducation.com/Match Charter School: https://www.matchschool.org/Match Education: https://www.matcheducation.org/Mike on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-a-goldstein/Phoning Parents Book: https://www.matcheducation.org/export/prior-projects/overviewChapters:(00:00) - Schools Are Boring By Design(03:00) - The One-on-One Tutoring Revolution(09:39) - Building a Dorm for 42 Tutors(15:07) - Why Good Ideas Fail at Scale(18:00) - The Advisory Period Nobody Wants(27:14) - Parents Need Exit Rights(36:52) - Finding Your Kid's First Win(43:18) - The "I'm Not Good at Anything" Crisis(46:00) - What $30,000 Per Student Actually Buys(51:04) - The 360-Degree Child Nobody Does---Every child needs to discover something they're genuinely good at. Not for college applications or report cards—but for the confidence that comes from earned excellence. Sometimes the best education investment isn't another program, it's finding that one thing they can win at.Want even more? Sign up for the OpenEd Daily newsletter at https://opened.co for practical tips and insights about more open and innovative approaches to education.Subscribe:https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-opened-podcast/id1760216903https://open.spotify.com/show/6Kf7SZ8XASA6tSqMEuHmVCFollow us on social:https://www.instagram.com/openedHQhttps://www.facebook.com/openedhqhttps://x.com/OpenEdHQhttps://www.linkedin.com/company/openedhq/