Getting Smart Podcast

We are thrilled to bring you a new podcast from Getting Smart called EduCatered: A Podcast That’s Catered to Educators. It’ll be on its own podcast feed soon! At Getting Smart, food, education, and innovation are at the heart of our recipe. This podcast mixes it all together to get to know teachers that are doing the work and making a difference. We kick off the podcast series with Ululani (Ulu) Shiraishi, a middle school language arts teacher at Kamehameha Schools Maui. She is also a mother of three and a self-proclaimed laugher. Shawnee chats with Ulu about a range of topics, ranging from salad goulash and listening to the importance of community and habit. She also expresses gratitude for the work of Ekela Kanaiaupio-Crozier, one of the first people to teach the Hawaiian language at the collegiate level. Let’s dig in.

This episode of the Getting Smart Podcast is sponsored by the Getting Smart newsletter: Smart Update.  On this episode of the Getting Smart Podcast, Tom Vander Ark is joined by Robert Simmons III. Robert is a scholar and activist on diversity, equity and inclusion. Robert serves as a Scholar in Residence and a Scholar of Antiracist of Antiracist Praxis in the School of Education at American University and as a member of the Diversity Scholars Network at the National Center for Institutional Diversity at the University of Michigan. Let’s listen in as they discuss new social contracts, longtime DEI advocacy, compounding crises, food programs and much more. 

Be sure to sign up for our Smart Update newsletter to get a weekly round up of what's innovative in learning.  On this episode of the Getting Smart Podcast Nate McClennen is joined by Kim Alexander and Alton Frailey from Collegiate Edu Nation (CEN).  Kim is the CEO of Collegiate Edu Nation and has spent most of his career at Roscoe Independent School District where he served as superintendent from 2003 to 2019 before transitioning to lead CEN. Kim has done so much in Roscoe to promote early college and STEM to support disadvantaged rural students. Alton has been in the education world for 35 years, serving as a superintendent for two districts in Texas and one in Ohio. Alton is involved in numerous boards and community organizations both locally and nationally. and He is currently President of Alton L. Frailey & Associates, LLC, specializing in leadership development, community engagement, school board team building, and executive coaching. Let’s listen in as they discuss rural innovation in Texas schools and more about CEN. 

On this episode of the Getting Smart Podcast, Tom is joined by Daniel Pianko and Nasir Qadree. Daniel is the co-founder and managing director of Achieve Partners, an investment fund harnessing digital transformation to build new models for learning and new pathways to good jobs. He also hosts the Better Money, Better World podcast.  Nasir Qadree is the Founder and Managing Partner at Zeal Capital Partners, an inclusive investment vehicle partnering with entrepreneurs to bridge America's Wealth and Skills gaps.  Before Zeal, Nasir led AT&T social impact fund and before that was head of education at Village Capital, an early impact seed fund. Let’s listen in as they discuss investment in learning, why it’s more important than ever and how investments are shifting towards social, as well as financial impacts. 

Getting Smart recently hosted a monthly town hall event called Ask Away: A Getting Smart AMA (Ask Me Anything). We invited the audience to ask us questions about leadership and the future of learning and we did our best to answer them. We recorded the session and you can listen to it now.  You can register for our next town hall on Difference Making here. 

On this episode of the Getting Smart Podcast Getting Smart team members Mason Pashia and Shawnee Caruthers are joined by Timothy Jones, a long-time educator, coach, mentor and someone who lives and breathes hip hop. Timothy is the Chief Visionary Officer at #HipHopEd, a digitally-birthed organization with a sprawling membership of brilliant educators and passionate advocates that know just how powerful this intersection can be.  He is also the founder of Techniques4Learning, a company dedicated to utilizing Hip-Hop and Culturally Relevant Pedagogy to develop and implement strategies, curriculum and activities to improve teacher student engagement for schools, universities, education organizations and community based organizations. Let’s listen in as they discuss the role of hip hop in school, how being an MC is like being a minister, what educators can learn from other professions, student engagement and much more. 

On this episode of the Getting Smart Podcast, Tom is joined by Sarah Stein Greenberg, the Executive Director of the Stanford d.school and the recent author of Creative Acts for Curious People: How to Think, Create, and Lead in Unconventional Ways. Sarah has spent the last decade leading d.school and her new book is a masterclass in design activities, design process and creativity. Throughout the episode Sarah and Tom mention "Sam", they are referring to Sam Seidel K12 Lab Director of Strategy + Research. Let’s listen as Sarah and Tom discuss design thinking, a design toolkit, problem solving, community involvement and much more.  

Amy McGrath, Deputy VP of ASU, discusses 'Learning Under Quarantine' model for students. They explore challenges & solutions in online learning, adapting education during quarantine, empowering student learning through community connection & internships.

On this episode of the Getting Smart Podcast, Rebecca Midles is joined by Dr. Ulcca Joshi Hansen, the Chief Program Officer at Grantmakers for Education. She is also the author of The Future of Smart: How Our Education System Needs to Change to Help All Young People Thrive.  Ulcca has a career built upon learner-centered and inclusive education policies and her new book looks for ways to incorporate those human-centered approaches alongside social justice and large-scale education reform.  Let’s listen in as they discuss identity, definitions of indigenous, codification of learning and more. 

Dr. Roger Weissberg passed away this week after a multi-year battle with cancer. Roger always strove to live social and emotional learning as well as teach it, and he helped to shape much of the present day vision of what education should be. We are deeply grateful for Roger’s leadership and his commitment to making education better for all learners. You can go to this link to read more about Roger’s life and work. We are reposting this 2016 conversation with Roger in his memory.  Roger Weissberg, chief knowledge officer for the Collaborative For Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL), joins Tom for a discussion around Social Emotional Learning (SEL), and shares more on reasons he feels SEL has become so prominent in education discussions and what the future of SEL in schools might be.