This is just a preview of what’s included in our August newsletter, featuring an opening letter from our president, Timothy Knowles. Click below to explore all the updates!

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

If you look closely at the landscape of secondary schooling across the nation, you will see a sea change underway. There are hundreds of high schools across the country actively moving away from our 120-year-old, pre-industrial educational model, where time is a proxy for learning and credit accumulation rules the day. Instead, educators and policymakers are embracing modern, competency-based models of schooling, where the actual acquisition of academic skills, durable skills and credentials is becoming the new currency of the educational economy.  

You can find evidence of these shifts in red states and blue ones, in rural regions and the suburbs, and in cities across the country. Rhode Island, Indiana, Utah, Nevada, New Hampshire and North Carolina are just a few of the states on this essential journey. A through line in this work are the educators and citizen leaders, forging strong partnerships between schools and their communities. Teachers and students are working with local organizations to identify, assess and address real community challenges. There is rapid expansion of partnerships designed to ensure all high school students can take college-level coursework, making high school learning richer, and college more accessible and affordable. And there is explosive growth in 21st-century career and technical programs that bridge school and career, help young people discover their passions, earn valuable credentials, and develop essential skills…