I’m grateful to our wise and hardworking EIC team member and recent college graduate, Michelle Alber, for sharing her compelling story in a video-letter to education innovation advocates. (See letter/transcript here). 

As Michelle says, young people have for too long been disempowered and disengaged in their learning experiences. Even privileged students like her have felt the imposed stress of the current education system to conform to an outdated definition of success; get all As in courses, strive for a competitive college, compete for high paying jobs, earn enough to own a car, home, and raise a family. But the education rat race has left young people feeling unsuccessful, under-prepared for the workforce, unmotivated, in debt, and struggling to make ends meet in unsatisfying jobs. Michelle spent a year searching for a job that leveraged her expensive out of state BA in political science and anthropology, and then settled for an office manager position that taps into a fraction of her abilities and interests. Michelle’s brother will be graduating from college in June to a likely still-COVID-ravaged economy that will be challenging for ALL graduates - whether high school or college - but even more so for a passionate philosophy major.  It seems that both of my children feel the best and only path is to pursue yet another expensive degree - to take on more education debt for a business or law degree that will eventually, hopefully help them make ends meet.  

For less advantaged students, which are the bulk of our population, higher degrees are seen as impractical and out of reach. Even if they get scholarships and Pell grants, today’s young adults know how many of their peers have failed to earn any degree (on average, only 55% of freshmen complete a degree at a Nevada university - and community colleges are even lower). The bulk of education debt is carried by incompleters who also struggle to access jobs that can pay it off.  Clearly it’s not our young people who are failing. It’s our non-adapting system of schooling that is failing to meet new needs. The system must update criteria of “readiness” and “success” in today’s world. Instead of diploma factories for yesterday’s jobs, schools need to start fulfilling their core role in serving a rapidly changing society.
 
I hope we can all agree that that role, simply put, is to prepare every learner to thrive for life. 

I hope we can also agree that today’s systems are not designed to develop and uplift each and every learner to thrive - to honor their glorious uniqueness, unleash their strengths and full genius, or empower their highest contribution to a better world.

While shifting our education system to serve this higher purpose is a daunting challenge, COVID-19 is forcing us to action. Education is the slowest social system to innovate - to integrate new technologies to optimize efficiency and effectiveness - to adapt to the new reality of what citizens need to be successful in our increasingly complex world. As education is the most foundational system to society, its products - high performing self-directed lifelong learners -  are crucial to enabling the high functioning of all other social systems; 

• If our graduates aren’t equitably prepared to thrive in Fourth Industrial Revolution occupations, then the economy will collapse from growing unemployment and income inequalities. 
• If graduates aren’t prepared to optimize their own health and wellbeing, the healthcare system will collapse from the burden of having to handle growing rates of illness, substance abuse, and contagious disease. 
• If citizens aren’t prepared to understand the complex, international dynamics and science of the environment, politics, economics, healthcare, and education, then democracies will collapse from the burden of fear and ignorance that welcomes autocratic rule.  

The education system has been the most bureaucratic of all social systems - slow to leverage new technologies to empower the end-users; to enable learners to be in charge of their own learning. If we act quickly and collaboratively, Nevada has a unique opportunity to leapfrog and transcend the outdated goals, assessments, policies, politics, methodologies, inequitable funding, entrenched politics, and misguided promotion criteria. How? By adopting the EIC mission: to reimagine education to empower every learner to thrive to their potential. 

After years of seeking pathways to realize this essential and urgent mission, the fog is slowly lifting, and we are seeing the bridge to our brightest future. EIC’s team is now working with innovators in several Nevada counties, including Churchill, Washoe, and Pershing, to host student Design Clubs. These small teams of forward-looking students and coaches will work on two key PROJECTS to envision the future: 

1. Design My Life Plan; using their Selfpreneur Playbook practices, each student explores and prototypes potential futures and decides what their learning plan needs to be to achieve their desired future. Their small peer cohort engages in practice together.  
2. Design Our Ideal Thrive Lab for Life; considering all needs of members of the community, small student teams lead the community in visioning the perfect learning spaces and ecosystem to meet every student where they are; to develop their strengths, passions, and interests to serve the needs of their community.  

EIC is well-equipped and excited to support Nevada's youth to design and develop their community Learning Lab Ecosystem. For example, we look forward to supporting Pershing County to expand their Nevada School Television Network, an already successful workforce development CTE program, where students operate the K14KQ TV broadcast channel and produce informational video stories for the community. The work-study program serves to prepare students for the workforce through building in-demand skills and competencies for success in 21st century occupations. These include learning about computer science, technologies, engineering, arts, early literacy, digital and media literacy and production, business management, and marketing. By expanding the broadcast range to Elko, Carson, Reno, and the I-80 corridor, many more students across the region can have meaningful learning experiences by producing content for distribution through the network - including those in underserved rural communities. As students become investigative journalists studying the needs of employers, families, and community civic organizations, their stories will inform each other and community members while also building self-awareness and clarity about their optimal life-work/career pathway. 

In this great video by master teacher John Spencer, Why Journalism is the Subject of the Future, investigative story-telling in and with the community is revealed as a profound and powerful learning methodology. Please visit our website to learn about our vision and plans for nurturing community-based Thrive Lab Ecosystems based on the common principles behind journalism, scientific inquiry, and entrepreneurialism to solve community needs. 

As student Design Club members guide us in re-imagining education, we’ll necessarily need some re-languaging: 

1. Moving from student to learner to Self-Preneur; designer and creator of one’s best life; 

2. Moving from teacher-instructors to coach-cheerleader teams who guide Self-Preneur teams through “collaborative action research and design” project investigations in the real world.  

Does this paradigm shift sound scary, essential, and fun at the same time? 

Please join us to unleash ALL young people to explore their world - to discover their gifts and passions on their hero’s quest to their most fulfilling place and contribution to their community and world.  

GIVE GENEROUSLY to make 2021 an amazing year for Nevada students. 
SIGN UP to learn more and co-create with us!

Mary Alber, PhD, MBA
Founding Director of Education Innovation Collaborative
775.224.3736    mary.alber@eic-nv.org        
​eic-nv.org

Here's the Situation;

• Nevada ranks 50th in the nation for student opportunity (Ed Week, Quality Counts Report Card 2020)
• Less than 15% of Nevada’s students are prepared to succeed in college and career (ACT 2020) 
• COVID has only made matters worse as Nevada was far from prepared for distance education. Every day our young people fall further behind. Those who were disadvantaged before are losing the most learning (McKinsey, June, 2020). Parents are struggling to become teachers while teachers are struggling to keep students engaged without the technology and programs to do so.

Here's the Solution
The Education Innovation Collaborative (EIC) was created to solve these problems - through transforming the system. EIC has a plan to turn this crisis around and position Nevada as a leader in the new paradigm of student-powered learning. We believe that enabling all children in Nevada to become independent and collaborative learners, online at home and in enhanced schools and community places, is the path to success for education in Nevada - and beyond.  Our team of experts has been working with Nevada’s vanguard of innovators and leaders to design a roadmap to a future in which ALL students thrive to their full potential. 

What’s the key to this future? Empowering every learner, of every age, to design and own their learning as self-directed masters - as Selfpreneurs* of their best life. These passion-driven learners will be highly collaborative, creative, compassionate, and ready to make the world a better place to live.

To achieve these critical, challenging shifts, we envision Power Learning Labs in every community -- virtual and physical spaces and resources where students engage in REAL learning challenges that build their capacities to thrive in a rapidly changing, unpredictable world.

Power Learning Labs will enable the shift by:

• Integrating latest technologies, learning sciences, & goals to personalize learning
• Unleashing each individual’s strengths and passions to empower self-direction
• Collaborating to solve real-world challenges in communities and workplaces
• Having a caring coach team of peers, parents, experts, counselors, and mentors
• Developing leaders who inspire a culture of student-powered learning

Here’s How You Can Help
Sponsor students to join Design Clubs where they collaborate with community members to design and prototype a world class Power Learning Lab. Our budget is $200,000 for each site. 

• For $50, become a member of EIC and help students with design
• For $100, sponsor a student in a Design Club 
• For $1000+, support a Design Club team 

​During this holiday season, we count our blessings to have caring community members and generous donors like you. Thank you for your support!