NewTech High--It is Personal!

The Palace & Kingdom Philosophy Early in my career, I experienced a game situation that involved different levels of communication and power that affected how you are perceived, how effectively you operate, and all the conditions that affect the various subgroups. After a while, I started to see some trends that became part of an organizational philosophy that I've listed above, the Palace & Kingdom philosophy. Bear with me for a bit as I describe the folks and their varying levels of knowledge and power. It resides in our concept of royalty making decisions (The Palace) that affect the people that reside in those areas (The Kingdom). Perhaps you've heard the Palace called the Ivory Tower. Same principle.  At that time, I had a King who had a very cynical view towards the people that I was closest to in that school district, and the same types as my previous work. They were teachers and coaches, mostly male, probably teaching because they loved athletics...that type. Te...

Lars Esdal Podcast December 15, 2025   Today, I had a special podcast with Lars Esdal, Executive Director of Education Evolving.  Education Evolving is offering a 5 month cohort in January that will likely be of interest to some of our NewTech High schools. If you would choose to be in this cohort, we can combine forces this Spring (NewTech and Education Evolving). Here is the one-pager document from Education Evolving that you can share with your teacher-leadership team.  I think it is in part the same message towards student-centered, personalized learning and certainly would give us more structure for the second half of the year, as we move past the changes that have already been made for 2026-2027.  Esdal has been working on these ideas moving from his days at New Country School in Henderson through college and then beyond in various shapes and forms with Education Evolving. I mention and remember having a tour at New Country from a young Lars Esdal when he was ...

Episode 15 December 17, 2025 Jay Haugen, Former Superintendent at Farmington, MN This is a bit different podcast. It is kind of the retro version of casting where we would have the audio, which was originally the genesis for the term podcast. However, the transition to video along with it, the precursor to Zooms, and WebEx's were called vodcasts. I guess we're just getting old.   Anyhow, Jay and I were visible to each other the entire time. I didn't realize until afterward that perhaps a camera button somewhere was off. I will have to check on that in the future. If you see a man with a 30" gray beard, you may be seeing Jay about somewhere. It's too bad you missed that; you would never mistake him for someone else if you did.   Nevertheless, we have this conversation for you to listen to.   I think you will find Jay to be a very unique man. Whether you are an administrator or just a human being, you will enjoy this conversation .  One of the unique things I took fr...

December 10, 2025 Podcast This afternoon, we were pleased to have Whitney McKinley from World Savvy to join us. Whitney did such a great job of explaining the pillars of what World Savvy works on with schools. In a sense, we all want to work on them, but it is a coaching aspect that most of our high schools don't have access to. Thank you Whitney for sharing about your beliefs and your organization!  Whitney McKinley, World Savvy Learner-Centered Update Learner-Centered Collaborative believes it starts with reimagining how we give learners the agency to joyfully, purposefully drive their own learning. Let go of standardization. Embrace learner agency. When students “think freely and move freely,” stressful schools become joyful learning communities. More than 30 public school districts and over 250,000 learners have begun to center learners by design. In this final episode in this fall’s learning series, Devin Vodicka and Katie Martin share their  Brief But Spectacular...

Good morning NewTechies:  We have had a couple of weeks off here over the Thanksgiving break. Hopefully, you have acclimated to this colder, snowier version of Minnesota again. I went on a golf trip right before the snow fell, so I haven't had the joy of experiencing it yet, but that will soon change, of course.  I have many topics to get into, so I will start by letting you know that I recently visited Paideia Academy in South Phoenix.  Arizona School Visits From Will Grube: AI School Leadership Minute: AI Text Detector Guidance For Your Teachers Here are two resources you can share directly with your staff to give them AI text detector guidance: 1)  The Hidden Damage Caused by AI Detectors  (Luke from Gruvy Education created a short 5-minute video that explains why AI text detectors are not reliable proof of misconduct.) 2)  AI Detectors in the Classroom: What Teachers Need to Know  (Research-backed guidance document)  Here is how to handle the ...