Thanks for the shout out! We appreciate it.?Surf Skate Science?may be a young program, starting in late 2018, but we’ve already seen incredible success. We’ve had three students graduate from college: - Our first graduate finished at the top of her class with a Master's degree and is now on the path to a Doctorate in Child Psychology. She discovered her passion for working with children on the spectrum during her time with Surf Skate Science. - Another graduate completed his degree in architecture, with a senior project inspired by our partnership with the Everglades Foundation. His focus on the?Rhizomes of Mangroves?and AI-generated structures that work with the environment led him to design our?Skateparkitecture?program, where we teach kids architecture through skatepark design. -The third earned a full scholarship in fashion merchandising, inspired by a design from one of our skate school engineering lessons. She is now interning with?Louis Vuitton?in New York. We’ve also had one high school graduate pursuing a professional skateboarding career and another set to graduate high school with his associate’s degree and five welding certifications—at just 17! I’d say that looks like success. Our students are discovering their gifts, passions, and pursuing careers they love!
Christopher Stewart and I chopped it up on his podcast for The Branch, about homeschooling. Charter schools, he mused, were a public policy "trade." Freedom from some typical public school rules in exchange for producing measurable achievement gains. With homeschoolers using Education Savings Accounts, Chris wondered, are proponents and parents chasing achievement gains? 1. My sense: not as a top priority. Parents are perhaps maximizing some "holistic sense" of well being, including/especially lots of enrichment purchases - sports, arts. But we don't yet see lots of homeschoolers buying, say, lots of math tutoring (in sharp contrast to non-homeschooling upper middle class parents). Feel free to correct me here. 2. Still, it's early in the ESA timeline. Specialization could lead to achievement gains. For example, next week on Pioneer Institute's Homeschooling Journeys podcast, Avonlea Cummings and I profile Surf Skate Science (hat tip Ron Matus). And this week, Andreina - a customer - mentions how much her kids love that class. So maybe this category blossoms. Maybe on the supply side, ESAs bring in teachers, who liberated to "go deep" in a narrow domain they love, and never feel pressure to "cover the state standards." And maybe that, in turn, shows up downstream on test scores or STEM careers. I'll put a note on the calendar for Citizen Stewart and me to check in circa 2028; hopefully a scholar has answered the question by then.... 3. Another thought. Because homeschoolers have gotten this far with nearly zero government help - how they like it! - the ESA behavior is still locked in previous (healthy) culture of do-it-yourself. But I meet tons of homeschool kids who, while dutifully doing math problems daily on Khan Academy or whatever, aren't actually learning so much (That's true of traditional school kids as well). Maybe that DIY culture will change. Many homeschool Moms are befuddled by math instruction (they show this by with desperate Facebook posts for help). The current behavior is: change curriculum. A better behavior might be: spend some ESA dollars to try out a few math tutors, and find one that connects with your kids. If this happens, I could imagine where ESAs lead to achievement gains....the Old School learning gains that people like Chris and me (but not everyone, for sure) hope for. Give a listen!