Entrepreneurship, innovation, and reform are defining parts of the fabric of K-12 education in the US and other places, presenting opportunities and risks. For the first two months of the course, we will be visited most weeks by one or more experts who have led or studied innovative or entrepreneurial projects in the education sector. Perspectives and cases to be discussed include the founding of schools and businesses, start-up ventures, social entrepreneurship and nonprofit organizations, educational law and policy, and innovation within public schools and districts. A visit to New York City to visit multiple start-ups and investors is also planned, schedules allowing.
Students will learn from conversations with experts in the field about how to define problems in education, how different people have approached solutions to these problems, and lessons learned. The professor and students will work together to draw connections between the various case studies and to articulate larger principles. Our study will culminate in a guided project in which students will develop or investigate an educational innovation to solve a specific problem that they have learned about, following some of the principles of design and innovation that they have learned. |