Peter Hostrawser and Alli Dahl sit down with Chris Brida, CTE Director in Portland Public Schools, to unpack a concept most education leaders do the work of… but rarely have language for: boundary spanning. Chris breaks down how CTE leaders sit between K–12, higher ed, workforce, nonprofit, and government systems, and why “partnerships” can’t just be guest speakers and career fairs if we’re serious about student opportunity.

Chris walks through six boundary spanning skill-sets that show up in high-impact CTE leadership: broker, translator, trust builder, convenor, buffer, and integrator—explaining how each one helps reduce friction between systems, protect educators from chaos, align stakeholder expectations, and build partnerships that actually produce shared value.

The conversation goes deep on a big shift: moving from partnership management to partnership design—starting with real problems, using data, and bringing the right mix of partners together to solve them. The episode lands with a powerful example: a multi-partner design lab initiative that puts Black engineering students at the center of a real civic redevelopment project—showing exactly how intentional systems-level collaboration can expand access, build relational capital, and create authentic learning that matters.

Connect with Chris Brida on LinkedIn

A quick thank you to our sponsor, YouScience Brightpath, the next generation platform helping students make personalized decisions as they move from education to career. If you are serious about connecting students to real opportunities, head to youscience.com/disrupteducation-podcast. Request a demo and let them know you heard about YouScience right here.

What happens after you hit stop on a conversation that challenges everything you thought you knew about grades, college, and internships?

In this recap episode of the Disrupt Education Podcast, Peter Hostrawser and Alli Dahl unpack their recent conversation with Brandon Busteed and go even deeper into what it all means.

Peter shares the full circle moment of first hearing Brandon speak a decade ago and how that research on experiential learning helped shape the Disrupt Education movement. Alli connects the dots between her own early work experiences and the idea that we need to value the learning from all work, not just what happens in a classroom.

They wrestle with big questions.

If grades are inflated, what are they really measuring?Why are internships still not scaled in higher education?Are students going into debt for something employers are not prioritizing?

What would happen if we treated work as learning from day one?

This episode is about mindset shifts, internships, work based learning, and redefining what signals real readiness. If last week’s conversation made you think, this one will push you further. The data is there. The opportunity is there. The question is whether education and industry are ready to align.

A quick thank you to our sponsor, YouScience Brightpath, the next generation platform helping students make personalized decisions as they move from education to career. If you are serious about connecting students to real opportunities, head to youscience.com/disrupteducation-podcast. Request a demo and let them know you heard about YouScience right here.Check out more at DisruptEducationPodcast.com

What if the “A” isn’t proof of learning anymore?

In this episode of the Disrupt Education Podcast, Peter Hostrawser and Alli Dahl sit down with Brandon Busteed to challenge one of education’s biggest sacred cows: grades.

Brandon drops a stat that should stop every educator and parent in their tracks: 60% of grades at Harvard are A’s (up from about 25% two decades ago). So… what does an A even mean now?

From there, the conversation goes exactly where schools need to go next:

Why grades and GPA often don’t predict real job performance

Why students need internships and work-integrated learning more than “perfect transcripts”

The internship gap: millions of students want internships, but far fewer actually get them

Brandon’s bold solution: the 5% Internship Pledge—and how it could scale opportunity fast

How we shift the culture to value learning from all work (yes—even retail and “starter” jobs)

Brandon also shares what he’s building through Edconic: immersive industry learning experiences that are co-designed and co-taught by educators and industry experts—giving students real exposure, real feedback, and real skill-building that actually transfers.If your school is still living and dying by grades… this episode is your wake-up call.

Connect with Brandon Busteed at https://www.linkedin.com/in/busteed/A quick thank you to our sponsor, YouScience Brightpath — the next-generation platform helping students make personalized decisions as they move from education to career. If you’re serious about connecting students to real opportunities, head to youscience.com/disrupteducation-podcast. Request a demo and let them know you heard about YouScience right here.

A spicy LinkedIn post about field trips lit up the internet—and this episode is the why behind the fire.

Here is the post that started it all - https://www.linkedin.com/posts/peterhostrawser_disrupteducation-cte-careerreadiness-activity-7382071108952498176-O__x?utm_source=social_share_send&utm_medium=member_desktop_web&rcm=ACoAAAm03zEBGi3ZOO_BO8D4Sr3zhuz2I4cEmLI

In this conversation, Peter and Alli unpack the unpopular opinion that traditional high school field trips often miss the mark. Not because experiences don’t matter—but because too many trips are disconnected, passive, and designed as checkboxes instead of catalysts for growth.

This episode goes far beyond buses and permission slips. It’s about intentional design.

You’ll hear:- Why most high school field trips don’t actually change student direction or outcomes- The difference between career awareness and career readiness—and why timing matters- How “field trips” should evolve into field experiences, micro-experiences, and real community work- Powerful real-world stories involving Hyatt, Coca-Cola, Calamos, and students performing in front of real executives- Why reflection, durable skills, and value creation matter more than tours and sit-and-gets- How districts can reduce burnout by shifting from isolated teacher efforts to system-wide experience design

This is not an anti-field-trip rant.It’s a challenge to rethink them.

If you care about student engagement, work-based learning, durable skills, or connecting school to real life—this episode is for you.

Head to www.disrupteducationpodcast.com for more!

What happens when you ask 500+ CTE leaders one simple question: “How are you disrupting education in 2026?”

At ACTE CareerTech VISION in Nashville, Alli Dahl and Peter Hostrawser put that question on the screen, dropped a QR code, and let the field speak. This episode is the result — real responses from real leaders who are done with “CTE as a second choice” and ready to treat schools like talent hubs.

In this conversation, we break down the biggest themes we heard:

CTE isn’t a side pathway — it’s infrastructure for relevance

If learning isn’t real, it doesn’t stick (experience are greater than worksheets)

Industry partnerships are shifting into co-design

AI/VR aren’t “flash” — they’re a force multiplier for personalization (when used with purpose)

The hardest disruption is adult disruption: hard conversations, real accountability, real readiness

Success metrics are getting rewritten (hint: “college enrollment” isn’t the whole story)

If you’re building pathways, work-based learning, youth apprenticeships, or just trying to make school matter again — this one will hit.

🎧 Subscribe for more “Bold 2026” conversations📌 Drop a comment: What’s ONE way you’re disrupting education this year?

www.DisruptEducationPodcast.com

Episode 4 is the pause-and-process moment after a truly disruptive series.

Peter and Alli step back to unpack the emotional, mental, and professional reactions sparked by the pega6 conversation. This episode isn’t about selling a model — it’s about acknowledging the discomfort that comes when a system you trusted, went through, and maybe even thrived in… starts to crack.

They explore why failure is still treated as something to avoid in education, how perfection quietly kills progress, and why the hardest part of disruption isn’t the model — it’s the zero-to-one mindset shift required to even consider it.

From chemistry labs to internships, pull-ups to professional growth, this episode connects the dots between experiential learning, real-time coaching, intentional friction, and what it actually takes to prepare learners for a fast-moving, AI-driven workforce.

Big questions tackled:

- Why does disrupting education trigger fear and nostalgia at the same time?- What does “workforce engineering” really mean — and why does it make people uncomfortable?- Why high engagement and accountability still require humans, not systems- How zero-to-one learning shows up everywhere, not just careers

This is the episode for educators, parents, and leaders who felt something during the series — even if they didn’t fully agree with it yet.

If you came this far... head to www.pega6.com/dep You won't be disappointed!

Check out www.disrupteducationpodcast.com for more!

In Episode 3, Peter and Alli stop talking about what’s broken and start building the alternative in real time — the pega6 model. Jeremy Smith takes everyone into the “why now” moment: he’s been sitting on this idea for 15 years, watching college get more expensive and less useful, until the market finally hit a tipping point. Parents, students, and employers aren’t just annoyed anymore… they’re done.

Then the episode gets tactical. Jeremy explains why universities can’t pivot into a one-year, career-focused, experiential model (even if they wanted to), because their incentives, culture, and infrastructure literally won’t allow it. That opens the door for a new category of higher ed — not “college,” not bootcamps, not apprenticeships — but a white-collar trade school built for the AI age.

Big takeaway: Pega 6 is about graduating students as “Pegasus” — AI-first entry-plus employees with real technical skills, real soft skills, and the ability to deliver on day one… while being four years and ~$300K ahead of the traditional path.

If you came this far... head to www.pega6.com/dep You won't be disappointed!

After lighting up the college model in Episode 1, Peter and Alli come back with the real question: if higher ed is broken… what replaces it? Jeremy Smith (PEGA6 co-founder/CEO) answers with one phrase that frames the entire episode: workforce engineering.

Jeremy argues that education shouldn’t be treated like a pipeline where students just get moved along. It should be treated like a supply chain where value is added at every stage—because the goal is not “school completion,” it’s readiness for the next step. And in his model, the customer isn’t the student (even though they pay)—the customer is the employer, because that’s where the best jobs and opportunities get decided.

From there, Jeremy breaks “job-ready” into three non-negotiables for the AI age:

Technical Skills — not “theory,” but real, usable tools and mechanics of the job (he references things like industry tools and workflows).

Soft Skills — communication, professionalism, managing up, teamwork—the things that make people actually promotable and trusted.

AI-First Approach — not just knowing AI tools, but thinking AI-first to accelerate work, then finishing with human judgment and technical fundamentals.

Then the conversation gets spicy again—in the best way:

Jeremy calls out the “college builds critical thinking” claim as a myth, arguing real critical thinking is a concrete set of skills (biases, logic, stats, fallacies) that most students aren’t systematically taught.

Alli challenges the framing: “Are we just building workers? What about leaders?” Jeremy’s answer is timing: optimize for the next step first, then build leadership later through real experience (and future “Pegas7”-type progression).

Peter hits the big fear word: pigeonholing. Jeremy flips it—being “open to everything” but skilled at nothing isn’t optionality; being skilled creates mobility. And the solution for students who don’t know their path is better “routing” earlier—he directly connects this to aptitude/fit tools like YouScience.

The episode ends with a clean cliffhanger: next week they go inside PEGA6—how it’s being built, what the accelerator experience looks like, and how close it is to launch.

If you came this far... head to www.pega6.com/dep You won't be disappointed!

Welcome to 2026 — and the Disrupt Education Podcast’s 10th year — with one word leading the charge: Bold. Peter and Alli kick off a brand-new 4-part series with Jeremy Smith, founder and CEO of PEGA6, and he doesn’t tiptoe into the conversation… he kicks the door in.

Jeremy shares his path from investment banking and multiple startup exits to building what he calls a totally new kind of higher ed: a one-year, $15K, career accelerator designed for the AI age. His claim is simple and explosive: the only thing most universities reliably provide is a “stamp,” not real readiness. Students leave with debt, time lost, and too often no practical skills—while employers are stuck spending the first year turning new hires from zero to one.

From there, the episode gets real:

Jeremy argues universities only lower prices when forced by real competition (and he believes universities can’t compete with a faster, cheaper, experiential model).

He breaks down who gets harmed by the status quo (parents, students, employers… basically everyone) and who benefits (universities).

He connects the entry-level job squeeze to a brutal reality: AI tools don’t have to be amazing to replace grads—because many grads show up unprepared.

The conversation also hits a key instructional truth you and I both love: skills only develop through doing. Jeremy uses the bike-riding analogy to torch the lecture-test-textbook model for skill-building, pushing “just-in-time fundamentals” after failure and experience—not frontloaded theory.

The episode ends by teasing Part 2: Workforce Engineering, and Jeremy’s belief that education should function less like a pipeline and more like a supply chain—starting with what employers actually need and building backward from there.

This isn’t a polite conversation about education reform. It’s a blueprint to burn down a broken model and build something that actually prepares students to win alongside AI.

If you came this far... head to www.pega6.com/dep You won't be disappointed!

What a year. 🎙

In this special New Year’s episode of the Disrupt Education Podcast, Peter Hostrawser and Alli Dahl look back on 2025 – the year disrupting education stopped being “spicy” and started becoming the norm.

They unpack:

How the podcast crossed 400+ episodes and over half a million downloads, and why it still feels like a movement more than a show

Why 2025 felt like education finally catching fire – with more CTE leaders, WBL innovators, and classroom “doers” stepping up and sharing what actually works

The impact of the student summer series (Liam, Isaac, Abby, Lindsay, and Derek) and how their honest stories exposed where the system drops learners

The global-to-local arc:

EduVitality with Kristy Volesky

State-level transformation with Dr. Gary Skeen in Virginia

District and academy models with Scott Carr and Jeff Stenroos

Human-centered change with Dr. Karen Baptiste (Dr. K) and teacher efficacy

How partnering with YouScience and running a 6-part series on aptitudes, exposure gaps, and economic development reframed everything from “pipelines” to pathways with on- and off-ramps

Why language, mindset, and individual aptitudes matter more than ever for students and educators

Stories from Peter’s own internship students and his kids that show how young people are already thinking differently about college, cost, and career

Peter and Alli close the year with gratitude for the Disrupt Education community – teachers, parents, students, leaders – and a promise: 2026 is going to be bolder, messier, and even more real.

If you care about where school is going next, this recap sets the stage.Check out www.disrupteducationpodcast.com for more!