What are the 'future skills' our young people need, and will the university of the future be unrecognisable from the universities of today? Laura Eigbrecht and Professor Ulf-Daniel Ehlers have gathered some of the top thinkers around the world who are creating the university of the future. They join Tim this week to share some of these powerful ideas.

'Creating the University of the Future: A Global View on Future Skills and Future Higher Education' - https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-658-42948-5

Laura Eigbrecht is a senior researcher at the Baden-Württemberg Cooperative State University at the Chair of Educational Management and Lifelong Learning.

As a doctoral candidate, she conducts research in the field of transformative and participatory future skills in higher education. After her binational bachelor's degree and her master's degree in children's and youth media, she worked at the children's channel of ARD and ZDF as well as in teaching and consulting in the field of migration, language and education.

Professor Ulf-Daniel Ehlers is the founder of mindful-leaders.net and a serial social entrepreneur. He is a full Professor of Educational Management at Baden-Wurttemberg Cooperative State University. In 2011, he launched Germany’s first Cooperative University, now serving 35,000 students.

In 2017, Ulf founded NextEducation (https://next-education.org/), focusing on the future of education and Future Skills. He served as Scientific Director at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology until 2023.

Ulf has collaborated with over 30 universities globally and held leadership roles in EURASHE and EDEN. He has delivered keynotes in 45 countries and authored over 20 books and 300 scholarly articles. A trained systemic coach, Ulf integrates Future Skills into education for sustainable development.

Social Links

LinkedIn: @laura-eigbrecht - https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-eigbrecht-60a586171/

@ulfehlers - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ulfehlers/

X: @uehlers - https://twitter.com/uehlers

In this mini-series, Tim Logan and Ewan McIntosh talk about some of the most interesting bits (to us) of intriguing guests on the show so far, followed by a bitesized excerpt.

You can also find more information about Rachel's fantastic work with CollectivED: Centre for Coaching, Mentoring and Professional Learning⁠⁠ - https://www.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/research/collectived/

Information and connection were once scarce resources. But no longer! So what does this mean for the way education happens? This week, Dave Cormier, author of the fantastic new book 'Learning in a Time of Abundance: The Community is the Curriculum' joins Tim.

https://www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/12862/learning-time-abundance

With 25 years of experience as teacher, researcher and author, Dave is interested in how technologies change what it means to learn and to have learned. He is currently a learning specialist for digital strategy and special projects at the Office of Open Learning at the University of Windsor in Ontario Canada.

Social Links

Website: https://davecormier.com/edblog/

LinkedIn: @davecormier - https://www.linkedin.com/in/davecormier/

Instagram: @cormierdave - https://www.instagram.com/cormierdave/

In this mini-series, Tim Logan and Ewan McIntosh talk about some of the most interesting bits (to us) of intriguing guests on the show so far, followed by a bitesized excerpt.

And do check out Jo's latest book, released last month, Math-ish: Finding Creativity, Diversity, and Meaning in Mathematics - https://www.harpercollins.com/products/math-ish-jo-boaler?variant=41226038083618

What would it mean for ALL of our young people to feel safe and that they belong in our schools? This week, it's fantastic to have Dr Emily Meadows with us on the podcast to talk about creating spaces of belonging for everyone, but in particular for LGBTQ+ young people.

Dr. Emily Meadows (she/her) is an LGBTQ+ consultant and published author specializing in international schools. Emily creates an environment that is non-judgmental and engaging for her clients, while taking an intersectional approach that addresses both the why and the how of inclusion so that educators become confident and competent supporting LGBTQ+ students. 

In addition to her doctoral degree, Emily holds master’s degrees in both Sexual Health and Counseling, and has worked as an international school counselor for over a decade. She researches, publishes, and trains school communities on equitable policy and practice, while also teaching for the LGBT Health Policy & Practice graduate program at George Washington University. 

Emily has developed inclusion standards, referenda, and trainings for professional organizations such as the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC), the National Association of School Psychologists (NASP), The Fulbright Commission, the Association for International Educators and Leaders of Color (AIELOC), the Association for the Advancement of International Education (AAIE) and the American Psychological Association (APA). Having spent more than half of her life in international schools, Emily specializes in culturally-relevant solutions to promote equity and inclusion worldwide.

Additional resources

Supporting LGBTQ students: https://www.cois.org/about-cis/perspectives-blog/blog-post/~board/perspectives-blog/post/preparing-lgbtq-students-for-an-overnight-camp 

"Transgender Student Support Toolkit for International School Counselors": https://iscainfo.com/Transgender-Student-Support

Wheel of Safety and Belonging:

https://www.cois.org/about-cis/perspectives-blog/blog-post/~board/perspectives-blog/post/can-diversity-equity-and-belonging-initiatives-create-division-in-schools-and-a-framework-to-help 

LGBTQ+ Identity Affirmation in International Schools: An Ethical Framework for Educators:

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/01614681231194416

There are many myths that hold teaching back. But more than any 'trad' or 'prog' debates about pedagogy, perhaps the most powerful one is the mind-body split. This week we welcome Professor Guy Claxton to talk about his forthcoming book on the importance of 're-membering' our learning bodies and reconnecting our ideas about education!

Guy Claxton is Emeritus Professor at Winchester University and Visiting Professor of Education at King's College London. He has previously taught and researched at Oxford University, Bristol University, and the University of London Institute of Education, and is an internationally renowned cognitive scientist. Guy's books include The Future of Teaching and the Myths that Hold it Back (2021), Hare Brain, Tortoise Mind (1998); Wise Up (1999): The Challenge of Lifelong Learning; The Wayward Mind (2005); and Intelligence in the Flesh (2015). Recent books on education include Expansive Education (2013); What's the Point of School? (2008); Building Learning Power (2002); and, with Bill Lucas and others, New Kinds of Smart; The Learning Powered School (2011); and Educating Ruby (2015).

Guy's Building Learning Power approach to teaching is widely used in all kinds of schools across the world.

You can find more about Guy on his website at: https://www.guyclaxton.net/

The Active Inference paper by Laura Desirée di Paolo et al (2024), referenced by Guy in the conversation, can be found here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/377634490_Active_Inference_Goes_to_School_The_Importance_of_Active_Learning_in_the_Age_of_Large_Language_Models

Social Links

X: @GuyClaxton - https://twitter.com/GuyClaxton

With the recent release of her book 'Every Child Can: Riverside School's Design-Led Approach to Empower Children', the wonderful Kiran Bir Sethi is joining us again on the podcast this week.

Kiran Bir Sethi⁠ is a designer who became a teacher, a principal who grew into an education reformer and subsequently morphed into a social entrepreneur. A trained graphic designer from the National Institute of Design, she comfortably uses the language of design – iteration, prototype, design specs – to develop not only curriculum innovation, but also community-based social programmes.

Kiran founded the award winning ⁠Riverside School⁠ in Ahmedabad, India, in 2001. Riverside, is viewed as a laboratory to prototype design processes that uses a systems approach to build a culture of empowerment, graduating young citizen leaders with an ‘I CAN Mindset’ – using their agency for the greater good. Riverside won the T4 Education 'World's Best School Prize' for innovation in 2023: https://t4.education/worlds-best-school-prizes/the-five-prizes/innovation/.

In 2009, Kiran launched ⁠Design for Change⁠ which uses a simple 4 step design framework – FIDS (Feel, Imagine, Do, Share) to cultivate the I CAN mind-set in all children. Today, DFC is the world's largest movement of change - of and by children, and is in 60+ countries—impacting over 2.2 million children and 65,000 Teachers.

Kiran is a judge for the prestigious YIDAN Prize and a Visiting Global Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. In 2019, she was awarded the Earth Prize in Luino, Italy, the Lexus Design Award for 2019, in Pune, India, and DFC has been recognised man times as one of the 100 most innovative educational programmes in the world by HundrED.org.

Social Links

Instagram: @kiranbirsethi - https://www.instagram.com/kiranbirsethi/

Twitter: ⁠@kiranbirsethi⁠ - https://twitter.com/kiranbirsethi

LinkedIn: ⁠@kiranbirsethi - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kiranbirsethi/

This episode will hopefully give you a sense of where the most promising organisations in the world who are innovating around assessment are at, and what the prospects are looking forward for significant assessment change.

You can also check out Episode #72 with Sandra Milligan.

I am joined by Prof. Sandra Milligan from Melbourne Metrics, Bill Lucas from Rethinking Assessment and Mike Flanagan and Patricia Russell from Mastery Transcript Consortium.

Melbourne Metrics Website: https://education.unimelb.edu.au/melbourne-assessment New Metrics Partner Schools: https://education.unimelb.edu.au/melbourne-assessment/our-research/new-metrics#aboutThe International Big Picture Learning Credential: https://www.bigpicture.org.au/what-international-big-picture-learning-credential Sandra's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandra-milligan-223b384a?miniProfileUrn=urn%3Ali%3Afs_miniProfile%3AACoAAAp9jjsB5xVeP0Ygvbn2XC33I-bcL0ACsCY&lipi=urn%3Ali%3Apage%3Ad_flagship3_search_srp_all%3BOaCWQPVdS%2BKv0N3bE64NYw%3D%3D Melbourne Metrics on X: https://twitter.com/MelbMetrics 

Rethinking Assessment

Website: https://rethinkingassessment.com/

Rethinking Assessment in Education - The Case for Change: https://rethinkingassessment.com/assessment-around-the-world/

Blueprint for Change: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NoyUc3P-wFi_LCJS0SlzzUrQxkLC2WsG/view?usp=sharing

Mastery Transcript Consortium (MTC)

Website: https://mastery.org/

ETS and Mastery Transcript Consortium (MTC) Join Forces to Scale Skills Transcript: https://www.ets.org/news/press-releases/ets-mastery-transcript-consortium-mtc-join-forces-scale-skills-transcript.html

MTC on X: https://twitter.com/MastTranscript

MTC on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/masterytranscript/

Kevin Simpson is one of those rare special people who thrive on connecting others And bringing people together around shared causes and visions of a different kind of education system free from injustice and discrimination.

Kevin is founder of the Association of International Educators and Leaders of Color (⁠https://aieloc.org/), and through AIELOC, one initiating partners of the International School Anti-Discrimination Taskforce (https://isadtf.org/). Alongside ECIS, Ecolint and IB, their collective aim is to "make schools truly diverse, inclusive, safe, equitable and welcoming for all students, staff and families".

Kevin owns and operates KDSL Global (http://kdslglobal.com/), an international education consulting company which launched in 2016 in the US and the UAE. He and his team have served thousands of schools, educators, and leaders worldwide in over 60 countries. He is also the Co-Founder of the UAE Learning Network, leads the ASCD Connected Community for the GCC region, and is Co-Founder of Resourceya. 

Kevin Simpson is a native of Flint, Michigan and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Education and a Master of Education degree in Curriculum and Teaching from Michigan State University (USA).

As we discuss in the podcast, Shwetangna Chakrabarty wrote a great piece about the 'Leadership for Radical Dreaming' at the AIELOC conference: https://www.tieonline.com/article/3674/radical-dreaming-aieloc-conference 

Social Links

LinkedIn: @kevin-simpson-kdslglobal - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-simpson-kdslglobal/

Instagram: @kdslglobal - https://www.instagram.com/kdslglobal/

X: @GlobalKdsl - https://twitter.com/GlobalKdsl