The idea that schools simply deliver objective and neutral knowledge and skills to our young humans is a complete myth. In fact, with the amount of time that we spend in them over the course of our early lives, schools are incredibly good at conditioning us into particular sets of assumptions about the way the world works. My guest this week, Dr Ida Rose Florez is calling this out in amazing and very grounded ways and we discuss the impacts of what this does to our ability to be comfortable and competent in working with and in complexity (which is pretty much the place we all find ourselves in pretty consistently these days!). Ida Rose tells the full story brilliantly in her new book, The End of Education as We Know It: Regenerative Learning for Complex Times, as well as describing the examples of learning communities that are successfully doing education in whole new ways!

Ida Rose Florez, PhD, is a transformative leader in education, dedicated to reshaping learning for a more sustainable future. As the author of The End of Education as We Know It: Regenerative Learning for Complex Times, she challenges traditional education models and advocates for schools that nurture individual growth and ecological responsibility.

Ida Rose has spoken at a White House panel on Hispanic education, keynoted the Asian Preschool Education Annual Conference, and presented to leaders such as the governor of Shanghai and the California State Legislature.

Over the last decades, Ida Rose has led statewide education initiatives in Arizona and California, was a National Science Foundation Advancing Informal Science Learning Principal Investigator and governing board vice president of the National Association for the Education of Young Children. She served as assessment subject-matter expert with the National Governor’s Association and is a frequent grant reviewer for the National Science Foundation. She has also served on the board of the Human Systems Dynamics Institute.

Ida Rose holds a Ph.D. in educational psychology from the University of Arizona. She has held faculty positions at Penn State University College of Medicine, University of Arizona College of Education, Northern Arizona University College of Education, and Arizona State University Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College. She is a certified Human Systems Dynamics Professional and certified Warm Data Host with the International Bateson Institute. In 2017 she founded a consulting practice serving U.S. and international clients that focuses on regenerative education.

If people are interested, here is a blog post from Dave Snowden that touches on his view that we are unable to understand systems as wholes: https://thecynefin.co/regularities-reduction-2-2/

And here is a video where Jiddu Krishnamurti talks about thinking itself being the cause of the fragmentation and separation: https://youtu.be/CvL4uNA4U-k?si=bLbWpiSaPHJ4K5-Z&t=1073

Ida Rose's website: https://idaroseflorez.com/

The book: https://theendofeducationasweknowit.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/idaroseflorez/