Utopian Education?

“Traditional” schooling has been around forever. Not much has changed besides standards and more technology immersed and implemented in to the classroom. There have been many interesting ideas that have been thrown around throughout the years to make schooling more effective, but more often than not traditional schooling has stayed the same. The town I live in, has had the same traditional school methods, up until this next year. In the 2017-2018 school years they are going to move to career academies. For our area this is a massive shift in the way that things have been run. Although it is not identical to Logan LaPlante’s “Hack Schooling”, it is starting that movement towards more non-traditional school.

Logan speaks about hack schooling so passionately, and sounds so educated on his nontraditional learning style of school. How many kids could you say have that information about their traditional learning style of schools & would do a ted talk on it? Just that alone speaks volumes to how valuable Logan holds his education. Could you count how many students you know that could speak that passionately about their education?

As our world is changing it is vital to push and lobby for movements such as hack schooling. With traditional schooling, student’s health & happiness are not core subjects that are “taught”. It is no longer satisfactory or justifiable to our students in the school system to use the public school structure of the past.  With our job force, society, and even people evolving it does not make sense to not look at other options such as hack schooling. We want our students to succeed, be able to implement the lessons we teach them to real life situations, as well as be critical thinkers. What better way than at earlier ages letting them have internships as Logan does, be able to choose their classes, and use core subjects such as Logan’s bocce ball experiment in real life.  If you give kids the chance they will blow your mind away with their creativity and intelligence.

As Logan and his parents have been pioneers of education, so must we as teachers and in the education system. We must continue to embrace, challenge, and work with new and innovative educational reforms that work. Instead of using the same methods that are ineffective, why don’t we adopt the “hacking” education lifestyle that works? As Bud Hunt implied, we know that students learn hands and get to create, they make deeper and more meaningful connections.


4 thoughts on “Utopian Education?

  1. littlebrainfood says:

    Watching and listening to a 13 year old boy be so excited to learn was awesome! That is what inspires me to teach is seeing children happy, exited and those “ahh hah” moments. Change is often times a good thing and hearing that the town you come from is finally changing up their traditional school system to something new I think is great! You don’t know until you try it and this may be exactly what their school system to be even better. I hope it turns out for your town and maybe it it does surrounding areas will adapt!


    • hillarybollish says:

      I totally agree, you really don’t see many young people, especially at that age so passionate about their education! I’m excited to see what the career academies have in store for the high school students. It makes me wonder if they will make adjustments at the lower levels that coincide with the career academies program that they will begin to implement. Thanks!



  2. ryanlmosier says:

    I find it very exciting that your school district is trying something new. In a world where learners are changing so does schooling. I feel like we need to adjust school but not scrap the whole plan. I feel like school is effective as is but can be made better by some changes. I like your insight!


    • hillarybollish says:

      I agree. I think it’s great that the school is rethinking education, and they way they approach it. There are going to be so many new opportunities for students who didn’t see a future past regular high school education. There will be new and further opportunities for students who don’t learn best in the traditional classroom.

      Liked by 1 person

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