6 Ways State Policymakers Can Build More Future-Focused Education Systems: A Podcast Series with the Aurora Institute: Episode 1

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Hi, this is Aurora from the Educating All Learners Alliance,
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and you're listening to Six Ways State Policymakers Can Build More Future-Focused
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Education Systems, a podcast series with the Aurora Institute.
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The Aurora Institute is a national nonprofit organization working on policy
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advocacy, field building and capacity building, research and knowledge sharing,
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and convening to advance innovative approaches that transform education for youth across America.
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In April of 2024, the Aurora Institute released state policy recommendations
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to transform education for all learners,
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especially those who have been underserved by the current system.
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Each five-minute segment in our series will cover one of the six identified policy shifts.
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Joining us today is Virgil Hammons, CEO of the Aurora Institute,
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and Jennifer Kabaker, Stocker, Director of Strategy and Partnerships.
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Let's just dive right in and start with some background. You know,
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what is this resource and why is it needed?
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You know, there's so much out there right now in the world of education.
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So why this and why now?
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Yeah, great question, Aurora. And for us, we believe it's important to help
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provide some guidance and help shift and shape some priorities for our policymakers.
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So we've created in this year, these state policy priorities to offer policymakers
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six levers to transform education for all learners, and especially for those
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for whom have been historically marginalized yet resilient.
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And taken together, we believe these recommendations will help empower and inspire
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a shift in our system from one that was created in the industrial age,
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more of a one-size-fits-all model, to one that is much more future-focused and supports innovation,
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learner agency, knowledge, and prioritizes the skill set and competencies that
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our learning communities and states believe are important for the future success
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of our kids and their region.
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One of the priorities we referenced was the idea of reading a profile or a portrait of a graduate.
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We think it's important to create this to help shape the learning system.
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The idea is to identify the knowledge, skills, and dispositions that are important
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to the success of our young people.
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And what we have learned is that oftentimes across the country,
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many states have taken the lead in creating a statewide profile or portrait of a graduate.
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And our states are utilizing this process to help create exemplars for how to
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engage community in identifying those key skill sets and to think about ways
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to help inspire ways for learning communities to utilize profiles in ways that
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are meaningful within their local context.
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Thanks so much, Virgil. So with your first policy recommendation,
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establish a vision by developing a profile of a graduate.
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You know, what might that look like in practice, in a classroom?
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Yeah, it's a great question. And, you know, the profile of a graduate essentially
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helps us to create a shared goal across a state or across a learning community
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to create some tailored instruction and assessment opportunities that meet the
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individual needs of our learners while inspiring them to pursue their evidence
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of learning in new and unique ways.
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Any kind of challenges that you've run into or that you anticipate with this
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policy shift? I think one of the biggest potential challenges is putting it into action.
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What does it look like for these competencies to exist for four-year-olds versus 16-year-olds?
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And many states like Utah and South Carolina and North Dakota have essentially
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created exemplar continua around the competencies and those skills and those
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dispositions identified in their profiles so that local learning communities
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can take a look at those exemplars and say,
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great, what does it mean to be an effective communicator as a five-year-old?
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And how does that scaffold to be an effective communicator as an 18-year-old?
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And then how do we embed that in our instruction and our assessment practices?
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Not a challenge, but really an opportunity to think about how we do teaching
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and learning differently.
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That's it for us today, folks. Thank you to Virgil Hammons and Jennifer Kabakar.
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Be sure to check out the next episode in our series.
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I'm Aurora from ELA, and this was Six Ways State Policymakers Can Build More
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Future-Focused education systems.