The Self-Driven Child

How To Redesign Schools to Unleash Extraordinary Learning For All

• Ned Johnson • Season 1 • Episode 49

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If you’ve ever looked at your kid’s school and thought, “Is this really the best we can do?”—this episode is for you. I sat down with the incredible Jenee Henry Wood, a national leader in community-based school design, and co-author of Extraordinary Learning for All. We dive deep into why our current educational system—designed a hundred years ago for a very different world—often fails to meet the needs of today’s young people, and what it would look like to redesign schools to actually serve them better.

Jenee brings so much wisdom, humor, and hope to this conversation. We talk about the real challenges of educational reform, how parents and students can become catalysts for change, and what it takes to create schools that are co-owned and co-loved by the communities they serve. Trust me, this isn’t your typical education podcast—it’s a call to action rooted in agency, relevance, and hope.

 

Episode Highlights:

[0:00] - Introducing the episode and our latest book, The Self-Driven Child Workbook
[1:44] - What does it mean to redesign schools—and are today’s schools meeting kids’ needs?
[3:01] - Jenee Henry Wood shares her background and mission with Transcend Education
[5:46] - The “three big ideas” behind redesigning education: design awareness, prioritizing experience, and community-based transformation
[11:15] - Why the old model of school no longer fits the world our kids are inheriting
[12:52] - The politics of change: why we stall at the 20% we disagree on
[15:07] - What kids and parents really want from school (hint: it’s not just test prep)
[17:22] - The power of voice, agency, and building trust in the redesign process
[20:56] - A powerful story from North Dakota about shifting from imposed solutions to shared ownership
[24:31] - How to start a redesign process—yes, even without a superintendent's blessing
[26:54] - Jenee’s message of hope: “Institutions are of us, from us. Change starts with you.”

 

Links & Resources:

If this episode has helped you, remember to rate, follow, and share the Self-Driven Child Podcast. Your support helps us reach more people and create more content that makes a difference. 

If you have a high school aged student and would like to talk about putting a tutoring or college plan together, reach out to Ned's company, PrepMatters at www.prepmatters.com

Ned Johnson:

Hey, folks, Ned here, like me, you want your kids, your students, honestly, all the young people you know, to thrive, and you know how much you can help. But like me, you probably also recognize that you fall short more than you'd like to, in part because we tender virtual old ways. We hear a great suggestion or learn a new approach, but to easily fall back into the same darn things that didn't work before, it isn't easy, which is why I'm really excited to share with you that Bill and I have a new book out this spring, the seven principles for raising a self driven child, a workbook. Our goal is to make it easier to put into practice more of the advice from our first two books, the self driven child and what do you say? Full of reflections and exercises to do yourself, with your partner and with your children, we want to help make the self driven child way your way, so that you can, more often than not, be as effective as you want to be with your kids in ways that we know you want to be if you get a chance order a copy bill, and I and your kids would be grateful.

Jenee Henry Wood:

And so we are advocating for a third way, which we think brings together the visionary and necessary leadership of policy, of school leaders, of system leaders, with the energy that brings teachers and crucially, parents and young people themselves to the design table, to collaboratively design what school needs to look and feel like for them in their communities. And what this allows is for us to really focus our locus of change on school communities, on towns where we can really get our arms around what needs to change for young people.

Ned Johnson:

Welcome to the self driven child podcast. I'm your host, Ned Johnson and co author with Dr William stick shoot of the books the self driven child the science and sense of giving your kids more control over their lives and what do you say? How to talk with kids, to build motivation, stress, tolerance and a happy home. When you think of the school your kids attend, do you think it's meeting their needs? Are the needs it's trying to meet the right ones, and if they are, are the approaches right? What should parents, students, teachers do if a school isn't designed the right way for the right needs, are you the one to change it? Where would you even start? Take a listen to school design and school redesign expert Janae Henry wood. She's co author of extraordinary learning for all, and someone who has spent a lot of time thinking about the design of schools and how we redesign schools to best meet the needs of young people. I'm Ned Johnson, and this is the self driven child podcast. Welcome Janae. Hi. Thank you so much

Unknown:

for having me.

Ned Johnson:

I have been looking forward to having this conversation with you since I sat there, sort of slack jawed listening at the kickoff for Rebecca Winthrop and Jenny Anderson's book The disengaged teen at Brookings. And you were part of the panel there, and I couldn't write notes fast enough, but I did my best for people who don't know your work. Can you just give us a thumbnail sketch and then we can before I start pestering you the questions that I have kicking around my head? Sure.

Jenee Henry Wood:

Hello to the audience. Thank you so much for having me. It is always wonderful to just meet like minded fellow travelers on this road that I think intersects which we are, in fact, both communists, sorry. Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, wow. Are you gonna get us put on a list?

Ned Johnson:

You're gonna get us put on a list, but as people are not listening to my podcast, yeah,

Jenee Henry Wood:

probably not. I will not disavow the fundamental tenets of that belief, but we will keep going. I will not just about it, so maybe the murder, but definitely not the core ideals. So it's nice to be with fellow travelers. And I think our our respective life work, intersects at this really interesting place, which is parenting, which I know that you think a lot about, and me and my day job, what I think a lot about is school design. And so we might be wondering, and the audience might be wondering, how do those two things meet? Because we often, we definitely understand parents, and we've talked about parents colloquially, anyway, as the consumers of school, there was definitely a moment in time, even though, I think this rhetoric has been slightly dampened, that might be coming back, there has definitely been a moment in time where we considered families customers of schools, and schools have a product. And so it's nice to meet fellow travelers and to ask ourselves. Like, what are the guiding metaphors of both of our work? So nice meeting you and thank you for having me. So here's what I do every day. Here is what I get to obsess about. Me and my colleagues at transcend. We are a national nonprofit focused on community based school design, and we work with school communities across the country who want to transform the way that we do school, and there are so many different components that go into that, but there are three main ideas that hold our work together, and that I am on a crusade to have everyone know truly on a crusade, not the Bolshevik crusade that you opened this podcast with, but a crusade. Nonetheless,

Ned Johnson:

kids are gonna roll, but only metaphorically, only metaphorically,

Jenee Henry Wood:

metaphorically, exactly. So there are three big ideas. One is the idea that school has a design, I think that we often can imagine. And think that this institution that we have all had some exposure to, or most of us have had exposure to, is something that has been, you know, granted and gifted to us by natural law. And the truth is, the model of schooling that we have right now has been granted. It has been given to us, but certainly not by natural law. It's been given to us by a 100 year old design in our work at my organization, we call this industrial era learning, or, you know, outdated learning. And our goal is to move systems and move to move school away from an industrial paradigm of learning to one that is more extraordinary for young people. But in order to do that, we first have to bring to people's consciousness the idea that school is designed. When we think of design Ned, we often think of a chair, we think of a phone, we think of a pot. We think of a you know, a wedding experience, something like that, a kitchen. But we don't often think of the fact that social studies and science have been designed for us. We don't often think of the fact that the bell schedule that our children, you know, attend to day in and day out, five days a week, sometimes year round, a minimum of one 880 days a year, that that has been a designed experience. And so the first thing that we are really obsessed with is getting folks to understand that school has a fundamental design. The second thing is that we have to now ask ourselves, if we've acknowledged that school has a design, how then do we also understand differently what we want that system to do. So if we're going to change it from industrial era learning, what are we changing it towards? And we believe this is the second big idea that we need to be just as obsessed with the experiences that young people are having in school as we are obsessed with the outcomes that they are achieving. So we have done some work to really define the 10 key experiences that we believe need to change in order for school to one, be a place where young people are being comprehensively developed for the whole humans that they are two, to be a place where young people are preparing for the opportunities, but also the trials and the tribulations of what this next century might hold. Most of my days, I maintain a lot of hope about the new frontier in the new world where we're entering and some days it's less hope, it's hard. But what we know for certain is that the world that our young folks are inheriting today is different than the one that we grew up in, is certainly different than the one that our parents grew up in, and is obviously unrecognizable to the one that our grandparents grew up in. And unfortunately, our schools see point one, a brown school has a design. Unfortunately, our schools are designed for that world, and we need them to be designed for experiences that our young people need today. So that's the second big idea. The third big idea is you might then will ask, okay, then how do you do that? And we have a concept that we call community based design, and that concept is really a third way for how we believe we're going to really make significant change in school design. We have often tried in our country, but in our world, I'll stick to our country for now, we often try two different pathways for change. We either believe there is going to be a broad, universal change that may come down from Washington or other politicians, or a really driven superintendent who has a vision a big picture change, or we believe that change is going to come in the smallest increments, with teachers. And doing radical new things. And what we have learned is that both of those things are often necessary but wholly insufficient when pursued in isolation. And so we are advocating for a third way, which we think brings together the visionary and necessary leadership of policy, of school leaders, of system leaders, with the energy that brings teachers and crucially, parents and young people themselves to the design table, to collaboratively design what school needs to look and feel like for them in their communities. And what this allows is for us to really focus our locus of change, on school communities, on towns where we can really get our arms around what needs to change for young people. So every day, I get to help lead a team of people and trade and develop them to do this thing that we call school design. And that's sort of where we that's where you and I met our our books kind of dovetailed and met each other, and our books have like, you know, met at the metaphorical bar, and our books are talking to each other. So like, that's, that's what's going on right now.

Ned Johnson:

Thank you for that, for for walking through that whole framework. I The biggest thing that sticks in my head from hearing your remarks with with Dr Winthrop and Jenny, was that point that school was designed, and, as you just said, or, you know, whether a chair or a wedding or whatever, with us, with a with a purpose in mind and a need and need to be met when those needs change. So should, you know shows, so should the design? And you've made the remark at Brookings that anything that was designed can, of course, be redesigned. That's hard for folks, right? I remember absolutely. I remember, I freak. I wish maybe you know the term for this. I heard this on podcast, you know, decade ago, and they're talking about, really, the intransigence of systems and why politically, it's so hard to change things. Yes, and the concept was this, that you and I and we can get it to others and other people as stakeholders, we are likely to agree around about 80% of what we need to be changed, but there'll be 20% that I disagree on, and there'll be 20% that you disagree on, and everybody else, but everyone's 20% is different, true. And you'll be like, over my dead body, I'll be like, over my dead body. I'm gonna, I'm I'm with you, I'm with the 80% but not this last 20% right, right? And everyone's stake is different, and this, everybody's second choice is the status quo. I was like,

Jenee Henry Wood:

oh, that's, that's, I think that's very wise. It's painful, but it's a wise observation about some of the obstacles to change. I mean, it truly is a wise observation. And I mean, here's what I'll say, that might bolster this, but hopefully can give us a little bit of hope. One of the things that I get to do in my job is I get to talk to a lot of parents, a lot of young people, a lot of communities. And you're right, it's about 80% I might even raise it to about 90% I really, truly believe that when I talk to parents about what they want for their young people, and actually, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna segment that out for different groups. When I talk to parents about what they want for their young people's educations, it's probably 95% the same. No parent says, My kid has to go to the best school ever. They have to go. It's Harvard or bust for my kid. No one says, I want my kid sitting in a room staring at a teacher all day focused on test scores and test prep. No one actually says that when you ask them what they want now, when you ask them, well, well, what are you preparing them for? Like, what are the actions you're taking? Well, they're in a system, so they're taking the actions that they have to take to get their kid through the system, to get their kid through the process. But when you ask them what they want, it is places of joy, of fulfillment, places where young people are learning what it means to be human, what it means to be adult, places where they're getting real, practical community and connection and skills. When you ask young people, it's nearly 100% shared, they are saying, make it relevant. Make it relevant. Make it relevant. Yeah. And when you and I met at Brookings, the topic that we were focused on was chronic absenteeism. And I think the point that I was trying to make in that space was young folks are voting with their feet, and they have been telling us for decades, but very recently, we've been doing a ton of studies with them. They've been telling us in surveys. Now, it's not relevant. It's not relevant. It's not relevant. And. And one of the things that we learned from COVID Is that school broke in front of our eyes, and we were able to see if I could jump

Ned Johnson:

in for 10 seconds. Yeah. Go ahead. For everyone who's um, yeah, the listeners know that Bill and I, our true north is self determination theory, and that relatedness, which is so often great educators, but is also things that you care about, right? So the relevancy is that? Relatedness piece,

Jenee Henry Wood:

great point, great, yes, throw in some series. See, we're both doing that. This is our books. This the listeners. This is our books talking at the bar Exactly. Young people have been telling us this, and they are voting with their feet. They're like, if you're not going to make this thing relevant, I'm not going and so, yeah, I have other things to do. And you know what? They're right? They have never had more places to learn. More places to like do the act of learning. Now is it always the highest quality and the best and what I would want them focused on? No, not exactly, but there have never been more places for them to get that learning and so, yeah, tick tock, right? I mean, it's true. It's true, right? I talked to my brother, who is in his early 20s, and the amount of text that he sends me from tick tock, either of political events, of world events, of movies, of philosophy, he's learning and getting this information in such a social way. So I think my I think my point there is, you know, to this, to this podcast point, it is probably even higher than 80% but what we have realized is that gap, that space between where we disagree on things is truly holding us back in some ways, from the fundamental change we see. And we are hoping that by going through real change processes, towards outcomes for young people, towards experiences for young people, that we can try to bridge that gap and get ourselves out of the ideological muck and instead focus on the results. Let's actually focus on what we see, versus starting from this place of ideology. And what I have found is that community based design has been an engine in the communities that we've been blessed to work with. Community based design has been an engine that has gotten people out of their ideological camps and into their but what is actually happening for young people. That's the most important thing. I

Ned Johnson:

love. This, this approach, this, you know, protocol, this philosophy, in that so much of the work that I do, that we do, is trying, when we're trying to help parents or trying to help young people, you really can't help people who don't want help. And so buy in is really everything that I can have the best solution to whatever. But if I, if I ram it down someone's throat who isn't asking for that advice, it doesn't tend to go very well, in part because, from our work, it decreases people's sense of control, and then they resist what may be in their own best interest. And this community based model where it's not just the superintendent from on high. It's not some renegade teacher Justin in a corner. You know that that parents and students and leadership and faculty, that everyone is there, what I kept going through the back of my head was that, in some ways, in bringing, you know, a say so of, you know, voice and choice, giving a sense of control to people who may have been voices unheard, in some ways, means people who have been the stage, on the stage, or the superintendent, you know, bringing things from on high, they may be yielding a little bit, because if it's now a collaborative rather than a managerial model. And one of the things I so appreciated about this, this work with the book, with your colleagues, is, how is talking through? How do we really, how do we do this so that we don't have people with voice and people who are just taking orders?

Jenee Henry Wood:

Yeah? One of, that's such a great point, one of the one of the former leaders that we interviewed in the book, and whose school was in her district, Kyle Henderson, who used to be the Chancellor of DC public schools, we chronicle a school that was in the district during her time there, Van ass Elementary, which I talk about. But one of the things that she said is I've learned in my leadership that over and over, when you actually deeply involved, not just engage, not just communicate, but deeply involve community members, to include parents, to include young people themselves. You're getting these sticky solutions that are co owned and CO loved. And I think that's such a great point co loved, you know, and that's really important for us to be thinking about, and I think we've tried to do a lot of school change that has not been co owned. It hasn't been co loved. And as a result, we're okay to just accept what we've got. Because, you know, I'm not going to take this thing that you're telling me to do down my throat. I'm not going to do it. Yeah. And so I think it's important for us to be creating solutions that are co owned and CO loved. She didn't say the CO owned co loved part, but that's what she

Ned Johnson:

meant. The CO love, yeah, I love that. And I think about, you know, the work that transcend did with Brookins, on, on, on those on student engagement and how poor it was. And, you know, Rebecca and Jenny were kind of to talk with us on the podcast, that that quadrant of people who are resistors, right? You know that they're using their agency to go, Oh, hell no, not gonna happen. And they don't have to be disruptive, but they can certainly slow walk anything and throw a wrench in the machine. And of course, this is not just students. This can be faculties, this can be administrators, all kinds of folks. And the secret to that, as I understand from, from, you know, from the work that your colleagues did, is if we increase the agency, right, we can shift people from resisting to engaging with with the process. Yeah, that's

Jenee Henry Wood:

true. It's true. So one of the things, let me tell you a story about this that I love so much that that really illustrates your point. One of the communities that we work with is called the northern Castle district, and they are in North Dakota, about 30 to 40 miles north of Fargo. And they we are in the open prairie fields of North Dakota, and we have been working with that community over the last several years to really bring a structure to the work that they do. They were already a pretty innovative community. They are led by Dr Corey Steiner. He is their superintendent. And what's great is their whole district is in one building, because it's a small rural community, so pre K all the way through 12th grade, and the whole system is in one building, and Dr Corey Steiner and his team were already pretty innovatively minded. You know? They would look at problems and they would say, that's not serving young people. We got to change it. We got to fix it. And so in the early days of their innovative work, Dr Corey Steiner said to himself, he decided the problem here is that kids are too obsessed with grades. So you know what we're going to do, we're going to get rid of grades. And so he went on this whole crusade to get rid of grades. So no longer did the kids get A's, B, C's. They now got 4321, and the parents were livid, absolutely livid. He said he had parents coming into the school saying you're going to ruin my kids life. They're not going to get into college, they're not going to get a job. Who the hell knows what a three is anyway? You had parents saying the system worked for me. I'm successful. I did fine. It's

Ned Johnson:

going to be CD descended from with Divine Law. Yeah,

Jenee Henry Wood:

absolutely. That's my point. It descended from natural law. You can't do this. You know what I love, and what Dr Corey Steiner has, and what so many superintendents are getting hip to, is the idea that what, instead of looking at the parents who came into his building and saying, oh my gosh, they just don't get it, I'm going to write them off. They don't get it. They don't want to see progress, I think he came to a very reflective space that said, Well, I never actually got my community obsessed with the problem I was seeing. And oftentimes we can, especially in the education sector, where we spend so much of our time thinking about these things, we can be obsessed with solutions, as opposed to getting everybody obsessed about the collective problem. Now, there is always, there is always a downside to that, right? It's helpful, right? Yeah, there's a downside to that. Right. Like, you don't want people so obsessed with problems that we're circling the drain, you know, and we're not being effective. We're just circling the drain. We don't want that, but we do have to invest, particularly parents and young people themselves, in the problem that we see. So that then got him to go back, Corey Steiner, to go back to the drawing board, and he started hosting community conversations and design circles with parents and with young people, where they started getting obsessed with the problem, and they had to go back several steps. So instead of trying to get people on board with a solution, you know, we're going to get rid of grades, he wanted to get obsessed. He wanted this community obsessed with the question of, how do we get young people excited and engaged and invested in their learning? That was actually the problem he was trying to solve, and he had come to a solution that he thought was right, but that solution did not go at the pace of his community's conditions, and it didn't go at the Speed of Trust. Wow,

Ned Johnson:

getting young people in obsessed with their learning and their everyone obsessed with the learning, that seems like a pretty good jumping off place to finding solutions create extraordinary learning for all. Yeah,

Jenee Henry Wood:

look at you reading the book and using the tagline Ned, just

Ned Johnson:

trying to this is a book that people need to read. I mean, because, I mean, there's so many of us that are worried about the process in young people and mental health and engagement. And and and their futures and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but your point just to to create a problem and have us, all you know, staring in the business certainly drain without offering solutions would be a real disservice to folks. And so I that your book is so practical and allows people to to pick this up and start where they are, in the communities where they are. So for folks who are are probably like, I need more of that. So where? How do people find you? Janae,

Jenee Henry Wood:

alright, so there's two places. The first is, find us on bookshop.org extraordinary learning for all. How communities create schools where everyone thrives. So please buy our book, available at all good bookshops, available at all good book shops, but bookshop.org, is our, is a is a mainstay. Please go there, and then second, you can find us at transcend education com, where we share the stories of communities that we work with. It will help you to get resources that you can use. Because the thing that I want for everybody to really understand, especially parents, is community based design does not have to start with your superintendent. It doesn't have to start with a politician in your community. It can start with you. And I want for young people to understand this too. It can start with you. And by picking up this book, we can give you some very practical tools for how you can get started today, to get your community on a community based design process, to really reimagine the kind of school that you want. I think what we have to remember is our institutions are ours, and our institutions are ours. They are they are of us. They are from us. They are made up of they are made up of us. And we've got to rest them through these processes that really can make them better. We can't throw them into the trash heap and say goodbye to them. We really have to figure out how do we and reimagine them from a place of good faith. And I think that community based design is a way that we can truly re imagine learning and what schooling can be from a place of hope and good faith.

Ned Johnson:

Oh, I love this. They are of us. They are from us. It can start with you to to make them for us? Yes,

Jenee Henry Wood:

beautifully done. Yeah. Well, Janae

Ned Johnson:

Henry, what I could talk with you all day. We're gonna have to do this more, because I know you're running off to save the world, as you do, but thank you. I mean, it's great work that you guys are doing, and I'm so, I'm so grateful that sort of Kismet allowed us to cross paths. You know, two books, two books at a bar. It's

Jenee Henry Wood:

great, right? Oh,

Ned Johnson:

it's, that's a terrific metaphor. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna use that one for a while. Thanks for joining me.

Jenee Henry Wood:

Thank you so much and so wonderful. And thank to your audience for listening.

Ned Johnson:

I'm Ned Johnson, and this is the self driven child podcast. You Ned. Hey folks, Ned, here, over the past 25 years, I've talked to countless parents of high school age students who care deeply about their kids' education and how they deal with stress and the pressure to succeed. It can help parents to work with a team they trust won't just pile on more pressure to achieve better scores and grades. That's why I founded prep matters in 1997 to create a different kind of experience for test preparation and academic tutoring. This podcast and my books with my friend Bill sticks reflect our company philosophy and approach to helping students. If you have a high school age student and would like to talk about putting a plan together. Please get in touch with us. Visit our website at prep matters.com, or while your kids may only text, you might want to actually talk with a person, if so, you can reach us at 301-951-0350