Are you with me now? AJ Ryder Hands up! This Easter, I spent time with friends who are in the construction business on land and sea. This is not unusual for me but this time it was even more meaningful given the grant we received to develop an apprenticeship program called S.T.A.R.T. that will have 18-year-olds enter the carpenters union apprenticeship program upon high school graduation. My friends are not people who spent their lives in school as traditional academics. They

Are you with me now? AJ Ryder Third Time’s the Charm Conference season is almost over—just two more to go: ASU GSV and BPL Winnipeg. At the Deeper Learning conference, there was finally time built in to actually mingle with, muddle through around things that matter. Funny thing is many of those same people had been at the last three conferences and we had little time to connect. What I appreciated most was the pacing. Deeper Learning created space—real space. Long breaths bet

Are You With Me Now? A. J. Ryder This was a week of shuttle diplomacy. I flew from San Diego to Newark, back to San Diego, then to Washington, D.C., and finally home again. Along the way, I learned a great deal about the skilled trades and college admissions. My first stop was the Carpenters Training Center in Edison, New Jersey. There are 260 such centers across the U.S., but the one Charlie, Mychal, and I visited stood out: a 100,000-square-foot facility with classrooms con