Elliot Washor's TGIF 08.14.2026

Are you with me now? AJ Ryder

Ghostwriters in the Sky

Ghostwriting has been around for a very long time. What is surprising is just how many books, musical pieces, and screenplays were not actually written by the person whose name appears as the author. Most ghostwriters are compensated very well, and most of the time, no one really knows they were there.

This isn’t new. Ghostwriting has been an accepted practice for centuries. Mozart ghostwrote music for the elite. The exception, in some cases but certainly not all, has been academia.

Now, with the advent of AI, we can all have a personal ghostwriter in the sky—or, more accurately, in the cloud—and it costs little or nothing. Suddenly, something that was once available mostly to people with money, connections, or publishers is available to just about everyone.

Here’s where it gets interesting. At the same time AI may be putting some people with writing skills out of business, it is also revealing just how many people don’t actually write what they author. Here’s some data to ponder. A good guess is that 50% of memoirs by famous people are written by ghostwriters and that 60–70% of books on the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list are ghostwritten. Put it all together and it means that about half of all bestselling nonfiction may be ghostwritten. Wow!

So, what does this reveal say to students of all ages about honing their writing skills and how they use their time? If people have always had others helping them write—and now everyone can have AI helping them—what does it mean to really be a writer? Maybe the skill isn’t simply putting words on a page. Maybe it is having something worth saying, knowing what questions to ask, and knowing when the words actually sound like you.

And what does all this mean for the ghostwriters who are going to stay in business? Will they be the ones who know how to use AI? The ones who have deep personal relationships with their clients? Probably both.

Hmm?

Last week I was New Jersey, and this week San Diego, where Anthonette and I had meetings for our ongoing work in S.D. A few highlights this week:

·       A meeting with Bridegette Colman from the SD Economic Development Office. They convene loads of industries and businesses that are key to our work moving forward.

·       While on a call with Carlos, I loved the nod from Kent McGuire regarding “practice and advise.” We can support the work by advising from our practice. Very few groups can do this.

·       A shout-out from Richard Barerra, President of the Board of the San Diego Unified School District, about the great ongoing work at the San Diego Met. Richard has always supported our school.

·       A meeting with Anthonette and Andy Trakas on Adult Ed and CTE down in Chula Vista, including gaining a greater understanding of the bi-national work going on in the Sweetwater School District.

·       A fantastic meeting with Equity Fellow/Deputy Supt. Vernon Moore and Superintendent Dr. Moisés G. Aguirre (thanks, Bob) about joining us for our SD convenings focused on IBPLC, Real World Learning, and Advisory.

·       It seems that wherever I go, I meet up with Equity Fellows through the work. Shameka Gerald, Dennis Campbell, and now Vernon Moore in just the last few weeks. That’s pretty incredible if you think about it. Am I in the right place at the right time, or is this what planned happenstance looks like?

·       A trip to the San Diego Met during their first regular week of school. It was great to be in the environment of advisory and all the activities of a first week.

·       I’m always trying to link the work in one place to another. This time it was about how NJ START Center students remain enrolled in their high schools while completing Career Connections coursework that can earn them up to 16 transferable college credits through Thomas Edison State University. In this way, they get credit for both college and high school at the same time. There is a lot of confusion out there about the definitions of dual and concurrent enrollment, and hopefully this work makes things much clearer.

Walks in the Parks

Last week, on my way to Barringer High School, I had noticed a large park, and to me it resembled an Olmsted-designed park, very similar to my beloved Prospect Park close to where I grew up in Brooklyn. When I got to Barringer, I noticed that the same park abutts the school grounds. I asked the carpentry teacher, Ben Gallano, what park it was, and he told me it was Branch Brook Park, an Olmsted-designed park, famous for being the first county park in the United States. It features the nation’s largest collection of cherry blossom trees.

Then, this week, Jen Ghidu put out a list of Leaving to Learns for our Weavers meeting in her hometown of Rochester, New York in late September. Of course, my first stop almost anywhere I go are parks. Sure enough, there are many parks in Rochester designed by Olmsted—Genesee Valley Park, Highland Park, Seneca Park, and Maplewood Park. These parks make up Olmsted’s Emerald Necklace. He also designed some of Rochester’s smaller neighborhood parks, such as Jones Square and Brown Square. Few know this, but I used Olmsted’s design principles—Prospect, Refuge, and Mystery—to design the Met in Providence. You know where I’m going for my Leaving to Learns when we get to Rochester.

Finally, it is always great to read Jeff Palladino’s TGIF at this time of the year. I look forward to reading about all the great things Fannie Lou Hamer students did over the summer because of the effort Jeff and his team put into ensuring that so many students pursue their interests in real-world settings.

His two questions this year:

o   How has your Summer Youth Employment work affected your community?

o   How has your Summer Youth Employment work affected you individually?

Next week, I’ll be off to Australia along with Andrea to meet with Viv and her team, Sandra Milligan from the University of Melbourne, and the team from Northeastern University on the International Big Picture Learning Credential. There is a great deal to get through in a short amount of time, and I’m grateful we could all find the time to meet down under.

Be well!