The Making Schools Work Podcast

Send us Fan Mail Strong school leadership is not just about having the right plan. It is about making the work clear, actionable and human for everyone in the building. In this summer highlight episode, Ashley Shaw looks back at six powerful conversations from the first two seasons of the Making Schools Work podcast. Each clip explores a different communication move leaders can use to build focus,...

Send us Fan Mail Career readiness can sound like a big, abstract goal — something that belongs in a strategic plan, a district initiative or a career fair once a year. But helping students connect school to life after graduation can happen in practical, everyday ways. In this summer highlight episode, Ashley Shaw looks back at five powerful moments from the first two seasons of the Making Schools...

Send us Fan Mail Artificial intelligence is already changing how educators plan, teach and support students — but using AI well does not mean handing over the thinking. In this summer highlight episode of the Making Schools Work podcast, SREB's Ashley Shaw revisits six practical AI lessons from the first two seasons of the show. Featuring clips from conversations with Daniel Rock and Leslie E...

Send us Fan Mail As another incredible season comes to a close, hosts Daniel Rock and Erin Anderson Williams sit down for a candid look at the major themes, tensions and breakthrough moments shaping our classrooms today.  In this wrap-up episode, the team dives deep into how schools are redefining student data, shifting the conversation around classroom engagement and navigating the rapidly evolvi...

Send us Fan Mail Student engagement is at an all-time low, while student anxiety and behavioral challenges are at an all-time high. How do we turn the tide? Mark Perna, a public speaker, best-selling author and founder of TFS Results, joins Daniel Rock and Chris Bailey to offer a game-changing framework: competitive advantage.  By moving beyond a singular focus on high academic grades, Perna outli...

Send us Fan Mail What are you actually wired to do? Betsy Wills, co-founder of YouScience and author of Your Hidden Genius , joins Daniel Rock and Jason Adair to disrupt the traditional follow your dreams model of career counseling. In this episode, Wills breaks down why self-reported personality tests fall short, how unused biological aptitudes drive adult burnout and how educators can use perfor...

Send us Fan Mail "Help me work with resistant teachers." It’s a major request for instructional coaches, but Becca Silver, founder of The Whole Educator, says it's often a misdiagnosis.  In this episode, Silver joins Daniel Rock and Jason Adair to explain why resistance isn't a personality trait—it's a human response to unmet needs. Discover how to move your staff past sim...

Send us Fan Mail Bethany Wilson, principal of the #1 ranked middle school in Wilson County, Tennessee, joins the podcast to share the secrets behind five consecutive years of Level 5 TVAAS growth. From opening a new school just months before COVID to being named Tennessee's Principal of the Year, Wilson discusses the shift from doing to leading and how intentional culture-building turns data...

Send us Fan Mail Why do so many high-quality professional development units end up sitting on the shelf? Jason Adair and Debbie Robertson join the podcast to discuss the HOPE Protocol, a multimillion-dollar grant initiative designed to transform math instruction in North Carolina.  By flipping the traditional PD model on its head, the HOPE framework—Hear, Observe, Plan, Enact—ensures that teachers...

Send us Fan Mail How does a school move from a low-performing list to the top 5% in the state for academic growth? Natasha Brown, principal of Westover Middle School and author of Underdog Leadership , joins Daniel Rock and Erin Anderson Williams to discuss the "Three S’s" of school improvement: stance, systems and support. From data-driven PLCs to boisterous student restorative practice...

Send us Fan Mail What do great leaders and great educators have in common? They are exceptional communicators. Thomas Murray, Director of Innovation for Future Ready Schools, joins Daniel Rock and Erin Anderson Williams to dive into the curse of knowledge, the speed of modern communication, and why the most important part of any message is how it’s understood—not just how it’s phrased. Key Takeawa...

Send us Fan Mail How do we ensure the skills students build in the classroom translate to the world of work? In this episode, Dr. Nicole Cobb, Professor of the Practice at Vanderbilt University and member of the Governor’s Council for CTE, joins Daniel Rock and Ashley Shaw to discuss the intersection of school climate and career readiness.  We move beyond "checking boxes" to explore how...

Send us Fan Mail In a rapidly changing workforce, students need more than just technical skills—they need the analytical thinking and adaptive problem-solving abilities to apply those skills in real-world contexts. In this episode, SREB Instructional Coach Deb Cullen joins us to discuss how educators can blur the lines between "shop" and "theory" to create a more powerful, inte...

Send us Fan Mail In the conclusion of our two-part series with Principal Baruti Kafele, we move from the leadership mindset to the tactical execution of instructional coaching. This episode is a deep dive into the "Grow You" model, focusing on the sophisticated people skills and communication nuances required to turn high-stakes observations into transformative growth. We explore the psy...

Send us Fan Mail ​In the first half of this powerful two-part series, we sit down with Principal Baruti Kafele, a renowned school leadership expert and best-selling author. This conversation moves past the daily logistics of school management to challenge administrators with a foundational question: What is your instructional value to the teachers you supervise? ​Kafele dives deep into the "l...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when you stop treating the community as a "field trip" destination and start treating it as a classroom? In this special episode, we are joined by Dr. Lisa Bonelli, the assistant principal at Hume-Fogg Academic High School in Nashville, and three of her students: Melanie, Allison and Niamh. Hume-Fogg is a high-achieving academic magnet, but their secret sauc...

Send us Fan Mail How do we move students from simple compliance to authentic engagement? In this episode, Senior Instructional Coach Daniel Rock and Leadership Coach Erin Anderson-Williams sit down with Dr. Tony Johnson, founder of Captivate Perspectives. With over 25 years of experience across K-12, CTE and higher education, Johnson shares how educators can bridge the gap between generational val...

Send us Fan Mail How do you move a high school graduation rate from 60% to 87% in a few short years?  In this high-energy episode, Senior Instructional Coach Daniel Rock and Leadership Coach Erin Anderson-Williams sit down with Dr. Marck Abraham, CEO of MEA Consultant Services and author of What Success Looks Like . Abraham challenges the traditional, "mushy" definition of school culture...

Send us Fan Mail Teaching is often viewed as a "solo gig," but the work of student learning is far too heavy for any one person to carry alone. In this episode, SREB Senior Instructional Coach Daniel Rock sits down with Leadership Coaches Erin Anderson-Williams and Susan Simpson to discuss the transition from isolated classrooms to collaborative school cultures. Our guests dive into the...

Send us Fan Mail As the Fall 2026 semester comes to a close, it is time to look back at the schools and strategies that challenged our thinking. In this special wrap-up episode, Daniel is joined by SREB’s Jason Adair and Ashley Shaw to interrogate the "Best Of" ideas from the last few months. From a high school in South Carolina that lets teachers design their own professional developmen...

Send us Fan Mail The "first-year teaching blues" are real, but they don't have to be a career-ender. In this episode, Daniel explores the impact of the GREAT Grant (Georgia Residency for Educating Amazing Teachers), a program designed to turn career-changers into thriving educators through a paid residency model. We sit down with Jillian Degan, a former "problem child" stu...

Send us Fan Mail What really happens to students after they graduate? Does a diploma equal a plan? In this episode, Daniel Rock and Susan Simpson sit down with the innovative College and Career Readiness team from Tuscaloosa City Schools  to find out how they answered their superintendent's single, powerful question: "How do we know they're ready?" The answer was a comprehensiv...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when English and social studies teachers join a career academy — and every lesson connects to the real world? In this episode of the Making Schools Work podcast, SREB’s Daniel Rock and Debra Cullen talk with Angie Maples and Wes Stephenson, teachers at the Career Academies of Decatur (CAD) in Alabama. They share how academic teachers are helping students build essenti...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when a school flips the script — and lets career and technical education lead the way? In this episode of the Making Schools Work podcast, SREB’s Daniel Rock and Debra Cullen talk with Ressa Chittam, director of the new Career Academies of Decatur in Alabama, and assistant director Tyler Stevenson. Together, they share how this innovative school became a full-time hig...

Send us Fan Mail What if the key to doubling student learning is simply getting them talking? In this episode, Daniel Rock and Jason Adair unpack research showing how student discussion can double the rate of learning — and why most classrooms still rely on teacher talk 80% of the time. Together with Ashley Shaw, they explore how teachers can create classrooms that sound more like Socratic seminar...