One of the best side effects of this contentious election cycle is that we are seeing a huge increase in the number of registered voters, especially from groups that have been historically under-represented at the polls. Election officials are telling us that record numbers of voters are voting early in those states that permit this.

I think it is a particularly exciting opportunity to find ways to harness this energy and start a more or less permanent dialogue with these newly energized citizens about education and how we can reform our schools to perform better – and our legislatures to serve our schools better.

There is a sense, sometimes, that the problems in public education are too big, too scary, too daunting to tackle Well, the bigger the problem is, the bigger the solution must be — we need more people, not less, engaged in the conversation.

While we have heard a lot from the candidates about their ideas, we’ve heard less from voters this year on the subject of education. Change can happen without public buy-in so I think we need to hear much more from the public, which is why Education Voters created this video and quiz. You Decide: Take the Education Voters Quiz to make your voice heard.

We want to give voters agency on this issue and communicate the impact they can have on it with their vote, and with their voice. This problem is not too big, too scary, or too daunting – there are many things we as citizens can do.

We plan to follow up on this outreach efforts to voters with Listening Tours in several states, where we engage citizens in finding the solutions, and then help harness their energy to contact their legislators.

We are pleased to announce that the videos created by Institute for the Future that describe the major drivers of the Map of Future Forces Affecting Education now have a home on our website.

The videos are also described and linked in this previous blog post.

For the second time in one year, I have visited New Tech High School in Sacramento. Without getting into the details of why this is such an amazing school, let me just focus on one reason – because the students understand the concept of learning better than most adults, including many education policywonks, education leaders, parents, and, dare I say, some teachers and principals.

I asked a simple question to a group of students, “What would be different if you weren’t attending this school and were at another school?” The first answer simply inspired me, “I wouldn’t be learning.” Many of the other students spoke with similarly related comments, not comments like “I would have a basketball team,” “I would have a prom,” or the numerous other things that reflect the cultural icon of an institution called “high school.”

I wondered if this student really knew what “learning” meant (like I do?) and her follow-up answer was just as simple and inspiring as her original answer,. “I can apply what I know.” She added, “I know when and how to use [knowledge].” I asked the other students to define learning and here were their answers:

• Ability to talk with others and speak in front of others
• Learn now to be organized to plan things out
• Understand what I don’t know
• Know how to set goals
• Have an attitude of ‘can do’
• That I need others to learn
• That I need to collaborate to make something good
• How to work in a team
• How to balances schoolwork and personal life
• Comfort with technology
• Ability to multi-task
• To have self-discipline
• To be accountable and responsible for my own learning

I loved the last one equally as much as the first. Students talked about coming home from [former] schools and saying, “My teacher didn’t teach me anything.” Here at this school, “I can’t blame a teacher for not teaching me.” That is because at this school, teachers are coaches and facilitators, or as the KnowledgeWorks Map calls them, “Learning Agents”. Through project-based learning, teamwork, and technology as a tool, they have to take responsibility for their own learning. More importantly, they recognize that and embrace that. The school also uses rubrics developed loosely on the 21st Century Partnership outcomes (perhaps why some of their definitions of learning sound familiar). They shared how much they liked the rubrics. They felt they gave clarity to what was expected of them and made them take responsibility.

Applying knowledge and taking responsibility for learning. Simple, profound, and what all public schools like this one should be doing. As we have an expanded learning economy, many of our students and families will take responsibility for their learning to a new level and that may be in a school or out of a school; in a public system or in a private system. The question becomes: Why can policymakers and education leaders not mobilize around this definition of learning and ensure that all of our students can have equally as compelling learning experiences as the students at New Tech High in Sacramento.

Monica Martinez is the Vice President of Education Strategy at the KnowledgeWorks Foundation.