NOLA Micro Schools

As the learner-centered community grows and shares their work with one another, the guess work in launching a learner-centered environment lessens. Rather, aspiring founders can learn from how others have tackled the challenge of engaging their communities in the idea of education transformation, adapting those high-level strategies to their own stakeholders and contexts.

Such was the experience for Kim Gibson, Founder and Head of School at NOLA Micro Schools in New Orleans. In partnership with Matt Candler of 4.0 Schools, she traveled to established environments across the country—meeting with educators, parents, and young learners. Then, when she returned to New Orleans, she hit the ground running.

The most important lesson Kim learned during her tour was the importance of community input, and how gaining that input through authentic conversations validates assumptions and unveils unforeseen issues unique to the community and the young people being served. Back in New Orleans, the NOLA Micro Schools team began gathering information from their community, which opened the door to entirely new ideas.

Their next step was to test their ideas in a low-risk, intentionally targeted, and accessible manner. The NOLA Micro Schools team set up pop-up learning experiences within local recreation facilities that were free to all community members. Although some parents initially saw the experiences as free babysitting, it gave the team the opportunity to obtain the kind of objective, honest feedback only young learners can provide.

Additionally, they held community gatherings so parents could engage in questions like: What was your personal experience in school? What is the experience of your kids? What are you looking for? The answers highlighted the diverse needs of a largely segregated New Orleans community that is rarely acknowledged for their unique needs, assets, and values.

With the information gathered from the young learners, parents, and other interested community members, NOLA Micro Schools was going to be an open-walled (or as they would say, “porous-walled”), socially embedded learning environment focused on creating personalized, relevant, and contextualized learning opportunities so that young people could develop a strong sense of learner agency throughout their learning journey.

At NOLA Micro Schools, grades, age-based cohorting, and homework are non-existent. Young learners are always learning in multi-age settings, challenged to seek out experiences and information from the broader New Orleans community to complete long-term, hands-on projects, participate in Socratic discussions to hone their critical thinking skills, and set weekly and daily goals to track their progress and establish a rhythm of meeting with peers to hold each other accountable.

Given the robust systems NOLA Micro Schools has in place, you might think it launched more than a decade ago. However, they opened their doors in 2015. Once again, thanks to the work that has come before them, they have been able to accelerate their transformation in remarkable ways. If you would like to experience similar progress in your community, reach out to NOLA Micro School leaders and check out our map of learner-centered environments below.