Preface

The idea and possibility of equitable, community-based, learner-centered ecosystems is emerging from the collective work and imaginations of millions of people around the world. In many ways, what we are proposing is a return to more authentic learning in the natural ways in which humans develop and grow in connection and community with one another. We are imagining a public system that would enable, support, and intentionally nurture that orientation toward learning, growth, and development.

We see evidence of ecosystems across contexts and emerging from different starting places. We see:

• Out-of-school alliances that are serving family needs, creating safe and enlivening spaces for children to find community, learn, and grow;
• Networks of museums, businesses, and civic structures that are keeping their doors open and offering educational programming;
• Districts that are striving to break the bounds of their campus and partnering with higher education institutions to offer multiple pathways to college and career;
• Schools that are creating models for alternative schedules and credentials, interest-based internships, mentorships, community-based learning, advisories, graduate profiles, innovative transcripts, and partnerships with businesses;
• Youth leadership organizations that are calling for youth to be seen and recognized as full participants in the community long before they reach voting age;
• Collaborative cross-sector coalitions that are aimed at positive community impact;
• Philanthropic organizations that are fueling new invention and offering opportunities to create new ways of funding and investing in leadership, youth, and learning in communities; and
• Self-organizing infrastructures that are offering alternative flexible models such as micro schools, pods, unschooling, home schooling, liberation education networks, parent cooperatives, online learning management systems,