This issue is all about listening to students, learning from data, and recognizing that what students tell you is data! It kicks off with an article by a recent high school graduate reflecting on the highs and lows of his education, and features articles about running improvement networks, how to conduct effective empathy interviews, and strategies for sharing data with educators. It's also got an awesome strategies for assessment, peer critique, time management, essential questions, and teaching reading in early grades! And it ends with a magical project in Denmark, and a math teacher's reflections on his journey away from, and back to, PBL.

This issue highlights stories of school improvement and practical tools for educators. It features how Parkway Academy supports students during the school day, how NYC Outward Bound schools are rethinking advisory, and how the Teaching Matters Network is using identity questions to boost literacy. Tools include Baltimore’s method for turning routine processes into improvement projects, Chicago’s protocols for data reflection, and RISE Network’s resources on tracking absences and fostering improvement through personalized strategies. Additional insights come from educators like Loni Berqvist, Aneesa Jamal, Peter Jana, and Sara Sadek, who explore student voice, reading engagement, skill development, and child-centered learning.

Jeff Govoni kicks off this issue by writing about literal “making”—the power of construction projects in elementary school. Aneesa Jamal shares a strategy for helping students reconnect to their questioning abilities, Michelle Jaconette has suggestions for how to launch inquiry-rich lessons, “Dr Project” has ideas for helping students critique “models” and make high quality products, and Brad Blue offers advice on how students can curate their own work after a project. Robert Talbert and Sarah Strong both share ideas for making assessment meaningful and student-centered. And Elizabeth Brown, Paula Espinoza, and Amber McEnturff share stories and strategies that challenge us not just to help students “make the world differently.”

This issue opens with a piece that David Price wrote in 2023 about school improvement and continues with stories about schools and non-profits taking relationships seriously, professional development where teachers can actually try out their ideas, school lunches, music festival projects of course, fiction-writing during lockdown in India, the cardboard arcade in Minnesota, and the virtual-reality geology.