After 9 years in public education administration, I've decided to put my admin hoodie in the closet and return to the classroom.
When people asked why I wanted to work in administration, my answer was always the same: I wanted to have a larger impact on students. These past 9 years, I did. I helped chart the course for thousands of students' journeys after high school. I worked to make sure special education services were rigorous, data-driven, and implemented with fidelity. I created and vetted curriculums and tools to best support our students. This work brought me joy.
But teaching others is my passion, and the further I got from the classroom, the more I craved it. This fall I'll be teaching 8th grade special education, and the excitement has me feeling lighter than I have in years. I get to prepare my students for the first time they truly understand their own IEP, so they can grow in their agency and start laying the foundation for the rest of their lives. I'll also keep educating future teachers as an adjunct professor at NIU, helping our next generation learn how to care, collaborate, and include every student.
Shifting more of my focus to work that excites me is a big part of this too. Evalve Consulting is my passion project and creative outlet, and it's the truest, most fulfilling version of me I've ever been. To learn, to build, to fail, to reflect, and to keep giving it my all: that's why Evalve exists.
There are only a few moments in a lifetime when a single creation changes the course of mankind. Many of us have been lucky enough to witness them: the telephone, the microchip, wireless communication, the internet, and now artificial intelligence.
Like most things, I took to AI head on. More than three years ago, I started using it daily, for all sorts of use cases. The more proficient I got, the more I understood the impact AI could have on our students. It will far surpass the Dewey decimal system, the copy machine, and the overhead projector. AI has the chance to transform education into the best version of itself. I believe that. I see it in my own work every day, and I want our students to be the ones who feel it first.
That's the work I share here. I started a biweekly podcast and a weekly newsletter, where I write about AI implementation in education, the tools and automations I build as an educator, and the real work behind a solo consulting practice. I've been building this since November. Every podcast sounds a little less cringy, every newsletter gets tighter and more useful, and the more I grow into it, the more it feels like mine.
If any of that sounds like your kind of thing, I'd love for you to come along. Subscribe below, and tell me what you think. That feedback is half the reason I'm doing this in the open.
Chris