Personalizing Learning in Central New Jersey: Reflections from a LELA Fellow

A few months ago the Lexington Institute launched our first ever cohort of Lexington Education Leadership Award fellows.  Designed to help public school district leaders take the next steps toward personalized learning, the past few months have been terrific as we have watched districts take their visions and plans to the next level by putting in an incredible amount of hard work and with guidance and support from some of the nation’s top personalized and blended learning designers and educators (special thanks to Education Elements). We just announced applications are open for a second round of fellows and are excited for our new round of applicants.

I asked Ross Kasun, Superintendent of Freehold Township School District in New Jersey to reflect on the fellowship so far.  Freehold Township School District, which serves 3,900 elementary and middle school students, has made substantial progress implementing personalized learning over the past three years.  Beginning with an emphasis on targeted professional development to leverage technology’s limitless potential, we are confident the student-centered classrooms we are developing will produce connected, independent thinkers who are well prepared for the future.  Here is what he said:

As our district was embarking on our “next” strategic plan and already had much success infusing technology into our classrooms to enhance learning, we were looking for a partner to help us set goals in our efforts to offer more of a personalized learning approach for our students.  Thus, we eagerly applied for the LELA Fellowship; and although only in the first part of the Fellowship, the experience and support have more than exceeded our expectations.

The specialized track at the Education Elements National Personalized Learning Summit, the mentoring, and most importantly, the technical assistance, strategic resources and support have helped us to begin to develop a custom personalized learning framework, which is much more comprehensive than we could have on our own.   This critical work has “pushed” our thinking and guided us to set innovative, but realistic, goals that will best prepare our students for a very different future. 

I would highly recommend that any district leader who wants to move forward with personalized learning apply for the LELA Fellowship as it offers a unique partnership and learning experience.  

Have questions about the fellowship, please reach out to Don Soifer: soifer@lexingtoninstitute.org

We hope to get to work with you too!