Trevor Eissler
(From Montessori Madness) Trevor Eissler, father of three Montessori students, is a business jet pilot and flight instructor. Over the last fifteen years, he has taught hundreds of pilots, from beginners to professional pilots. He is the author of four books, Montessori Madness!, 4,962,571, That 17th Hat, and N is for North Korea. He is a juggler, unicyclist, triathlete, and Toastmaster. He lives with his wife and family in Georgetown, Texas.
Trevor Eissler “Montessori Madness!” (Video, 6 min.)
Thomas Gordon
(From Wikipedia) Dr. Thomas Gordon (March 11, 1918 – August 26, 2002) was an American clinical psychologist and colleague of Carl Rogers. He is widely recognized as a pioneer in teaching communication skills and conflict resolution methods to parents, teachers, leaders, women, youth and salespeople. The model he developed came to known as the Gordon Model or the Gordon Method, a complete and integrated system for building and maintaining effective relationships.
Gordon strongly believed that the use of coercive power damages relationships. As an alternative, he taught people skills for communicating and resolving conflicts that they can use to establish or improve good relationships at home, school and at work. These skills, which include active listening, I-messages and No-Lose Conflict Resolution, are now widely known and used by people around the world. He first applied some of these methods in the 1950s as a consultant to business organizations. Then in 1962, he introduced Parent Effectiveness Training (P.E.T.), a course which is widely recognized as the first skill-based training program for parents. He taught the first class to a group of 14 parents in a Pasadena, CA cafeteria. The courses proved to be so popular with parents that he began training instructors throughout the U.S. to teach it in their communities. Over the next several years, the course spread to all 50 states.
Parent Effectiveness Training by Thomas Gordon (Book)
Alfie Kohn
(From Wikipedia) Alfie Kohn (b. October 15, 1957) is an American author and lecturer who has explored a number of topics in education, parenting, and human behavior. He is considered a leading figure in progressive education and has also offered critiques of many traditional aspects of parenting, managing, and American society more generally, drawing in each case from social science research.
Kohn’s challenges to widely accepted theories and practices have made him a controversial figure, particularly with behaviorists, conservatives, and those who defend the specific practices he calls into question, such as the use of competition, incentive programs, conventional discipline, standardized testing, grades, homework, and traditional schooling.
Alfie Kohn on Punishment & Parenting (Video, 21 min.)
Logan LaPorte
Logan is an unschooler who presented his first TEDx talk at the age of 13 at the University of Nevada.
Hackschooling Makes Me Happy (Video, 11 min.)
Dayna Martin
(From daynamartin.com) Dayna Martin has been inspiring others for over a decade by sharing her experience through natural birth, attachment parenting and Unschooling. Author of, Radical Unschooling: A Revolution Has Begun, and her newest book, Sexy Birth. She’s been featured on Dr. Phil, CNN, Nightline, and Fox News several times. She was even used as an informational resource for Unschooling stories on the Discovery Channel, The Today Show and Our America on the OWN Network. She travels the world as the UnNanny, and is a featured speaker at the major unschooling conferences worldwide.
As an unschooling parent, author, and advocate, Dayna has been featured and interviewed in hundreds of local, regional, and international television and radio pieces about Radical Unschooling over the last several years. She and her husband Joe appeared as the featured guests on Dr. Phil Show in November 2006 introducing Radical Unschooling to the world.
Radical Unschooling – A Revolution Has Begun (Book)
Danya Martin on Bedtimes (Blog Post)
Teens Answer Common Questions About Unschooling (Video, 10 min.)Radical Unschooling Teens Discuss: Chores, Piercings & Prom (Video, 16min.)
Stefan Molyneux
(From Wikipedia) Stefan Basil Molyneux (born 24 September 1966) is a blogger, essayist, author, and host of the Freedomain Radio series of podcasts, living in Mississauga, Canada. He has written numerous articles and smaller essays which have been published on right-libertarian websites such as LewRockwell.com, antiwar.com, and Strike The Root, recorded over 2000 podcasts, produced over 900 videos, and written several books which are self-published except for his first, which was published by Publish America. In 2006, Molyneux quit his previous job in the field of computer software and works full-time on Freedomain Radio, a philosophical community website which is funded through donations. He self-identifies as a full-time parent and philosopher.
School Sucks Project
(From SchoolSucksProject.com) School Sucks Project is a podcast, You Tube channel, and on-line community dedicated to redefining education. We promote home-education, critical thinking, peaceful parenting, personal growth and nonviolent communication strategies.
What education is: a lifelong process of seeking and integrating new knowledge, an intrinsically motivated journey that serves the needs of the individual learner
What education isn’t: compulsory, institutionalized schooling
Brett Veinotte has worked in private education for the last 10 years, in a variety of activities. As host of the School Sucks Podcast, every week Brett shares his discoveries about American schooling with thousands of listeners. He is also now the vice president of a tutoring and educational consulting company in New Hampshire. Brett worked as an Outdoor Education Leader at a boarding school lin Vermont in 2000, then taught at the Great Expectations school in Manchester, Vermont from 2004 to 2006, where he designed new curricula for all classes he taught, including American History, World History, Media Ethics, Film History and a variety of mathematics courses. While teaching at Great Expectations, he completed masters level coursework in educational leadership, and the secondary education certification program at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. After leaving Great Expectations in 2006, Brett began to work exclusively as a private tutor in the greater Boston area. Much of this work was related to standardized test prep but also included providing essay writing support to college applicants, leading training sessions for prospective teachers planning to take state certification exams and serving as a liaison between parents and public schools to address student needs and parent concerns. He also worked as writing consultant to a London School of Economics graduate student, advising on foreign policy issues and Austrian School Economics.
The 3 Aims of Public Education (Podcast, 36 min.)
Cevin Soling
(From Wikipedia) Cevin Daniel Soling (pronounced “KEV-in SO-ling”) (b. August 5, 1966) is an American writer, filmmaker, philosopher, musician, music producer and artist. He is known for his Rumpleville book series, his bands The Neanderthal Spongecake and The Love Kills Theory, his film work including A Hole in the Head, Boris the Dog, and his writings and essays. In 2009 he appeared on The Colbert Report to talk about his documentary The War on Kids. In 2011 he released a documentary about the Ik people of northern Uganda titled Ikland. He is president of Spectacle Films and Xemu Records, and is a member of Mensa. In spring 2009, Cevin’s documentary The War on Kids won “best educational documentary” for the New York International Independent Film and Video Festival. While the movie had a week-long run at New York City’s Quad Cinema, Cevin was invited to appear on the Colbert Report in which Cevin explained how schools have been transformed into what are “effectively prisons”. The film also screened at universities such as Harvard, and has been reviewed in The New York Times, Variety, and The Huffington Post. The documentary was also featured on The Dr. Nancy Show on MSNBC and Soling was a guest on radio shows such as The Lionel Show on Air America, The Joe Reynolds Show on WOR, and the Leonard Lopate Show on WNYC.