School Sucks Project self-knowledge, self-education, self-mastery

Dr. Duke Pesta is an English Professor at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh and the Academic Director of FreedomProject Education. Frustrated with "call-out culture" and the misguided efforts to shield young ADULTS from upsetting ideas, Dr. Pesta issued a contract to his students at the beginning of this school year. The highlights: - “In this course, we study literature from cultures that existed before you were born,” reads the contract's Statement of Purpose reads. “Their world is not our world. Their beliefs may not be our beliefs. No one asks you to believe or endorse any premise, attitude, precept, theology, political system, or ideology contained in these books or expressed in class. Nor will you ever lose points or be ...

My guest today is Jonathan Carroll, a history teacher and a 20-year veteran of Florida's public schools. Jonathan's recent viral Facebook resignation post has made national news, and has inspired messages of appreciation from educators around the world. In his April 30th post he says that teaching has become a "toxic profession" because of numerous factors, several of which we've discussed on School Sucks for many years. While the point of this conversation is connection, and to let Jonathan tell his story long-form, I did need to ask if the compulsory nature of schooling could have produced anything other than toxic outcomes for far too many students and teachers. Special thanks to Jonathan for his commitment, courage to speak out, ...

Pam Lucashu is a home-educating parent and the Legislative Liaison for The Education of Christian Homeschoolers of CT. Because much of our recent content has been devoted to exciting and revolutionary educational alternatives, I wanted to spotlight Pam as an exemplar of the often forgotten people who are doing the less glamorous work of defending children and families from incursions from state legislatures and beyond. Some examples: In 2015 Pam worked with parental and homeschool rights advocates to form the CT Parental Rights Coalition to respond to the Sandy Hook Commission Report. The commission made recommendations to further regulate home education, using the false pretext that Adam Lanza had been homeschooled. Pam is also an outspoken critic of UN/UNESCO designs ...

Isaac Morehouse is the CEO of Crash, the career launch platform, and the founder of Praxis, a startup apprenticeship program. He joins me today to map out a better route to beginning or even relaunching a fulfilling career. Better than what? Better than what almost all of us learned to do. School inculcates a permission mentality; schooled people seek someone to vouch for them. Today you'll stand out more if you can vouch for yourself. Isaac's book, Crash Your Career: Ditch the Gatekeepers and Be Your Own Credential, provides a step-by-step process for how to do this. In it he writes: "...degrees are dead, whether or not most people know it yet. The internet killed them. But it didn’t kill ...

Andrew and Brett welcome Alex Bell and Drew Sample to The Studio of Champ-yinz. What we are talking about at... 0:10:00 - Andrew does not take Brett's advice from the previous meeting 0:20:00 - How did we punch the weekend in the dick? 0:30:00 - Planting your flag 0:40:00 - Brett spreads positivity in Pittsburgh 0:50:00 - Mastermind groups and impostor syndrome 1:00:00 - How to find/create the right Mastermind 1:10:00 - Masterminds and self-reflection 1:20:00 - Gooski's Bar, where you can smoke inside 1:30:00 - Positive reframing 1:40:00 - Taking your own advice

Brett continues to rave about block scheduling and deep work and yells at Andrew for not planning enough. Andrew vows to turn away from everyone else's productivity and time management advice. Brett is struggling with how to brand the Un-iversity Summits. Who are some of the presenters? How will it be organized? Andrew is looking at the long-term future of his short-term rental business. We discuss "money now," "money soon" and "money someday" propositions. Brett says prioritize easier cash flow opportunities over daunting investment properties. No Player? Click HERE.

It is revealed that Andrew is the exemplar of our brand new SSP slogan: "be unschoolable." Andrew dropped out of high school at the END of his senior year, after years of associating "learning" with boredom. At this same time he gained confidence and realized satisfaction in his problem solving skills with pursuits outside of school. Today we talk about his personal history - filled with discomforts, self-judgments and uncertainties - and how taught him important lessons about identifying opportunities, selling, not looking to others for validation or direction, and not following traditional paths.

A tough couple of weeks for the team - Andrew has a funk and Brett follows a story about two high-profile hip hop murders back to his wayward life in the late 1990s. An unexpected invitation also forces Brett to further revisit this regret-filled period of his life, so he asks Andrew if he should embrace the opportunity to face his past - up close and personal - or if he should just leave it behind.