Building Student Social Capital Has An Advocate in Julia Freeland Fisher

Closing the inequality gap in American classrooms demands a radical re-thinking, and one possible approach has the power to increase social mobility for students: relationships. In addition to student-teacher relationships, technology can enable the expansion of students' networks to include subject experts, college and career mentors—and possibly even future employers. This is where alumni come in. Alumni have the potential to be resource partners for students and program success, and engaged in school evaluation and community building efforts, yet they are frequently relegated to reunions, hall of fame walls, and the occasional assembly heralding the return of the hero student. The time to rethink the potential of alumni engagement is now.

Julia Freeland Fisher, Director of Education and Clayton Christensen Institute spells out this potential in her SXSW EDU talk. It’s worth a close look.