White Papers & Reports

Dear friends, After two long years of disruption, students, parents, and educators are grateful to reclaim many aspects of classroom normalcy. But they’re also exhausted as they confront the stark realities of steep learning loss, widening inequities, and lingering trauma. The sector faces immense adaptive challenges in this moment, from staffing shortages to resource management. Previous best practices are insufficient for today’s context. Now is the time for adaptive, inclusive leaders to define problems in new ways, identify novel solutions, and implement innovations that seize the...

Dear Friends, There are so many lessons from the turmoil of the past 18 months, but I keep coming back to one: leadership is so often the catalyst that can turn crisis into opportunity. In our schools and communities, we can’t wait to react; we need to have the right leaders in the right place at the right time. The Education Pioneers network is full of the leaders K-12 needs: 4,500 Alumni -- 3,000+ of whom still work in education -- who press onwards through trauma and fatigue to serve students and families during COVID-19, as well as nearly 50 new Fellows who raised their hands to...

Dear Friends, It is with pride and gratitude that we share our 2020 Annual Report. 2020 was an unprecedented year for us as a nation. And it’s impossible to separate EP’s work and mission from the traumas of an unrelenting global pandemic, a difficult reckoning with racial justice, and a highly divisive political climate. Leadership matters, and never more than in moments of crisis. We are proud that EP was able to transform and innovate in order to advance our mission of catalyzing leaders at all levels to drive systemic change. We moved our Fellowships virtual, welcomed 80 new Pioneers, and...

Dear Friends, It is with great pride that we share our 2019 Annual Report. This was a pivotal year for EP, an inflection point to position us for an even stronger future. We are excited to share the story of our journey with you. Thank you to those who have contributed to our impact along the way. We ended our fiscal year clearer than ever on the need for our work and where we can grow. Building leadership capacity in education is more important than ever. By attracting talented professionals to the sector and advancing their readiness for leadership, we’re catalyzing the collective effort...

EP teamed up with the American Institutes for Research (AIR) to determine if we are meeting our mission to recruit, connect, and advance more diverse, transformative leaders into the education sector. AIR also examined how EP Fellows and Alumni persist in the education sector as they grow their careers. In September 2017, AIR reported on their findings in “Education Pioneers’ Fellow and Alumni Demographics and Mobility Analysis.” AIR’s research found that EP Fellows are highly educated: 81% of Pioneers held or were pursuing a doctorate in education, a juris doctorate or a master’s degree at...

To address the structural inequities that perpetuate the opportunity gap and affect low-income students and students of color, Education Pioneers is building a network of leaders and partners in education who can reimagine systems of schools nationwide. As Education Pioneers (EP) has been building a leadership movement to transform public education for nearly 15 years, EP recently teamed with the American Institutes for Research (AIR) to examine our impact in the K-12 public education sector. We wanted to know: Is EP meeting our mission to recruit, connect, and advance more diverse,...

Diverse leadership teams bring tremendous value across organizations and industries. However, there is much work to be done when it comes to education organizations’ abilities to attract, develop, and retain leaders of color. Koya Leadership Partners and Education Pioneers developed From Intention to Action: Building Diverse, Inclusive Teams in Education to Deepen Impact to help translate these well-intentioned beliefs about the importance of diversity into actionable practices. Download the Full Report >> Download the Organizational Audit Checklist >> Download the Infographic...

Like never before, work in all industries is becoming increasingly complex. Leaders face significant and often competing challenges, like fewer dollars and greater accountability, global competition and a high bar for quality. We're facing next-generation work, and traditional skills like negotiation and delegation no longer cut it. To thrive, next-generation leaders need new and expansive skills that researchers have just begun to map. Among them: multi-sector experience, "greater diversity of experience and thinking styles," and emphasizing collaboration to make a broader organizational...

The United States K-12 education sector, a $600 billion industry responsible for the second largest workforce in the country, has tremendous management opportunities and challenges. This report by Education Pioneers, funded by the MetLife Foundation, provides a fresh look at the need for leadership and management in public education and reveals what efforts will be needed to strengthen the leadership pipeline from within education, and to bring in people and practices from beyond education.