But I worry that’s not what people hear. This week, I raised this concern with a colleague — a former teacher and principal, now VP of Academics — and to my relief, she wasn’t worried. Which made me wonder: am I overthinking this? Maybe. But I’ve seen what happens when words travel without shared meaning.

It’s not just “student-driven.” Project-based learning, exploratory learning, self-paced — these phrases carry so much baggage that the reaction often arrives before the explanation does. “Student-driven” lands differently depending on who’s in the room. For some educators, it signals a familiar debate: progressive vs. traditional, structured vs. free-range. They may have already picked a side. For others, it sounds like another initiative asking them to do less teaching or to learn a new curriculum or approach to teaching. For researchers, it’s sometimes flattened into “self-directed learning” or “self-paced,” which are related but not the same.

What I mean is something more specific: students who know why they’re learning, who can identify what they need, who don’t wait to be told what to do next — students who see a problem or a need and go after it, creating an opportunity or a solution. That capacity doesn’t emerge from freedom. It emerges from practice, in well-designed environments, with adults who hold high expectations and deliberately build toward it.

The either/or thinking is a distraction from something more important. Students are leaving school without the skills this kind of agency requires — knowing why they’re learning, identifying what they need, and taking initiative without waiting to be told. That’s not a progressive concern or a traditional one. It’s just true.

So maybe my colleague is right, and I’m overthinking it. But I keep coming back to the same question: what do people actually hear when we say “student-driven learning”? Because if the phrase is triggering the wrong debate before the conversation even starts, that’s worth knowing.

What do you hear when someone says “student-driven learning”?

I’ve spent most of my career behind the curtain, thinking, building, and writing for others. Stepping out from behind it feels strange. But the questions I’ve been wrestling with feel too important to keep working out only in private.

The question that’s driven most of my work: what does every young person need to thrive in school and beyond? I’ve spent twenty years chasing it, and I’m more convinced than ever that it’s the right one to be asking right now.

This is my space to think about it out loud — with you. I write about student engagement, agency, ownership, and ambition: what they actually mean, what gets in the way, and what it looks like when we get it right. Some of it is practical. Some conceptual. All of it grounded in real work and genuine curiosity.

I’m thinking out loud here, not delivering finished answers. Some posts will land. Some will be in motion. I’ll be honest about what I’m still working out, and I’d love to hear what you’re working out, too.

I’m glad you’re here.

— Jolene