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2019 Brunch Session

Mahoney says innovation important for schools in changing world

Kentucky School Advocate

March 2019

By Brenna R. Kelly
Staff writer

School board members and administrators are magic dragons.

That’s what Jim Mahoney told the hundreds school board members and administrators gathered for the closing brunch of KSBA’s 2019 Annual Conference.

Mahoney, a longtime educator and entrepreneur, relayed the story of an anonymous effort to organize experiences for a dying boy. No one ever learned the identity of the “magic dragon” who made the boy’s time in the hospital more bearable, he said.

“You’re all magic dragons because you do things behind the scenes to make things work for other people,” he said. “You enable school systems to move forward and it’s not about you.”

Mahoney served as a superintendent in eastern Ohio for 15 years and spent 15 years in leadership at Battelle for Kids, a national not-for-profit organization that partners with school districts and other organizations to advance educational equity and opportunity for all students.

Mahoney urged school board members and administrators to not just move public education forward, but to make it better through innovation, creating a positive culture and getting feedback.

“That’s part of your job, to promote change to continue to be relevant,” he said. “Public education needs to be the best choice, and part of that is to innovate in a world that is changing.”

Public education instruction needs to meet the needs of every child, he said.

“Every kid is going to have a future, and the question is whether or not we are going to have a pathway to help facilitate that,” he said.

Too often, educators can fall into the trap of providing a one-size fits all education.

“When you design for average, you design for nobody,” he said. “There are no average kids.”

And it’s not just what’s right for students; it’s something that schools and districts will need to do to survive, Mahoney said. Companies are looking to make money from public education, he said.

The largest provider of education could one day be an education service provider that doesn’t even own a school, he said.

“There are people out there who just want to make money from this enterprise,” he said. “They see kids as dollars.”

As school board members and superintendents work to improve public education and innovate in their districts, Mahoney urged them to use each other as resources to help their students.

“I guarantee there isn’t a problem that some of you are facing that another county hasn’t faced and can help you solve it,” he said. “You bring each other up.”

He also encouraged them remember that they did not get to where they were on their own. As he showed the crowd a catcher’s glove signed by Yogi Berra, Mahoney threw out baseballs to the crowd and urged them to get a baseball and collect signatures of the people who have made a difference in their lives.

“None of you got to where you are by yourselves,” he said. “So, go get those signatures.”

Mahoney sent the audience back to their districts with a toast:

“To public education, those who labor in it, for those who are elected to serve it, for those who are committed to it and most of all for those who have benefited from it, it leaves a flavor and commitment to plant shade trees for future generations. To the greatest equalizer known to man, the institution of public education and to you for serving it.”