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Human Restoration Project

Human Restoration Project

Since 2018, the Human Restoration Project Podcast has reimagined education through critical, progressive, human-centered learning.

Across nearly 200 episodes, and counting, we've explored every topic in education: ungrading and alternative assessment, interdisciplinary play-based and project-based learning, SEL, education reforms and systemic school change in society with students, teachers, leaders, researchers, and advocates around the world. 

Join us on our mission to restore humanity to education, together!

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  • 24 episodes
  • fortnightly
  • Avg 48 min
  • English

Episodes 24

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  • #183
    Dec 6, 2025 · 1 hr

    Cultivating Creativity and Connection in the Classroom w/ Tom Rendon & Zachary Stier

    How do you define creativity? Would you be able to spot creativity in the wild? What about creativity in the classroom? This endless human quest to define the seemingly undefinable, and somehow make it useful for educators, is what today’s guests Tom Rendon and Zachary Stier set out to do, bringing together philosophy, neuroscience, and site visits, in a years-long collaboration that became Creativity in Young Children: What Science Tells Us and Our Hearts Know. In this conversation, Tom and Zach help me understand the counterintuitive ways creativity shows up in the world, in the human condition, and how we can cultivate creativity and connection in the classroom.

  • #182
    Nov 22, 2025 · 1 hr 1 min

    Are we Reader or are we Player? w/ Karis Jones, Virginia Killian Lund, Brady Nash, and Trevor Aleo

    Most of us probably experienced a homogenous version of literacy in our English classes: read a book, answer a few questions along the way, and compose an essay at the end about how we viewed a key theme. Rinse and repeat. And in our current age of high-stakes testing and high-stakes literacy, some kids are lucky to ever encounter a book at all; however, those same students are also surrounded by the narratives and themes of English class - in the messages they send and receive and the virtual communities they participate in, the media they consume and discuss with their friends, and in the video games they play. The goal of my guests today is to expand our vision of what that English class could be and induct students into something of an animistic perspective of literacy, as you heard from one guest in the opening: that the narratives and themes of English class are everywhere for those equipped to see them as such. Their Reader-Player Interactivity Framework aims to give teachers and students the tools and confidence to do just that. Their paper, linked in the show notes, is a collaboration between Karis Jones, Brady Nash, Virginia Killian Lund, Scott Storm, Alex Corbitt, Beth Krone, and Trevor Aleo, of which Karis, Brady, Virginia, and Trevor joined me for this conversation. Article: The Reader-Player Interactivity Framework: How Do Readers Navigate Diverse Varieties of Narrative Texts? Unsilencing Gratia: a tabletop RPG book designed to be an easy introduction to collaborative storytelling, usable in a classroom setting. We Know Something You Don’t Know: a tabletop RPG that invites you into the lives of students making their way day-by-day through the education system. You can reach any of our guests by email: Trevor Aleo: aleotc@gmail.com Karis Jones: karis.michelle.jones@gmail.com Virginia Killian Lund: vkillianlund@uri.edu Brady Nash: bradylnash@gmail.com

  • #181
    Nov 8, 2025 · 1 hr 6 min

    Making School Finance As Public As Possible w/ David I. Backer

    We’re recording this episode the week the Iowa DOGE Task Force released their final 136 page report – you heard that right, that’s the state-level version of the Department of Government Efficiency convened by our governor back in February, tasked with maximizing return on investment of Iowa taxpayer dollars. As you can imagine, among their recommendations are ideas from the Return on Taxpayer Investment Working Group about improving education results “aimed at delivering greater value for taxpayers.” Fortunately for Iowans, this working group assembled a crack team of experienced education experts for the job, including the CEO of an ethanol plant, the former Chair of the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission, and the chair of a civil engineering firm. Among their recommendations are to: "Establish a merit-based compensation framework –including a bonus structure, teacher professional development and incentives for those in high-need schools in order to improve student outcomes and financially reward high-performing teachers.” Merit-pay is of course a tried, tested, and failed idea. But teacher salaries are just one thread in the complex tapestry of how states pay for public education and the ideological tug of war in our public debates over school funding – how we pay for buildings, pensions, special education, Title 1, school food programs…every cost that goes into making schooling work…or not. If the Iowa DOGE report and the policy agenda that will inevitably follow could be titled As Privatized as Possible – doubling down on outcome-based school funding and accountability measures and even recommending AI-based bus route optimization to “cut costs and improve service”...what’s the alternative? My guest today asks, “What would it mean to democratize school resources? What would it mean to have truly public schools, down to the very means of resource creation and distribution that fuels them…what will it take to make school as public as possible.” It’s also the title of his upcoming book, As Public as Possible: Radical Finance for America’s Public Schools out this December. You can preorder it now from The New Press. David Backer is the author. He’s an associate professor of education policy at Seton Hall University whose research, teaching, and organizing focus on ideology and school finance. A former high school teacher, his research has appeared in a half dozen scholarly journals like the Harvard Education Review as well as popular venues like The American Prospect and Jacobin. And you can find him on social media @schooldaves. As Public As Possible (The New Press) @SchoolDaves TikTok

  • #180
    Oct 25, 2025 · 54 min

    The Buzz About the Human Hive w/ Kate McAllister

    When I sat down with James Mannion to talk about the educational polycrisis back in July, his long-time colleague, friend, and collaborator Kate McAllister was right there by his side. After the recording, Kate & I spent a long time catching up about her work and its intersection with our own, and we immediately vowed to remember to hit record the next time we chatted. Kate McAllister is both a co-founder of The Human Hive and the founder of The Hive in Cabrera, a school for ChangeMakers in the Dominican Republic, where she joined me from for this conversation. Kate has over 20 years' teaching experience and has spent much of that time training and developing teachers and educators all over the world. She is a passionate educator, published author, fellow of the Chartered College of Teachers and The RSA. The Hive, founded back in 2020, is Kate's answer to the question "what if?" What if learning could be different? What if we did education with not for others? What if we can become more self-determined in our learning? What if education can help regenerate the planet? And as you’ll hear in this episode, Kate’s personal and educational journey is a remarkable reflection of her dedication to the fully human messiness of growing and learning in community with others. The Human Hive

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