Schools at the Edge of the Map
… and a Request
By Stuart Grauer

Friends,

For many years I've been collecting stories from schools, deserts, mountains, coastlines, villages, and unexpected places that have changed the way I and many readers think about education and leadership.

Those stories have become a proposed storytelling performance for SXSW EDU 2027 called Schools at the Edge of the Map: Stories of Human Flourishing in an Age of Artificial Intelligence. This is an incredibly inspiring venue to spread the word about our work.

If you’re wondering how we help young people—and ourselves—find belonging, purpose, and genuine human connection in a wildly changing world, I know this session will resonate with you. Recent research points to an important implementation problem: outdoor learning's benefits are increasingly accepted and proven in research and practice, while teachers still identify almost constant structural and social/political barriers to making it part of the ordinary curriculum. 

Breaking research points to an important paradox: the benefits of outdoor learning are increasingly accepted, healthy, and impactful, yet teachers continue to report barriers to making it part of everyday education: parents, grades, permission slips, standards, you name it. It's almost unbelievable to hear what many teachers believe stands in the way of simply taking students into the real, natural world.

This message matters. We can do this. If you'd like to help bring it to Austin, please click on the button below to vote for the proposal. It only takes a moment.

Vote For Stuart's Proposal

You'll need to create an account. I promise, it takes a minute and is just a click. You'll need to verify your account through a link that will be sent to your email address. Then, paste into the search field:  "Schools at the Edge of the Map" or "Grauer" to find the proposal summary, and click on the ❤️ to submit your vote.

Thank you to everyone who has encouraged this work over the years. Many of you have been part of these stories.

You made it this far...

If you've already clicked into PanelPicker (thank you!), let me tell you why I call it Schools at the Edge of the Map… and why ALL great schools are at the edge of the map. A story:

Many years ago, I was halfway down the Colorado River in the perfectly named Grand Canyon when I saw a mark on my nautical chart that indicated The Way to Pancho's Kitchen, about 3 km downstream. It looked like the sort of place you would never find on purpose.

The river became narrower, the water rougher. The chart now seemed useless. This was as remote as the future. Finally, around a sharp bend, we swirled into an eddy and there was a tiny campsite where we would spend the night. We made camp. By the time the sky was dark and the stars took over, I could see that there was nowhere further to look. Right here, in this small corner in the middle of the natural world—over the edge of what we often call the “real” world—was everything a person would ever need to learn about how to create and sustain generative, healthy organizations that people want to be in.

Maybe more important, when we are amidst the great, unspoiled natural systems, we have everything our children need for a perfect education. So much else can just bring distraction.

Nobody was trying to optimize anything we found at Pancho’s Kitchen. Everything was in its perfect place. In a place like that, we find what we need to remind us what human beings need to flourish …to matter. To want to learn. To look up instead of down, and to grow healthy.

It turns out every school, every community, and every organization has its own "edge of the map." Finding it may be the most important journey we make as educators, parents, leaders, and friends. That's the story of the stories I hope to bring to SXSW EDU.

Thank you for helping me get there. 

(Vote Here: https://participate.sxsw.com/flow/sxsw/sxsw27/community-voting-edu/page/community-voting/session/1782245001342001Qawx)

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