Texas Couple Take Prize for Creating Change Through Education

A 2009 encounter with a public college instructor dramatically modified the course of Laura and Jeff Sandefer’s lives—and the lives of 1000’s of scholars.

That yr, the Sandefers had been contemplating a transfer from a Montessori college in Austin, Texas, to a standard college for their sons. During a meeting with a teacher at a neighborhood personal college, Jeff Sandefer requested when they need to make the transition.

“As soon as possible,” the instructor replied. “Once they’ve experienced so much freedom, they will hate sitting in a desk and being talked at all day.” 

When Sandefer pictured his curious, energetic boys confined to a classroom on this means, he was heartbroken. And that afternoon, when he returned residence to his spouse Laura, he instructed her: “We’re not doing that to our boys. We’re either going to home-school or start our own school.”

That’s how Acton Academy was born.

For their groundbreaking contributions to schooling via platforms corresponding to Acton Academy and the Acton Children’s Business Fair, the Sandefers are the recipients of Philanthropy Roundtable’s 2023 Simon-DeVos Prize for Philanthropic Leadership.

The Simon-DeVos Prize honors dwelling philanthropists who’ve set an instance of management excellence via charitable giving and by conveying the values of particular person freedom, resourcefulness, religion in God, private accountability, scholarship, volunteerism, and serving to others assist themselves.

Awakening Heroes on a Hero’s Journey  

Acton Academy is a worldwide community of personal faculties impressed by the approach to education pioneered by the one-room schoolhouse. These faculties encourage all college students to see themselves as heroes in ready, with an essential quest to embark upon.

At Acton Academy associates, college students are inspired to connect with their distinctive presents and genius, very similar to the educational in small teams and apprenticeships of early America.

“We believe each child has a special gift, and our role is to inspire them with great stories from the past to be the heroes in their own hero’s journey,” Jeff Sandefer says. “We believe children learn best through trial and error, in a tightly knit community, tackling real-world problems through sharing the stories, examples, rubrics, and recipes widely available because of 21st-century technology.”

Acton’s founding centered round the concept that every pupil is a genius in his or her personal means. Every particular person has a novel calling to uncover, and inside that potential lies the flexibility to alter the world for the higher.

“While our learners excel as thinkers, speakers, writers and users of math and technology, we believe courage, setting goals and getting along with others are even more important,” Laura Sandefer says.

From Small Rental Space to Global Movement

What began with seven college students in a small rental home has expanded to a rising, worldwide academic phenomenon.

Acton Academy’s studying mannequin is characterised by:

• Game-based studying packages that assist college students develop core information and expertise.
• Discussions primarily based on the Socratic technique that encourage the event of crucial considering.
• Real-world, hands-on initiatives and studying experiences.
• Apprenticeships that equip college students with all-important expertise and information they will take into their skilled lives.

Now, with some 300 affiliated faculties in 42 states and 25 nations, the Acton Academy mannequin is rising steadily in reputation. Students from kindergarten via twelfth grade research and develop their particular person abilities in these intimate settings as they put together for entrepreneurship, larger schooling, or the workforce.

“My parents had seven children, none of whom learned the same way,” says Bill Simon Jr., co-chairman of the William E. Simon Foundation, which, together with the DeVos Family Foundation, sponsors the annual prize.

“Laura and Jeff Sandefer are visionaries in helping empower parents to create schools that meet the needs of their children through the Acton Academies,” Simon says. “We are so pleased that their accomplishments and generosity are being recognized with the 2023 Simon-DeVos Prize for Philanthropic Leadership.”

The Sandefers credit score Acton Academy’s success to the households who had the braveness to attempt a brand new strategy to schooling.

“We focused on the needs of the end customer,” Jeff Sandefer says. “Then, we built experiments that turned into kits many could use, and a network of people willing to work and learn together. In every way, it was a bottom-up experiment that relied on the hard work of thousands of young heroes and parents with real skin in the game.”

Sifting Through Past: Pre-Industrial Revolution Education

As the Sandefers started to contemplate what launching their very own college may appear to be, they traveled again in time—first to the Industrial Revolution of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when our present mannequin for public schools emerged. The present system is professionalized and modeled to coach productive residents. But meaning kids are being educated in an setting that’s, basically, industrialized.

The Sandefers consider the standard mannequin of schooling fails to acknowledge college students as people. Rather than treating kids as cogs in a machine, Acton Academy seeks to remodel them into the leaders and heroes they’re able to changing into.

“Children aren’t widgets,” Jeff Sandefer stated in a 2011 TED Talk in Oklahoma City.

Rather than emulating the present academic system, Acton Academy is modeled after the tutorial model of the one-room schoolhouse that predates the Industrial Revolution. It’s additionally characterised by apprenticeships that permit college students to review beneath a educated instructor who can assist them study important expertise for the years forward.

“Jeff and Laura’s visionary ideas have transformed the educational ecosystem by fostering entrepreneurship, critical thinking, and character development in young people through experiential student-led learning,” entrepreneur and investor Rick DeVos says. “Their work through Acton Academy has empowered students to discover their unique gifts and become independent lifelong learners. Jeff and Laura’s outstanding contributions uplift communities and ignite a ripple effect of transformational impact.” 

Creating an Agile Network Through Experimentation

Acton Academy’s founders and leaders have demonstrated a deep willingness to experiment and stay agile of their quest to develop its sturdy academic packages. Laura Sandefer says they’ve rigorously “defended against mission creep,” remaining targeted on the duty at hand.

“We learned from groups like the early Christian church and Alcoholics Anonymous how to create lightweight, powerful networks where those we serve promise to serve others and pay it forward,” she says.

Throughout Acton Academy’s growth, its leaders have experimented with enhancing the tutorial mannequin. They repeat what works till they will package deal it right into a equipment for others. Then, they create networks to study from each other.

When experiments are confirmed to be efficient, they develop into a part of Acton Academy’s playbook.

Entrepreneurial, Educational Roots Inspire Fresh Method

At its core, Acton Academy helps to develop crucial considering and entrepreneurial expertise in younger college students. The idea fashioned partly due to the Sandefers’ distinctive backgrounds.

A profitable entrepreneur and educator who based seven businesses, together with the oil and gasoline firm Sandefer Offshore and the vitality funding agency Sandefer Capital Partners, Jeff Sandefer realized entrepreneurship at an early age.

His father, an oil businessman from Abilene, Texas, made his dwelling from wildcatting, a high-risk technique of exploratory oil drilling that isn’t assured to yield outcomes. At 16, Jeff launched his first enterprise: portray oil tankers.

He earned his bachelor’s diploma in petroleum and gasoline from the University of Texas. From there, he went on to Harvard University to earn his MBA. During this time, he realized in regards to the Socratic technique, a instructing method that Acton Academy employs in the present day to encourage crucial considering.

For greater than three many years, Jeff Sandefer labored as a professor—first on the University of Texas, then at his Acton School of Business MBA program, and later as a information at Acton Academy.

Laura, whose mom was a beloved instructor, holds a bachelor of arts diploma and a grasp’s diploma in schooling from Vanderbilt University. She is the writer of the 2017 guide “Courage to Grow: How Acton Academy Turns Learning Upside Down.”

Combining their shared backgrounds, the Sandefers blazed an entrepreneurial path, establishing and rising Acton Academy into a worldwide motion. Despite its success, they are saying they continue to be aware of why they established the mannequin college.

“Our mission is to serve families and their quest for learning—not to take political positions or participate in educational reform,” Laura Sandefer says.

Making an Impact Through Engaged Philanthropy

At the center of each charitable donor is a want to enhance the lives of others. When it involves being an engaged philanthropist, Laura says it’s essential to concentrate on “questions, choices, and community” over cash and top-down options.

“[We focus on] questions to discover the deeply felt needs of an individual; choices to offer to the individual who becomes the hero in his or her own story; and community so the individual becomes part of something grander and more beautiful, and almost always pays it forward by serving someone else,” she says.

Rather than utilizing a number of metrics to gauge their success, the Sandefers say they concentrate on just one: the willingness of learners and their households to advocate Acton Academy to others.

Jeff Sandefer says Acton Academy has seemed to the nonprofit Philanthropy Roundtable as a mannequin for its personal progress and growth.

“I found … Philanthropy Roundtable in 1989 when I was 29 years old,” he says. “Over the last several decades, their focus on donor intent, keeping overhead low and staying focused on the needs of those we serve have been guiding lights.”

Looking Toward the Future

As recipients of the 2023 Simon-DeVos Prize, the Sandefers will obtain an award of $200,000, which can be paid towards a number of chosen charities.

The Sandefers say they’ve elected to separate the award between the Acton Institute, an academic establishment that’s unrelated to Acton Academy, and Hope International, a microfinance group that helps battle poverty.

“Jeff and Laura’s journey has been defined by a relentless pursuit of positive change, a commitment to innovation and a deep compassion for humanity,” says Dick DeVos, president of the Dick and Betsy DeVos Foundation. “Their ability to inspire, motivate and mobilize others across the globe through the Acton model is a testament to their exemplary leadership and charisma. Their story reminds me that each one of us has the capacity to make a difference, creating a legacy that extends far beyond our own lifetimes.”

For the Sandefers, accepting the Simon-DeVos Prize is the fruits of years of philanthropy and influence. But it’s additionally a poignant second for the couple, who’ve been impressed by the Simon and DeVos households for a few years.

“I’ve long admired the work and character of Betsy, Dick, and the DeVos family,” Jeff Sandefer says. “Likewise, Bill Simon has been a hero of mine since the 1970s, from his pioneering of the leveraged buyout to his world-changing service as secretary of the treasury.”

“Being recognized by the Simon and DeVos families is a great honor, and we’ll do everything we can to live up to it,” he provides.

The prize was introduced to the Sandefers in October at Philanthropy Roundtable’s annual assembly in Rancho Palos Verdes, California.

Learn extra in regards to the Simon-Devos Prize here. An earlier version of this article appeared first on the web site of Philanthropy Roundtable.    

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