I remember the first time I encountered unisex bathrooms. I was traveling, with a backpack and not much money, in Europe, staying in youth hostels and tourist rooms, often in the homes of women I would meet at train stations holding up signs saying Zimmer zu vermieten. Near the end of the trip, an eight-week […]| Teacher in a strange land
I’m old enough to remember Ronald Reagan hosting General Electric Theater, on Sunday nights, when he would look sincerely into the camera and say “General Electric, where progress is our most important product.” Presumably, progress was both inevitable and desirable—a mashup of American technologies and innovation, bringing (GE again) good things to life. On television, […]| Teacher in a strange land
I haven’t written much about AI and education, for several reasons. First, there are already many people writing compellingly and with considerable expertise about the uses and misuses of AI in the…| Teacher in a strange land
We need to make sure our coverage is rooted in enduring principles and values. We need to make sure we don’t “both sides” the issues when it comes to objective truths. We need to speak and deliver news with moral clarity. (Ben Meiselas) I would imagine that most sentient people—red- or blue-leaning—would agree with […]| Teacher in a strange land
In November of 2016, right after Donald Trump was elected for the first time, seventh graders at Royal Oak Middle School were captured on video shouting “Build that wall! Build that wall!” in the …| Teacher in a strange land
1 post published by nflanagan during September 2025| Teacher in a strange land
A few years back, I was facilitating a day-long workshop of self-identified teacher leaders in a western state. The topic: Blogging as a Tool for Change. It was a room chock-full of smart, feisty, …| Teacher in a strange land
4 posts published by nflanagan during August 2025| Teacher in a strange land
The mainstream media has been full of the bad news: new study shows that reading for pleasure has declined! Fewer people are reading for fun: From 2003 to 2023, the share of Americans who read for pleasure fell 40 percent, a sharp decline that is part of a continuing downward trend. It’s easy to feel […]| Teacher in a strange land
I am a big fan of Jess Piper, a veteran teacher from Missouri, who left the classroom to run for office, and has since reshaped the conversation around why red-staters vote against their own interests. Piper writes often about a childhood spent bouncing around the south, and the family values that influenced her. When people […]| Teacher in a strange land
It’s August. I admit that I am a sucker for the cute back-to-school photos—students holding little chalkboards, shiny floors and carefully stapled bulletin boards. Special props to veteran teachers…| Teacher in a strange land
Maureen Dowd, in a NYT article entitled Attention, Men: Books are Sexy!: Men are reading less. Women make up 80 percent of fiction sales. “Young men have regressed educationally, emotionally and culturally,” David J. Morris wrote in a Times essay titled “The Disappearance of Literary Men Should Worry Everyone.” The fiction gap makes me sad. A man […]| Teacher in a strange land
I’ve been more or less off the grid for the past two weeks, vacationing in Alaska and determined not to let the repellent Epstein Saga or other assorted travesties spoil the snow-capped mountain vi…| Teacher in a strange land
More than four years ago, in April 2020, I wrote this ridiculously optimistic piece: A Dozen Good Things that Could (Just Maybe) Happen as a Result of this Pandemic. Every now and then, I pull…| Teacher in a strange land
