Walk through any school hallway and you will see it right away. Students moving from class to class. Conversations. Laughter. Energy. What you do not see matters just as much. Every person in our schools carries a story. That includes our students. It also includes the adults who show up each day to serve them. Some come to school with stability, support, and consistency. Others are carrying things that are much harder to see. Stress at home. Health concerns. Financial pressure. Personal...

Every so often, a book comes along that doesn’t just tell a story—it holds up a mirror. Mitch Albom’s Twice  is one of those books. Like most of his work, it doesn’t shout lessons; it quietly whispers them. The story centers on redemption, second chances, and the simple truth that we often see life more clearly the second time around. When I finished the final page, I sat in silence for a few moments. It wasn’t the kind of story you walk away from and say, “That was nice.” It was the kind...

Every October, colleges and universities across the country send out midterm grades. They don’t actually count for much — they’re a progress report, a pulse check halfway through the semester. Dr. David Dinin, who teaches a class at Duke called Learning to Fail , recently wrote about his experience giving midterm grades in a course literally designed around failure. As you can imagine, that made for some fascinating irony. His students wrote to him confused and a little hurt: “Dr. Dinin, I...