The Edison Way: Education as Unique as Our Learners
Posts Tagged "excellence"
Cultivate an Exponential Impact
February 03, 2026
1992 was the year I began my career in education, and at the time I didn’t think about the long-term impact I might have on my kids. I started as a physical education teacher, so I taught fitness, sports, winning and losing, and having fun. I tried to teach good sportsmanship and character. I wanted them to be good kids who were well-rounded. I talked about doing the right thing and being a good example for others. But I don’t remember thinking about how those kids would one day become teachers, business professionals, leaders, parents, etc.
Over thirty years later as an administrator, I am still preparing kids for life, but now I am intentionally thinking about their future roles and the impact they will have on the world. It seems as I get older, the more focused I am on teaching kids to do the right thing, develop good character, be selfless, and work hard. While I may not be the person directly teaching these things to kids at The Edison School, I am talking about them with my team and reminding them to teach these to our students. All of this can be summed up in our third core value – cultivate an exponential impact.
What we mean by cultivating an exponential impact is that we teach life skills, character development, and we are focused on the whole child. When we do this with excellence, we transform the lives of our kids and their families. We talk to them about their future and remind them that they will one day have an opportunity to lead, teach, and be parents, which means they will be making an impact on other people’s lives. As a team, we cannot transform every child’s life, but we can transform the lives of those who enroll at Edison. In turn, we want them to think about how they can transform the lives of people they encounter after leaving Edison.
We have found that this core value is a result of consistently living out our other two core values, creating meaningful connections and striving for excellence. When you have strong connections with kids and are pushing them to be their best, they will have real-life examples of impact that they can turn to for the rest of their lives.
Striving for Excellence
January 28, 2026
This has been an especially hard week for middle Tennesseans, and the south in general, because of an ice storm that came through last weekend. People have been without power for days. Businesses and schools have been closed. Trees have fallen and caused damage. My guess is a lot of people are experiencing cabin fever since getting out has been tough. What we witnessed during the aftermath of this storm have been people needing to display character traits like flexibility and grit. These are two traits that we at Edison believe help make up our second core value.
Striving for excellence – this does not mean perfection; rather, we believe it means consistent growth and improvement that requires the living out of specific character traits by everyone on our team.
1) Being faithful in the little things – our team is consistent and diligent in unassuming, everyday tasks with our kids.
2) Having the humility to pursue personal growth – members of the Edison team understand the importance of constant personal growth. Personal growth is not just attending classes, or reading journals, it also happens when we talk with each other about situations we are facing. No one on the team thinks they are too good to learn from others and improve.
3) Having grit and persistence – we have a team of people who face challenges daily and push through these for the benefit of our kids, each other, and the entire school.
4) The flexibility to adapt to ever-changing situations – at Edison, no two days are the same. All of our kids learn differently, so our team must adapt. Kids come in each day with something new or different that forces our team to remain flexible in the way we meet the needs of each child.
Striving for excellence is the core value that reminds everyone on Edison’s team that we will not settle for mediocrity, and that we are constantly looking for ways to improve.