The Education Imperative
Ignite Transformation in Your District Community
Committed to achieving better academic, behavioral, health, and life outcomes for students and the adults that support them, Phoenix County’s school board agreed to a bold new approach. They found new leadership and embarked on a multi-year journey to transform their school system and community-wide partnerships into a coherent student-centered ecosystem.
In The Education Imperative, strategic education consultant Charles Wright, Jr. has combined three decades of work in education, philanthropy, and business to offer an inspiring and thought-provoking vision via the aspirational story of one family’s experience in the redesigned Phoenix County school ecosystem.
This novel tool will enable you to:
- Discover, develop, and/or accelerate your personal journey to support and lead transformative change
- Engage all stakeholders in a discussion that builds connections and sets the stage for bold changes
- Listen deeply, identify areas for healing, and discover support for breakthrough ideas
If you are a central office leader, supervisor, or staff member looking for a compelling way to deepen systemwide conversations around access, equity, and transformative change without burning out, this book is for you.
Inspire colleagues. Build trust. Take bold action.
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What Readers Are Saying
What Readers Are Saying
“A remarkable, courageous offering to a society and system in desperate need. Not only has the author maintained hope after thirty-plus years of witnessing worsening outcomes in Education, he is offering a transformative, interdisciplinary-informed, community-driven vision that I believe will captivate and empower the hearts and minds of those who have the power to co-create thriving ecosystems.
As a retired school counselor, I was in the trenches with students like the ones in this story, operating alongside under-resourced teachers and parents, and working myself to the bone for outcomes that still did not meet the needs of the children I supported. Today, as a grandmother, I am grateful for thought leaders like Charles who are determined to treat students and staff as whole human beings with needs that have been overlooked by our systems for far too long.
My prayer is that the leaders who pick up this book will agree to meet on the sacred grounds of our contractual obligation to our children, those who support them, and our future.”
~ Sandy Ingle, PsyD
Retired School Counselor
"As a Law of Attraction author who's written extensively about new paradigms and their power to help us change, and a recently retired public school administrator who had front-row seats to the need for change in public education, I highly recommend the approach Charles Wright, Jr. is taking with this book.
The Education Imperative offers an innovative paradigm for education that meets the needs and nurtures the potential of every stakeholder. Through the aspirational story, his insights into the mindsets, incentives, and other invisible barriers to change, and reflective questions, readers are invited to learn, probe, and hold themselves and their school system leaders accountable.
If you're open to new paradigms in education that will result in significantly better academic, behavioral, health, and life outcomes for students, parents, teachers, administrators, and staff, this is a must-read."
~ Greg Kuhn
Retired Public School Administrator
Author and Speaker
Charles E. Wright, Jr.
Charles Wright, Jr. is Founder and CEO of the System Transformation Accelerator, an emerging nonprofit organization committed to helping school district communities redesign their educational and student service offerings into a coherent ecosystem where significantly more students and adults thrive. Charles has more than 25 years of experience helping leaders of complex multi-site organizations achieve transformational results that have a social impact, fueled by his passion for helping families and professionals connect to the people, resources, and tools they need to help their children succeed in and out of school.
Charles previously served as Deputy Superintendent of the Seattle Public Schools. In this role, he was responsible for improving the systems that support the day-to-day operation of the district and overseeing the implementation of the district’s strategic plan.
Under Charles’ leadership, the system increased school leader satisfaction with services to the next performance tier in 10 programs, adopted and implemented the Seattle Preschool program, stabilized and improved Special Education Services, raised funding to double support for strengthening an aging technology infrastructure, and more.
He has extensive operational, planning, project management, and continuous improvement experience gained from previous roles with the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Wright Associates, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Denver Public Schools, School Evaluation and Management Services, Duval County Public Schools, Ford Foundation, and the Cleveland Foundation. In these organizations, he participated in a wide range of innovative local and national initiatives intended to bring about change within K-12 school systems and institutions of higher education.
Charles completed his Bachelor of Arts in Finance at Morehouse College, his Master of Arts in Elementary Education at Teachers College, Columbia University, and his Juris Doctorate at the University of Pennsylvania. Charles and his wife Stephanie live in Washington with their sixteen-year-old daughter where he spends his extra time cycling and swimming.