Mike Montoya
Bio
Founder and CEO of Stronger Consulting, with thirty-two years in education.Appears in 50 Episodes
Lead With Empathy and Assume Best Intent: How a Former Private Banker Builds Teacher Pathways in Greater DC (with Anthony Dorado)
Anthony Dorado's road back to the program that trained him began when a busy CEO made time for him, and now he tries to give fifteen minutes to anyone who reaches out....
Belief in Kids Is Only the Start: How Teach For America Indianapolis Turns It Into Results with Dr. Tenika Holden-Flynn
Dr. Tenika Holden-Flynn, Executive Director of Teach For America Indianapolis, says believing in kids is only the start. The work is turning that belief into clear goa...
Better Curriculum Isn't Enough: Mapping the Gap Between Common Core and Student Outcomes with Joy Osborne
Joy Osborne, President and CEO of Student Achievement Partners, says the Common Core era made instructional materials better across the country. Student outcomes have ...
The Future Is Not Something We Predict: Venture Philanthropy and Systems Change in a Global Realignment with Shruti Sehra
Shruti Sehra leads New Profit, a national venture philanthropy, through what she calls the largest global realignment of our lifetimes, driven by rapid innovation and ...
Education Data Misses the Kids in the Middle: From Community Organizing to Getting Servant Leaders on the Ballot with Leticia de la Vara
Leticia de la Vara, Chief Impact and Operating Officer at New Politics, spent their school years in the part of the education data nobody writes reports about: the mid...
Latino Professionals in Corporate America Plan Further Ahead: Why Culture Is an Asset and Not a Liability with Dr. Daniel Custódio
Dr. Daniel Custódio's research found that Latino professionals plan further ahead than their peers in corporate America, and that the culture they were told to leave a...
Teacher Attendance Predicts Turnover: The Retention Signal Most School Systems Miss with Dr. Tommy Chang
Teacher attendance is the clearest early warning sign of teacher turnover, and Dr. Tommy Chang, CEO of New Teacher Center, says most school systems are not watching it...
Teacher Retention Is a School Systems Problem: Building the Black and Brown Middle Class in South LA with Jesse Melgares
Jesse Melgares runs a TK-12 charter school network in South Los Angeles, and he argues teacher retention is not a teacher problem. It is a systems problem, and most sc...
Parents Are the CEOs of the Household: Why Cash and Coaching Break the Cycle of Poverty with Neils Ribeiro-Yemofio
Economic mobility programs usually arrive with a plan for parents. Neils Ribeiro-Yemofio starts by believing them. In this episode of The Stronger Podcast, Mike Monto...
Charter School Boards Should Keep Their Noses In and Fingers Out: Rebuilding a School the Community Co-Owns with Dr. Tara Raines
Dr. Tara Raines chairs the board of a Las Vegas charter school that just separated from its New York management network, and she is rebuilding it around the rule she k...
Education Leaders Don't Last Twenty Years Anymore: Lead Yourself Before You Lead Others with Bill Kurtz
Education leader Bill Kurtz spent twenty years building DSST Public Schools into one of Denver's top performing charter networks, then spent nine months learning how...
Washington Thought It Was Different: What It Takes to Grow Great Charter Schools Anywhere with Julie Kennedy
Charter schools have been legal in Washington for just over a decade, and Excellent Schools Washington founder Julie Kennedy has a blunt read on why the start was rock...
Not Everything That Ends Is a Failure: Career Pivots, Growth Mindset, and Redefining Fulfillment with Tess Vigil
Tess Vigil has had her role reduced or eliminated four times, and she will tell you none of it was failure. It was clarity. From a Los Angeles dress company to cultura...
People Already Know What They Need: Behavioral Health Systems, Agency, and the Softening That Leaders Resist with Denise Jensen
Ten percent of Utah's children were using roughly ninety percent of the state's behavioral health funding, and no one system owned them. In this episode of The Strong...
A Turtle Carries Home on Its Back: First-Generation Leadership and Student Success in Higher Ed with Dr. Aidé Acosta
Dr. Aidé Acosta went from a first-generation college student navigating higher education without a map to the Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students a...
Keep Your Eye on the Ball: 27 Years on a School Board and the Discipline of Not Getting Distracted with Bobby Blount
Bobby Blount has served on the Northside ISD school board for 27 years, and he has spent every one of them refusing to get distracted from the one thing that matters: ...
The Hidden Power of Relational Intelligence in Building High-Performing Teams with Dr. Jennifer Brown
Relational intelligence may be the one advantage humans keep as AI gets smarter, and Dr. Jennifer Brown has spent 25 years proving it builds stronger teams. A regional...
Stop Reimagining School, Start Building Better Ones: Why Intentionally Diverse Schools Are an Antidote with Ashley Heard
Ashley Heard has spent eight years making the case for intentionally diverse charter schools, and she is more convinced than ever that they matter right now. In this ...