About Me: http://about.me/boadams1
Twitter: @boadams1
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Narrative Bio
Bo Adams considers himself first and foremost to be a learner. He treasures being a dad, as well as an educator and innovator. Bo identifies as an adventure sport enthusiast, and he actively pursues hiking, mountain biking, rock climbing, and kayaking. In September 2016, he began a challenge to summit all 54 fourteeners in Colorado. Bo loves to read, write, draw, design, tinker, think and do. Bo believes any boundaries between school and life should be blurred and semi-permeable at least. For more than a decade, his core research question has been, “If school is meant to prepare kids for real life, then why doesn’t school look more like real life?”
In June 2013, Bo joined Mount Vernon Presbyterian School as Chief Learning and Innovation Officer, and Bo could not have been more excited to become a member of the team at this leading school of inquiry, innovation, and impact. Additionally, Bo serves as Executive Director of the Mount Vernon Institute for Innovation, a transformation design studio and PK-12 R&D lab. He’s extremely proud of his involvement in the establishment of the Innovation Diploma at Mount Vernon. Bo remains active as an edu-blogger at It’s About Learning (https://itsaboutlearning.wordpress.com) and @boadams1 on Twitter. Additionally, Bo regularly pursues deeper understanding in the area of “schools of the future and the future of schools.”
From July 2012 to May 2013, Bo served as the Director of Educational Innovation at Unboundary, a strategic design studio in Atlanta, Georgia, specializing in transformational change processes, communications, and brand significance.
From 1995 until 2012, Bo worked at The Westminster Schools in Atlanta, Georgia, where he fulfilled a number of roles during his tenure there. In Bo’s last nine years at Westminster, he served as the principal of the Junior High School. In 2006, Bo co-founded The Center for Teaching at The Westminster Schools. Bo’s primary points of focus throughout his principalship were faculty development, professional learning communities, assessment literacy, project-based learning, change management and educational innovation. In 2010, Bo and Jill Gough launched “Synergy” – a community-issues, project-based, problem-identification-and-solutions course for eighth graders. Prior to coming to Westminster, Bo worked at Darlington School in Rome, Georgia; Loudoun Country Day School in Leesburg, Virginia; and Camp Sea Gull in Arapahoe, North Carolina.
Two Speaking Demonstrations – Martin Institute & TEDxAtlanta
[Martin Institute for Teaching Excellence 2012 Summer Conference]
[TEDxAtlanta Re:learn, May 18, 2010]
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Carney, Sandoe & Associates names Bo one of 8 Thought Leaders to Follow Now (December 19, 2013)
Bo on Newsle
More about Bo’s Previous Chapters
- Posted on September 14, 2017, A.J. Juliani interviewed Bo about the innovative work happening at Mount Vernon Presbyterian School and the Mount Vernon Institute for Innovation.
- While Bo was at Unboundary, “We Love Creativity” conducted and published a series of interviews with Bo.
- On Feb. 29, 2012, students from the Westminster 8th grade Writing Workshop team that produces the Wildcat Press Xpress posted this podcast interview with Bo. Thanks WPX!
personal learning plan I professional learning I books & videos
it's about learning 
Good afternoon Mr Adams, I was given your email from Barbara beachley as maybe someone who can give me some insight as to how you folks used learning walks to measure the efficacy of specific rollouts. My school is involved in a personalized learning initiative and I’m looking to support that initiative through peer based learning walks. I was wondering how you guys have used learning walks and if you’ve ever tied it to measurement or evaluating how effective teachers have taken a professional development or roll out or initiative into their daily practice.
Please feel free to give me any idea of how you guys used it and your opinion of it, and I’d be really open to see some of your artifacts rubrics or tools that you used. Reach out if you think you’d be open to doing some sharing with me if not if you have anyone else that you can recommend that be a huge help thanks.
Michael, Great to connect with you. Thanks for your note on my site. I will respond via the LinkedIn message you sent. Take care.
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Hi Bo,
My name is Josh Miller and I am a Principal in Colorado. We just had AJ Juliani out for PD and he mentioned connecting with you about visiting as well as the FUSE conference. I sent you a message via Twitter and here as well hoping to be able to touch base with you. Thanks in advance.
Josh, It’s great to hear from you. Thank you so much for reaching out and connecting here on my blog, as well as on Twitter. We would love to have you come visit. On the mvifi.org website, you can navigate to “Hosts” in the menu and see a number of events that we host. One of the events is a School Visit Day. We have one on Nov. 2, and we have another on Feb. 15. As for the fuse conference, we are rethinking that programming for this year, but we should be able to tell folks something soon about a new direction there. I’ll send you a direct email, as well. Bo
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Hi Mr. Adams,
I don’t know if you will remember me but my name is Amber Cagle (now Fiddler). I was one of the first to go through the Westminster Center for Teaching about 6 years ago with Mr. Ryshke. I mentored Brenda Cobbler and even coached soccer with Christie Chalberg (with whom I also played soccer at Wofford.)
I interviewed with David Rhodes, a name I think you know, and have spent the last 5 years at Kings Ridge Christian School in Alpharetta, GA teaching science in both high school and middle school.
I am currently taking the Web 2.0 course, and low-and-behold, I see an article with your name on it. I thought to myself, there must be a dozen Bo Adams in this world. But I must say, I was more than happy to see that it was you. I really enjoyed my time, albeit not long enough, , at Westminster, and I truly enjoyed having you as my principal while I was there. Your hospitality was memorable. I just wanted to say “hello.” 🙂
Amber
Of course I remember you, Amber! Thank you so much for reconnecting. I did not know you were at KRCS; I’m a big fan of David and Lowrie. I hope you and I will get to talk soon. I’m now working at Mount Vernon School. All the best to you.
Oh it would be so nice to reconnect! And soon! I would love nothing more than to be able to catch up and maybe even pick away at some ideas for my classroom to get up to speed!!!??? I hope you are doing well, and this message finds you in a great health and good spirits. Good luck with the upcoming school year!
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Dear Mr. Adams,
I am a journalist near Chicago who recently started a blog at http://www.welovecreativity.org. My dream is to create a charter school for high school students to increase their creative capacities and entrepreneurship skills. I started a blog to shine a spotlight on people and schools that are models of innovation and/or are infused with teaching creativity/entrepreneurship; the blog also allows me to learn from others.
I just came across your reply post in the recent article by Liz Gerber entitled “Design for America: A Network of Students and Designers Solving Real-World Challenges.” (I’m a huge fan of design thinking and want to incorporate it as a problem-solving approach at my future school.) You asked if DFA was available for students in high schools. I’m wondering if she ever responded to that question. I also wonder if you would make some time for me to interview you for my site some time in the future. I am interested in finding out more of what you are doing in your job at Unboundary; it sounds fascinating. My e-mail address is weluvcreativity@yahoo.com. I look forward to your reply.
Sincerely yours,
Carlos Briceño
P.S. I really love and appreciate how thoughtful your blog is.
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Hi, Bo! Thanks for the nice Georgia Partnership mention. Jason’s presentation at our Forum was very well received. Thanks for flipping it along! Perhaps you and your readers would like to attend future Forums as we examine a variety of education issues? They are open to the public. The next one will be in November. Best wishes!
Bill, thanks for commenting on the post. As someone who combs the literature archives for great pieces on the educational-change crossroads, I can attest to the great content of Jason’s talk. I was impressed with the patterns and dots connected. I would enjoy coming to the November event. Thanks!
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