Roddenberry

The “education system” is broken. People have tried for generations to fix it, optimize it, or reimagine it. But today, it’s more unwieldy than ever before — and we now stand at the precipice of something uncharted. It’s up to us to decide where to boldly go next.

One thing remains true: humans love to learn. Education itself isn’t broken. So many parts inside the system are good. For instance, there are incredible teachers in the world. But the world is changing. There’s something bigger than classrooms, school districts, and test scores. Education is evolving — and we feel it.

That evolution needs direction, imagination, and community. This three-part proposal offers a bold, joyful, and actionable vision for how we can catalyze the future of learning.

Part One: Documentary. Exposes the system — a docu-series that investigates the past, critiques the present, and imagines, whether it’s in or out of the system, what education could be.

Part Two: Fellowship. Elevates the minds building the future — a first-of-its-kind fellowship supporting education leaders as they map scalable solutions at every level.

Part Three: Television. Brings it all to life — a mixed-media TV show that teaches emotional intelligence, cultural curiosity, and connection to kids and families everywhere.

Together, these projects form a single ecosystem: storytelling, strategy, and soul — rooted in the legacy of exploration, knowledge sharing, and hope.

Part One:

EDU is a documentary (or docu-series) tracing the past, present, and future of education. Inspired by PRIDE, it will blend history, critical analysis, personal narratives, and speculative imagination to create the most comprehensive and aspirational documentary on education to date.

Purpose & Guiding Questions:

  • What is education — and what could it be?

  • How did we get here, and why does our system work the way it does?

  • Who is it working for, and who is it failing?

  • What’s changing? What’s possible?

  • How can we reimagine learning to serve the future of humanity?


Structure: 6-Part Series

Episode 1: Foundations
"How We Got Schooled"

  • The historical roots of U.S. education: from colonial classrooms to compulsory schooling

  • Global comparisons: Finland, Japan, Ghana, Indigenous knowledge systems

  • How race, class, and colonization shaped the pipeline (forced boarding, integration, whitewashing, homogenization)

  • The myth of meritocracy and the origins of standardized testing

  • Who has succeeded? And who has the system failed?

Episode 2: The Present Crisis
"Learning in the Now"

  • Tour of today’s system: public vs. private vs. charter vs. unschooling

  • Urban vs. rural schools; funding gaps and systemic inequality

  • Politics of the DOE, policy battles, and pandemic fallout

  • Features of current pedagogy: trauma-informed teaching, project-based learning, etc.

  • Who’s leading change now?

Episode 3: The Pipeline Problem
"From Cradle to Career (to Crisis)"

  • Early childhood through higher ed: tracking the pressure to “succeed”

  • The college industrial complex, student debt, and access disparities

  • The SAT, ACT, APs, GPAs, and other acronyms that gatekeep success

  • Mental health and burnout in students and teachers alike

  • Is this a system of learning or of sorting?

Episode 4: Disruptors & Dreamers
"The Movers Who Changed the Game"

  • Spotlight on transformative figures & orgs: Sal Khan, Sir Ken Robinson, Geoffrey Canada, TED-Ed, Khan Academy

  • Tech vs. Touch: How AI, AR/VR, and EdTech are reshaping classrooms

  • Case studies in innovation: micro-schools, community-run schools, Montessori, democratic schools

Episode 5: What If…?
"The Future of Learning"

  • Scenarios: AI-based personalized learning vs. screen-free nature classrooms

  • Teachers as million-dollar public heroes?

  • How climate change, migration, and technology will reshape education

  • How do we foster belonging, creativity, and resilience in a changing world?

  • Interviews with futurists, students, and education visionaries

Episode 6: Rewriting the Story
"The Education We Deserve"

  • What we’ve learned from the past — and what we need to unlearn

  • A call to action: for families, voters, funders, and learners

  • What would it mean to truly educate for liberation, joy, and justice?

  • Final montage: visions of what’s possible when we commit to change

Voices to Feature:

  • Sal Khan (Khan Academy)

  • Sir Ken Robinson (legacy archive)

  • Barack Obama

  • Angela Duckworth (Grit Lab)

  • Logan Smalley (TED-Ed)

  • Linda Darling-Hammond (Learning Policy Institute)

  • Bill Gates

  • Arne Duncan (Former United States Secretary of Education)

  • Geoffrey Canada (Harlem Children's Zone)

  • Wendy Kopp (Teach for America)

  • Oprah

  • Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller (Coursera)

  • Anant Agarwal, Anthony Cody, Bobby Jindal, Cami Anderson, Cheryl Lowe, Clara Hemphill, David Coleman, Diane Ravitch, Don Shalvey, E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Joel Klein, Jose Ferreira, Randi Weingarten, Reed Hastings, Sebastian Thrun, and Seth Weinberger

  • Teachers, students, parents, and unsung heroes on the ground

Production Elements:

Why This, Why Now, Why Us?

  • Considering the evolution of technology, social constructs, and our understanding of humanity, the education system is undergoing existential change — and the public needs a map.

  • No one has told the whole story with both critical depth and visionary optimism.

  • Your legacy, Rod, is exploration in service of a better future. This series is the next frontier.

  • Together, we can create something that shapes not just the conversation, but the course of education for generations.

 
 

PART TWO:

This high-impact fellowship will identify, support, and amplify the most promising minds in education — those committed to reimagining learning at every level: classroom, school, district, national, K-12, and higher ed.

Alongside internationally renown education experts, and with a stipend of $50,000 each, the fellows will help map a pathway forward — from vision to implementation — that the world can follow.

Purpose

  • Support leaders who are actively transforming education

  • Foster a community of cross-sector thinkers (teachers, researchers, technologists, artists, organizers)

  • Generate public-facing media and thought leadership

  • Build a living blueprint for scalable, human-first, values-driven reform

Guiding Belief

Education isn’t broken — the system that delivers it is. It’s time to boldly imagine a future where everyone can learn without barriers, in ways that make sense for who they are and what they need.

This fellowship is rooted in a simple truth: systems don’t change people — people change systems. Or they build new ones. But only when they’re given time, trust, and the resources to think big.

We’re here to amplify those people.

Selection Criteria

Fellows should be:

  • Proven education changemakers and disruptors

  • Grounded in equity, imagination, and evidence

  • Representing a diversity of race, class, gender, geography, and discipline

  • Approaching education from fresh angles — not just school-based, but whole-child learning, SEL, AI, design, spirituality, play, civic engagement, etc.

  • Willing to collaborate and co-create a collective vision

Possible Partner for Nomination & Selection:

  • Greater Good Science Center / GGIE

  • Education Reimagined

  • TED-Ed Innovators

  • XQ Institute

  • GLSEN

  • Youth-powered orgs (e.g., Student Voice, The Future Project)

100 Videos That Reimagine Education

At the heart of the Roddenberry Education Fellowship is a bold public deliverable: a library of 100 short-form, thought-provoking videos that illuminate what’s possible in education — from the classroom to Congress. These videos won’t just inform; they’ll inspire action.

But we’re not asking fellows to shoulder the production burden alone. Instead, we’ll co-create this collection — ensuring that every fellow’s insights are honored, while respecting the demands of their full-time roles.

Co-Creation Process & Timeline:

Month 1: Ideation
Fellows gather to co-develop the list of 100 essential questions, topics, and bold ideas the series should cover.

Month 2: Scripting
A central content team drafts scripts and concepts based on those ideas, working closely with fellows for tone and accuracy.

Months 3–4: Review & Refine
Fellows provide feedback, annotations, and stories that deepen each script — shaping the voice of the collection.

Months 5–8: Production
Filming, animation, voiceover, and interviews — featuring fellows, educators, students, and visionary storytellers.

Months 9–10: Post-Production
Editing, titling, description writing, curriculum tagging, and social media prep — readying each piece for impact.

Months 11–12: Launch
We unveil the entire collection on the Roddenberry YouTube channel — a curated archive of possibility, built together. The launch will coincide with the culmination of the fellowship, creating a moment of collective pride and global visibility.

Each fellow will also co-create a TED-Ed Lesson — a 5-minute animated short developed with the TED-Ed team and released as part of a special Roddenberry Education Collection on the TED-Ed platform. These lessons will serve as evergreen educational tools, spreading fellows’ ideas to classrooms around the world.

This approach ensures:

  • Fellows aren’t overburdened, but fully involved

  • Content is collaborative, not extractive

  • A sense of ownership without burnout

  • A legacy project that reflects the power of shared vision

Fellowship Structure

  • Duration: 1 year

  • Cohort Size: 10 fellows

  • Stipend: $50K per fellow

  • Support Includes:

    • Media & storytelling training

    • Virtual convenings and two in-person gatherings

    • Coaching in leadership, public speaking, and systems mapping

    • Access to expert mentors (e.g., Logan Smalley, Angela Duckworth, Linda Darling-Hammond, etc.)

Program Anchors

Community
We don’t just support fellows — we surround them. Through monthly cohort calls, regional dinners, and spontaneous “you-have-to-hear-this” texts, fellows become part of a trusted, joyful circle. It’s not just about sharing ideas — it’s about belonging to a brave, brilliant learning family.

Curiosity
This isn’t a fellowship for experts with all the answers. It’s for seekers with the courage to ask better questions. Fellows explore what hasn’t been tried, what hasn’t been imagined, and what education could become if we prioritized wonder over convention.

Care
Burnout is real — and it’s a symptom of systems that ignore the human soul. Here, we prioritize care as rigor. Fellows receive regular wellness check-ins, access to mental health and creative support, and the freedom to show up fully — as thinkers and as people.

Co-Creation
We’re not handing down a roadmap. We’re building one — together. Every artifact of this fellowship, from video to vision, is shaped through collaborative storytelling, peer critique, and iterative design. No one creates alone, and nothing is created in a vacuum.

Intended Outcomes

  • A 100-video library of solutions, freely accessible worldwide

  • A network of education leaders with public visibility and expanded support

  • A roadmap that links policy to practice, imagination to implementation

  • A strengthened Roddenberry Foundation brand as a home for radical hope and systemic healing

Why Roddenberry? Why Now?

The original Star Trek wasn’t just science fiction — it was a vision for a more just, enlightened world. This fellowship channels that legacy into education — the foundation of every society’s future.

Roddenberry can become a global incubator for educational imagination at a time when traditional systems are collapsing and the world is hungry for new models.

 
 

PART THREE:

Hello, World! is a mixed-media, wildly entertaining, deeply soulful variety show for families. It teaches emotional intelligence, cultural literacy, community care, spirituality, and curiosity about the world — everything we’ve been missing in the classroom, delivered through the most beloved medium of all: television.

This is not about letters and numbers — it’s about how we live together, how we love, how we grow, how we struggle, and how we show up for each other.

It’s Mr. Rogers meets Pee Wee’s Playhouse. Bill Nye meets Captain Planet. Sesame Street meets Schoolhouse Rock. And it’s all wrapped in the whimsy of The Muppets, the warmth of Ms. Rachel, and the depth of David Attenborough.

It’s high art and high camp. It’s joyful, profound, musical, weird, and wise. It’s for everyone, but especially for the one who wonders about the world: how is it so big, why is it sometimes scary, and what am I doing here?

Narrative Philosophy

The show aligns with the same core values as the documentary and the fellowship:

  • Education must be whole-person

  • SEL and spirituality belong in learning

  • We are never alone, and we’re always stronger together

How It Connects to Parts One & Two

  • Part One (The Documentary) reveals the broken systems and shows us a better future.

  • Part Two (The Fellowship) elevates the voices mapping that future.

  • Part Three (The Show) becomes the daily ritual where that future takes root — in living rooms, in classrooms, and in kids’ imaginations.

The show can even feature guest episodes or themes based on ideas and fellows from Part Two. Imagine an episode based on idea from Jamie, a Roddenberry Fellow, who teaches kids how to listen with their hearts. Or an episode that expands a concept co-devised for the 100-video library. Or an episode taken directly from the documentary. This is where it all comes together — and it’s where we deliver our learnings to the world.

The Hosts / Cast

A dream ensemble of joyful, heart-forward educators and performers:

  • Joshua Holden – Lead host / heart of the show; puppetry & joy expert

  • Julian Shapiro-Barnum – Street interviews, real-kid wisdom, empathy explorer

  • Carly Ciarrocchi – Music, dance, mindfulness, relational play

  • Ms. Rachel – Familiarity & early childhood warmth, bridges young viewers

  • Joshua De La Cruz – Storytime, music, bilingual joy

  • Kelindah Bee – Art, creativity, self-expression, gender & identity magic

  • Megan Piphus – Puppetry, music, Black girl magic, gospel heart

  • LeVar Burton — A recurring guest star in the tradition of Guinan, Gandalf, or Grandma Willow. He doesn’t just teach — he knows. He arrives when things get hard or weird and reminds us who we are. A quiet force of soul and spark.

Plus: puppets, animations, recurring characters, guest stars (see below), and kids from all over the world.

Segments & Structure

Each 22–28 minute episode is structured like a vibrant variety show — mixing puppetry, animation, live-action, interviews, and music. The flow is playful but purposeful, with recurring segments that speak to both head and heart:

  • "The Feeling Forecast" – Julian interviews kids about emotions they’re feeling today. Think tiny humans, big wisdom.

  • "Joshua’s Corner" – Puppetry, play, and storytelling with Joshua Holden — turning big ideas into small, huggable moments.

  • "Ask the World" – A spinning globe drops us into a different country or culture, teaching us how people grow, live, and love around the world.

  • "Together Time" – Ms. Rachel or Carly leads an interactive SEL moment — breathwork, mindful movement, or a community-building game.

  • "Tiny Truths" – 60-second animated reflections on compassion, impermanence, forgiveness, or self-worth — bite-sized soul snacks.

  • "Sing It Again!" – The entire ensemble performs original songs on themes like apology, anger, joy, and friendship. (The kind that live in your head forever — in a good way.)

  • "Art Is Everything" – Kelindah Bee guides a bold, affirming creative practice: from drawing your feelings to wearable self-portraits.

  • "The Visitor" – Each episode features a magical drop-in from LeVar Burton or another iconic guest. These visitors bring a story, a question, or a quiet truth that anchors the episode’s theme. Guests may include:

    • Octavia Spencer

    • Julie Andrews

    • Morgan Freeman

    • America Ferrera

    • Brandi Carlile

    • Dolly Parton

    • Auli’i Cravalho

    • Daniel Radcliffe

    They’re the wisdom-keepers — the Guinan, the Gandalf, the Grandma Willow.

Target Audience

  • Designed for co-viewing: rich enough for adults, simple enough for littles

  • Kids aged 4–10

  • But also: parents, caregivers, teachers, education professionals

Educational Goals

  • Social-Emotional Learning (SEL)

  • Cultural Literacy

  • Spiritual Development (non-religious, wonder-based)

  • Creative Expression

  • Communication & Relationship Skills

  • Global Awareness

  • Joy, resilience, and community-centered thinking

Aspirational Impact

  • Peabody and Emmy Award-winning

  • School curricula built around episodes

  • YouTube + PBS + streamers (Netflix or Apple TV Kids)

  • Companion podcast, live tour, classroom guides, toys, storybooks

  • Families sing the songs and reference the segments like they do “won’t you be my neighbor?”