Photography by Anna Kane
Jack Krewson and Gavin Schiffres
On a June weekday, Emma Ruohoniemi and three other Yale University students tell residents of Dutchtown about Kairos Academies, a charter school that could open next fall. Their gray T-shirts are emblazoned “Empowering students to direct their own lives and learning.”
A native of Nepal, Ruohoniemi is optimistic about expanding education options here. “I’ve been doing a lot of reading about the personalized learning model,” she says.
The 20-year-old isn’t far removed from high school herself. Nor are the school’s founders, 25-year-old Gavin Schiffres and Jack Krewson, son of St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson. (He’s emphasized that his mother’s played no role in the project.) The two met while participating in Teach for America, a nonprofit that places recent college graduates in underperforming schools. The two say their age and recent experiences are in fact assets—and they’re proposing some new strategies.
For example, they plan for classes to meet year-round in a five-weeks-on, two-weeks-off format. The traditional schedule is based on the agrarian calendar, says Schiffres, suggesting that it’s an outdated model for more metropolitan areas. Teaching staff would consist of coaches rather than teachers, each responsible for eight to 10 students, who would stick with students throughout their entire time at Kairos.
Krewson, who taught at an underserved public high school in North County, says they tried to personalize the curriculum for each student. “We both saw big academic gains in our classrooms as a result,” says Krewson, a graduate of John Burroughs School, “but when we tried to bring the changes school-wide, we ran into a lot of difficulties.”
“A lot of our administrators went to college before the internet was invented,” adds Schiffres, who studied a variety of educational models at Yale. “What the 21st-century college and career looks like is going to be totally different than today.”
But there’s not universal support for more charters. Since the first charter school opened here, in 1999, about a third of the schools have closed. Critics also contend that charters pull resources from public high schools and cherry-pick top students.
“I think a lot of charter schools are opened with the best of intentions, but oftentimes reality sets in and, in many cases, charter school sponsors and operators begin to understand the challenges that our traditional public schools are facing,” says Brent Ghan, deputy executive director for the Missouri School Boards’ Association.
The founders see a real need for another school option in Dutchtown. (At press time, Krewson and Schiffres had not secured a building.) In July, the Missouri Charter Public School Commission sponsored Kairos; the founders now await approval from the Missouri State Board of Education. Already, they’ve received support from St. Louis native Eric Scroggins, a former Teach for America executive who founded education nonprofit The Opportunity Trust, which aims to help “accelerate the pace of change in St. Louis.”
“We are not saying that other models don’t serve students well,” says Schiffres. “We are saying that we want to be an option for families who feel like more project-based learning, more student choice, more independence is what their child needs.”
Editor's Note: This article has been updated to reflect that Ruohoniemi did not teach alongside Krewson at an underserved public high school in North County.
