What happens when the work itself becomes a source of well-being?

Alex Campbell, the teacher at the center of the Prime Video docuseries Murder 101, has spent years creating classrooms where students don't just learn about real-world problems — they help solve them.

In this conversation, Alex joins Michelle to talk about the philosophy behind that work: trusting young people with meaningful challenges, giving them opportunities to discover what they're capable of, and refusing to settle for learning that feels disconnected from the world outside the classroom.

But the conversation also turns toward Alex himself. His approach to teaching doesn't make the work easier — in many ways, it makes it more ambitious. Yet it also seems to keep him curious, energized, growing, and deeply connected to his sense of purpose.

Michelle and Chris reflect on what Alex's story might teach us about educator well-being, including the role of agency, meaningful work, productive discomfort, relationships, and the experience of doing something that genuinely matters.

Maybe educator well-being isn't only about how we recover from work.
Maybe it's also about creating more opportunities to come alive within it.

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Visit the Oxygen for Educators website to learn more. (https://oxygenforeducators.com/)

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At 13, Casey Cuny learned firsthand how profoundly a teacher can shape a life. Decades later, the 2024 California Teacher of the Year has built his own teaching around a simple idea: rigor happens through relationships.

In this conversation, Casey talks with Michelle about knowing students deeply, explicitly telling them we believe in them, creating classrooms where young people feel safe enough to take risks, and using mythology to help students see their own lives with greater meaning and possibility.

They also explore what it means to find well-being within the work itself—and how AI might give educators more time and energy for what only humans can do: connect, create, notice, imagine, and care.

Opt in HERE for a complimentary subscription to the magazine. (https://oxygenforeducators.com/#read-the-magazine)

Visit the Oxygen for Educators website to learn more. (https://oxygenforeducators.com/)

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Follow on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/oxygen-for-educators/id1775510846

Follow on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2i21QueuqVqmEPmI7gzFfQ?si=1bef3354bff2402c

Follow on Audible: https://www.audible.co.uk/podcast/Oxygen-for-Educators/B0DKL68DLX?source_code=ASSGB149080119000H&share_location=pdp

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What if some of the biggest challenges facing schools aren't problems we still need to solve — but problems research has already taught us something about?

Dr. Jeannie Haubert, sociologist and Executive Director of LEARN, joins us for a fascinating conversation about the surprising distance between what research tells us and what actually makes its way into practice. Jeannie points to a frequently cited estimate that research can take as long as 17 years to make its way into practice — a striking illustration of the distance that can exist between what we know and what actually informs decisions.

Together, we explore what gets lost in that gap — and what becomes possible when school leaders have access to credible, useful research at the moment they're making consequential decisions.

We talk about educator autonomy and voice, workplace conditions, initiative overload, and why well-being can't only be about helping people recover from work; sometimes we need to change the conditions of the work itself. We also explore the power of small structural shifts, the importance of starting with the problems educators and students are actually experiencing, and one deceptively simple question that can help cut through the noise:

Does this solve a problem we actually have?

Jeannie also takes us inside the work of LEARN, an organization built to make good research easier for school leaders to find, trust, understand, and put into action.

It's a conversation about curiosity, better questions, evidence-informed leadership — and closing the distance between what we know and what the humans inside our schools actually experience.

Opt in HERE for a complimentary subscription to the magazine. (https://oxygenforeducators.com/#read-the-magazine)

Visit the Oxygen for Educators website to learn more. (https://oxygenforeducators.com/)

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Follow on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/oxygen-for-educators/id1775510846

Follow on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2i21QueuqVqmEPmI7gzFfQ?si=1bef3354bff2402c

Follow on Audible: https://www.audible.co.uk/podcast/Oxygen-for-Educators/B0DKL68DLX?source_code=ASSGB149080119000H&share_location=pdp

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