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Dr. John Hodge

Education Avenger

Dr. John W. Hodge is president and co-founder of Urban Learning and Leadership Center (ULLC), an organization focused on student achievement and reduction of the achievement gap. Dr. Hodge has over 28-years of experience in education, and is a nationally recognized consultant. During his career, Dr. Hodge has provided training and support to educators in over 300 rural, urban and sub-urban school districts that serve over a million students in the United States, Canada and South America. Additionally, Dr. Hodge has co-authored over $30,000,000 in federal grants. His work and expertise are particularly focused in the areas of student achievement, equity, student resilience, poverty and high academic achievement.

Prior to launching Urban Learning and Leadership Center, Dr. Hodge served as a reading teacher, English teacher, AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) teacher, and Assistant Principal of a large urban middle school that received recognition by the United States Department of Education as a National Blue-Ribbon School. Following his success in this position, Dr. Hodge was named Associate Director of AVID Center Eastern Division where he provided training and support to all AVID schools and districts in the eastern United States. His passion and enthusiasm for working with underserved student populations resulted in him being named Director of An Achievable Dream Academy, a high-poverty inner city school in the commonwealth of Virginia.

At the time, An Achievable Dream served over 1,000 K-12, inner-city students. It was on this campus that many of the interventions used by Urban Learning and Leadership Center were piloted. Under the leadership of Dr. Hodge, An Achievable Dream Academy was named a National School of Character, and received the Mutual of America Community Partnership Award (MACPA). This is a national award that annually honors the outstanding contributions that nonprofit organizations make to society in the U.S. Dr. Hodge’s leadership, expertise and collaborative spirit resulted in the academy becoming a fully accredited, high performing school.

The success of An Achievable Dream Academy became the catalyst for the creation of Urban Learning and Leadership Center. Recognizing the expertise of the ULLC staff and the efficacy of is school improvement model, Governor Mark Warner and Dr. Jo Lynne DeMary, Superintendent of Public Instruction for the state of Virginia, selected the Urban Learning and Leadership Center to provide training for selected schools statewide. This effort was called the Governor’s Urban Learning and Leadership Institute and took place in July of 2003. The training institute served as the genesis of the Governor’s Partnership for Achieving Successful Schools (PASS) initiative. PASS targeted more than 100 academically warned schools based on results of Virginia’s Standards of Learning exams.

John received his Bachelor of Science degree from North Carolina A&T State University where he graduated with honors. He later received his Master of Arts degree from Chapman University. John completed his academic and professional preparation by earning a Doctor of Education degree from Virginia Tech where he conducted extensive research on factors that contribute to the academic success and/or failure of impoverished children.

What sets Dr. John W. Hodge apart in the field of education is his well-documented ability to put research and theory into everyday practice in rural, urban and suburban schools. Dr. Hodge has helped educators in elementary, middle and high schools make the necessary changes to help all children meet and exceed rigorous academic standards. He is known as a master teacher and staff developer.

Dr. Hodge’s career has been defined by assisting students and teachers overcome obstacles and achieve goals. He has also served as an inspirational speaker throughout the United States.

Meetings and Conventions Magazine, a leader in the conventions industry since 1965, polled conference organizers about the best speakers they’d heard in recent years. Poll respondents listed Dr. John Hodge along with Mr. Steve Forbes, Gen. Colin Powell, Former First-Lady Laura Bush, Dr. Condoleezza Rice and Rev. John Maxwell among America’s very best speakers. Dr. John W. Hodge is truly one of America’s most respected voices in education. His seminars are often “the spark” for schools in their quest to meet and exceed state/federal accreditation standards and implement strategies for continuous improvement. Dr. Hodge is an expert in helping schools create and sustain academic excellence.

Prior to starting his career in education, Dr. Hodge distinguished himself in the service of our country with the 7th Infantry Division of the United States Army.

Categories: Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Educator, Educator - AEIs Most Popular Educators, Educator - Leadership, Educator - Motivation and Inspiration, Educator - Poverty, Educator - SEL Social Emotional Learning, Educator - Virtual Learning, Featured

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View Dr. John Hodge's

  • videos Videos
  • topics Topics
  • books Books

Videos

Topics

  • Leading Schools through Turbulent Times: Keys to Success

    The United States and the world have endured unprecedented challenges in the last 18 months. Today, we are recovering from the impact of economic and social hurdles that may seem overwhelming. It’s during times like the present that leadership it most important. Guided by peer-reviewed research in resilience, and the lessons learned by school leaders after Hurricane Katrina, this presentation will provide participants with 5-research supported principles designed to guide schools through the many obstacles ahead. Excellence is possible. Even when times are tough.

  • Culturally Responsive Teaching

    The children who walk into our schools daily come to us from a variety of different cultures and social norms. Culturally responsive teaching helps schools to establish emotionally safe environments where all children feel welcome. Emotional safety often translates into higher academic achievement for greater numbers of children. This presentation will help teachers to make pedagogical decisions that are more culturally inclusive and achieve higher levels of student engagement. Children who feel cared for become adults who care more.

  • Social-Emotional Learning for Students and Staff

    In the wake of this pandemic, we all want to go back to normal. To get there, there are seemingly insurmountable social and emotional issues to overcome before our students can return to learning. For K – 12 students and staff, the unconventional school year has meant less social interaction, increased stress and anxiety, and a struggle to keep up with remote classes or hybrid configurations. School districts are seeing decreased engagement, lower attendance, and slipping grades. Many education experts surmise that even if students aren’t “losing” information in the ways we generally think about learning loss, they may still be missing out on educational opportunities that would prepare them to be successful. The pandemic has set back learning for all students, but especially our most vulnerable student populations. Social-emotional challenges make academic progress more difficult. The cumulative effect of COVID-19 has impacted students and staff in significant ways. But there is hope.

    Dr. John W. Hodge has a well-documented record of helping to create school-wide cultures in which children and adults thrive despite a variety of challenges. His company, Urban Learning and Leadership Center (ULLC), founded in 2003, is best known for its SAME (Social-Academic-Moral-Education) model, which creates emotionally safe learning environments for all stakeholders, particularly those who are most vulnerable. His research-supported model has impacted 246,000 students in 494 U.S. schools.

  • Virtual Learning Topic

    Making Up for Lost Classroom Time

  • Be the One!

    The education of America’s youth is a challenging prospect when one considers the many burdens faced by impoverished children and their families. Research indicates that poverty need not be a barrier to academic excellence. As co-author of the book Standing in the Gap, Dr. Hodge states, "across the nation, schools are demonstrating that it can be done: That students can reach high standards, that all children can succeed, that the gap between white and minority students, poor and affluent, can be closed." More often than not, one caring adult can make all the difference in the world. Today’s presentation will encourage all of you to be the one!

  • Following the S.A.M.E. Pathway to Excellent Schools

    S.A.M.E. stands for Social, Academic and Moral Education. It is a holistic approach to creating and sustaining academic excellence in today's schools. S.A.M.E. provides a research-supported, holistic view of school improvement by addressing all of the components of school and district culture which must be addressed if lasting school reform is to be attained, i.e. The social domain, the academic domain and the moral domain. As the rigor of state accountability measures increase, schools must focus their efforts to achieve and sustain academic excellence. This approach is designed to assist schools along a vast performance continuum, from schools that are struggling to schools that are exceeding performance standards. This approach has been particularly successful in schools serving high-poverty populations.

  • Please Stop Calling Me At-Risk: The Power of Resilience in Today's Urban Youth

  • Achieving and Sustaining Excellence in the Common Core Era

    This presentation is designed to help school districts meet and exceed the Common Core Standards with their students. Dr. Hodge will discuss the clarity and collaboration among all stakeholders needed to achieve success for all students. He clarifies not only what schools need to do, but also what schools boards must do to support the journey.

  • Motivating Teachers to Motivate Students: Let's Talk About Belief!!!

  • Educating Students Socially, Academically and Morally

  • Helping Students Bounce Back: Resilience

    This presentation provides research supported strategies designed to help children bounce back from adversity. Dr. Hodge shares not only the relevant strategies that can be used in schools, but also the framework, S.A.M.E. (Social-Academic-Moral-Education) that can be embraced from school boards to classrooms to support resilience in all students.

  • Higher Order Thinking: From Theory to Practice

  • The Miracle Starts Here

Books

Standing in the Gap: A Guide to Using the SAME Framework to Create Excellent Schools
Standing in the Gap: A Guide to Using the SAME Framework to Create Excellent Schools

Across the nation, schools are demonstrating that all students can reach high standards, that all children can succeed, that the gap between white and minority students, poor and affluent, can be closed. This book distills the lessons that can be learned from those schools in a common-sense guide that can be used by practitioners. It gives principals and teachers, school board members and administrators, a guide for putting to work in the own schools the practices that really make a difference in student achievement. It can be done... it must be done... and this book will show you how it can be done in your school, with your students.

You can purchase this book here

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