An Educated Guest

Todd Zipper
  • 4.9 (54)
  • Education
  • Updated Semiweekly

An Educated Guest is a podcast that dives deep into the innovations and trends shaping the future of education. The host is Todd Zipper who has over two decades as an entrepreneur, executive, and investor across K-12, Higher Education, and Workforce Development. He brings together visionaries, innovators, and operators from the education industry to explore the solutions that are transforming learning and work.

  1. 5d ago

    Ep.92 | Rethinking Assessment for the AI Era with ETS CEO Amit Sevak

    What if the future of assessment is not simply about creating better tests, but about measuring what truly matters? In Episode 92, Todd Zipper speaks with Amit Sevak, CEO of ETS, about the organization’s evolution from the Educational Testing Service into a global measurement and talent-solutions organization. Amit explains why ETS acquired ACT, how WorkKeys can strengthen pathways from high school to employment, and why the education-to-workforce pipeline remains far too fragmented. Todd and Amit examine what traditional assessments capture and what they miss. They discuss falling math and reading performance, lessons from the latest international PISA results, and how AI could make communication, collaboration, curiosity, and other historically difficult-to-measure human skills more visible. Amit also makes the case for connecting formative and summative assessment into balanced systems and for using exit measures to hold colleges accountable for learning and employment outcomes. The conversation then turns to AI literacy and workforce adaptability. Amit offers a practical framework for understanding, applying, evaluating, and ethically navigating AI. Drawing on the ETS Human Progress Report, he explains the “adaptability paradox”: workers know they must continually adapt, but many do not know which skills to pursue or how to begin. He asks whether adaptability itself should become the next essential skill that educators and employers define, teach, and measure.

  2. Sep 23

    Ep.91 | From Struggling College to Thriving University: Marian’s Dan Elsener on Thinking Big

    When Dan Elsener became president of Marian University in 2001, the institution had roughly 1,100 students, significant financial challenges, and what he calls “one foot in the financial grave and the other on a banana peel.” More than 25 years later, Marian has become a growing, ambitious university built around a simple conviction: universities should not exist merely to survive. They should take on big problems and advance human flourishing. In this episode, Dan explains how Marian built a championship football program, launched Indiana’s first new medical school in more than a century, and developed a broader healthcare ecosystem spanning medicine, nursing, engineering, research, and workforce development. He also shares how Marian is working with neighborhood schools to improve childhood literacy, creating earn-and-learn pathways for students who cannot afford to stop working, and expanding college access through prison education. Dan and Todd also discuss the future of higher education, including the promise and risks of artificial intelligence. Dan believes AI can enable individualized learning, improve student retention, and make universities more responsive and human. But he warns that it can also become a shortcut around the discipline required for genuine learning. This conversation offers a powerful model for how universities can combine ambitious leadership, long-term thinking, and service to the common good.

  3. Sep 16

    Ep.90 | Funding Students, Not Schools: Stand Together’s Adam Peshek on the Future of Education

    What if instead of funding schools, we funded students and families—and gave them the power to build an education around what each child actually needs? In this episode of An Educated Guest, Todd Zipper sits down with Adam Peshek, Vice President of Education at Stand Together, to explore that idea and why the traditional one-size-fits-all model of education is increasingly being challenged by families, educators, and entrepreneurs. Adam explains the rapid expansion of school choice and Education Savings Accounts, the rise of microschools and other alternative models, and why funding families could create a more dynamic education marketplace with greater personalization and lower costs. They also discuss troubling signs from the current system, including declining student engagement and academic performance, and why simply giving families choice isn't enough—we also need great new education options for them to choose from. The conversation also gets personal. Adam discusses raising a son with autism and how that experience reinforced his belief that educational outcomes should look different for different children. Todd and Adam explore what it would mean to "de-risk high school," give teenagers more exposure to careers and real-world learning, and ultimately create an education system where families have the resources and agency to assemble the learning experiences their children need to thrive.

  4. Sep 9

    Ep. 89 | From Hours to Outcomes: Fixing Work, Unlocking Productivity, and Reimagining the Essential Workforce with Array’s Fouad ElNaggar

    What if the biggest problem with the way we manage people is that we're measuring the wrong thing? In this episode of An Educated Guest, Todd Zipper sits down with Fouad ElNaggar, co-founder and CEO of Array, to explore his provocative argument that the workforce needs to move from hours to outcomes. Rather than treating workers as interchangeable units of labor, Fouad believes employers should understand the value individuals actually create, reward high performers accordingly, and use technology, training, and better management to unlock dramatically greater productivity. Fouad brings a remarkable perspective to the conversation. He has been an entrepreneur, venture capitalist at Redpoint Ventures, Chief Strategy Officer of CBS Interactive, co-founder of Sapho, which was acquired by Citrix for $220 million, and a board member at Yahoo. At Array, he's applying lessons from technology, investing, and company building to what he sees as one of the world's largest broken marketplaces: labor. Fouad explains Array's model of combining software, staffing, and services and its framework of identify, amplify, and coordinate to find motivated workers, help them become more productive, and connect individual performance directly to business results. Todd and Fouad also dig into the disconnect between education and employment, workforce churn, the importance of grit and persistence, and what AI will actually mean for American workers. Fouad offers a fascinating distinction between the knowledge economy and the "essential economy," arguing that AI could disrupt white-collar work much faster than jobs requiring people to interact with the physical world. Ultimately, the conversation comes back to the American dream and a powerful question: What if greater productivity could simultaneously create better businesses, higher wages, and more opportunity for workers?

  5. Aug 19

    Ep.88 | Beyond the Sticker Price: Rebuilding Public Trust, ROI, and Value in Higher Ed with Strada’s Justin Draeger

    In this episode of An Educated Guest, host Todd Zipper sits down with Justin Draeger, Senior Vice President of Affordability at the Strada Education Foundation and former President & CEO of NASFAA. Drawing on decades of experience at the center of federal financial aid policy, Justin offers a nuanced, insider perspective on the real drivers behind the $1.7 trillion national student debt burden, the erosion of public trust in higher education, and why fixing affordability requires looking far beyond top-line sticker prices. Together, Todd and Justin explore how postsecondary institutions can restore confidence by focusing on true value and workforce alignment. They dive deep into Strada's research on what makes a credential "worth having," the hidden costs associated with time to completion, the transformative impact of paid work-based learning, and how innovative models like Direct Admissions are removing traditional friction points for first-generation and low-income students. Finally, Justin shares his perspective on the future of federal policy, state-level governance, and non-degree credentials in a rapidly changing economy. Despite current headwinds and skepticism, Justin outlines a compelling vision for how higher education can fulfill its promise as the primary engine of social mobility and the American Dream.

  6. Aug 12

    Ep.87 | Penn Engineering Dean Vijay Kumar on Scaling Higher Ed the Right Way

    How can higher education scale its reach without sacrificing academic rigor or student outcomes? In this episode of An Educated Guest, host Todd Zipper sits down with Dr. Vijay Kumar, Dean of Penn Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania, to discuss the changing landscape of engineering, robotics, and academic leadership. Drawing on nearly 40 years of experience as a researcher and administrator, Dean Kumar shares his vision for expanding educational access and explains why measuring higher education excellence through selectivity alone misses the broader purpose of institutional impact. The conversation dives deep into Penn’s pioneering efforts in modern learning, including expanding their online graduate programs to reach thousands of non-traditional learners worldwide. Dean Kumar unpacks Penn’s decision to launch the Ivy League’s first undergraduate degree in Artificial Intelligence—emphasizing "Intelligence Augmentation" and systems engineering over simple software generation. He also shares how AI is reshaping classroom assessment, driving faculty toward Socratic oral exams, team-based problem solving, and higher-order critical thinking. Finally, the discussion explores the power of cross-disciplinary collaboration and university commercialization. From developing an AI-driven mRNA Biofoundry alongside Penn Medicine to building an entrepreneurial ecosystem that takes robotics startups from university labs to the Nasdaq, Dean Kumar offers a hopeful, forward-looking playbook for the future of higher education. Tune in for a masterclass on technology, pedagogy, and institutional leadership.

  7. Aug 5

    Ep.86 | Education higher than higher ed — Flight School’s Abby Falik on cultivating aliveness, agency and attention

    What happens when our modern schooling system reaches its logical conclusion—one optimized for a thin slice of intellectual testing that the computer in our pocket can now ace in seconds? In this episode of An Educated Guest, host Todd Zipper sits down with Abby Falik, the founder of Global Citizen Year and the creator of the flight school, an innovative global community without a physical campus designed to provide an education higher than higher ed. Abby shares how her early experiences as a Backroads trip guide and her two decades of dedicated Vipassana meditation practice converged to form a living laboratory aimed at moving learning entirely beyond traditional schooling. The conversation dives deep into the concept of human agency, exploring how the hyper-distractions of 2026 threaten our innate ability to choose our responses to the world around us. Abby explains why the flight school completely upends the classic "gap year" narrative, choosing instead to view this transitional life stage as a structured "launch year." By guiding ambitious young seekers from dozens of countries through specialized modules on rethinking success, time, attention, and money, the program serves as a secure base for daring global explorations that reshape identity from the inside out. Ultimately, Todd and Abby unpack the exhilarating inflection point currently facing higher education as the traditional credential economy faces unprecedented disruption. Moving past rigid metrics and AP-course arms races, they discuss what it truly means to build learning pathways centered around the "immeasurables"—qualities like equanimity, attention, and vitality. Whether you are an institutional leader looking to navigate the era of AI, a parent trying to foster resilience in your children, or a seeker trying to align your livelihood with genuine aliveness, this episode serves as a beautiful invitation to make the leap from fear to freedom.

  8. Jul 29

    Ep.85 | Closing the Experience Gap with Cloud for Good's Founder Tal Frankfurt

    What happens when an entrepreneur builds a business not out of a tech epiphany, but simply to survive? In this episode of An Educated Guest, host Todd Zipper sits down with Tal Frankfurt, Founder and CEO of Cloud for Good, to trace the company's remarkable evolution from a one-bedroom apartment to a premier Salesforce implementation partner spanning three continents. Tal shares his candid journey from managing giant, un-scalable spreadsheets for a small youth nonprofit to building an organization that now powers the data infrastructure for 75% of R1 higher education institutions and massive humanitarian networks like Feeding America. The heart of the conversation dives into how Cloud for Good is actively solving the tech industry's "experience gap" through its pioneering Talent for Good apprenticeship program. Strikingly more selective than elite universities, the program completely upends the classic tuition-heavy coding bootcamp model by paying career-changing individuals from day one to learn, get certified, and deploy directly into high-impact client systems. Tal discusses the incredible social impact of this pipeline—which brings massive demographic diversity into tech—without ever compromising on the rigorous quality demands of the modern enterprise workforce. Beyond workforce development, Todd and Tal unpack what it truly takes to scale a healthy company culture in a fully remote environment. From the dangers of "mistake hoarding" to the strategic shift toward becoming an IP-backed services company in the age of AI commodity, this episode is a masterclass in operational intentionality. Whether you are an educational leader navigating digital transformation, an entrepreneur scaling a remote team, or a professional looking to understand how AI will genuinely multiply human capability rather than replace it, this conversation offers invaluable, real-world blueprints.

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4.9
out of 5
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About

An Educated Guest is a podcast that dives deep into the innovations and trends shaping the future of education. The host is Todd Zipper who has over two decades as an entrepreneur, executive, and investor across K-12, Higher Education, and Workforce Development. He brings together visionaries, innovators, and operators from the education industry to explore the solutions that are transforming learning and work.

Information

  • Creator
    Todd Zipper
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2026
  • Episodes
    92
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 An Educated Guest
  • Show Website
    An Educated Guest

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