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Explorers Foundation ••• home page

Glyphs ••• list of fragments of Freeorder

Investments ••• a table of all investments

freeorder ••• the concept & vision

2020: Cobden-Bright Award of $500 for work on the reformation of education.

2008: Cobden-Bright Award of $500

2007: Cobden-Bright Award of $250

“Michael Strong has created the most sophisticated online school I know of”

Norman Doidge, author of The Brain that Changes Itself

and the forward to Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules for Life.

Academia as the World's Leading Social Problem and What to Do About It, by Michael Strong

The Socratic Experience: https://socraticexperience.com/

His substack: https://michaelstrong.substack.com/

“The entire game, from my perspective, is the creation of new virtue cultures focused on developing new habits, attitudes, norms, character-traits, and sub-cultures.  This task is not really possible right now because we do not have adequate pipelines of talent (e.g. adults trained in the requisite virtues), we do not have a sufficiently large and open market to incentivize the development of such pipelines of talent, and similarly there is no payoff to creating a large branded educational entity that can profit from the development of such a branded pipeline of talent development.”

The Tibetan Buddhists, who have seen as much deliberate destruction of their lives and their culture than almost any people on the planet, are committed to a 500-year plan to create a better world. While most of us believe that it won't take 500 years, sometimes it is worth thinking about what you as an individual can achieve over the course of a lifetime. The Renaissance artist Lorenzo Ghiberti is famous for completing two sets of bronze doors in his life. The first set took him 21 years to complete. The second set took him 27 years to complete. Each door is covered with amazingly beautiful and detailed sculpture, doors that will be famous for as long as they exist. In our world in which life moves so quickly it is worth reflecting on the kind of commitment to excellence that could motivate someone to spend the first half his life perfecting a set of bronze doors (he started on them when he was 21), and then, when finished, to spend the second half of his life on a second set.

What if you committed yourself to making a powerful difference in the world over the course of your lifetime? Realize that making a difference is not about a feeling that you have now, but a focus on doing good and a commitment to personal excellence that you make for the long haul. You may not know exactly what your contribution is and you may have a number of different ones. As long as you develop your abilities and apply them on behalf of doing serious work for good, you will create your own bronze doors. The historical record shows that the world has become more peaceful, more prosperous, more environmentally healthy, and more comfortable than it was in the past. What can you do to create a better world over the course of your lifetime? What will your 'bronze doors' be

https://thoughtandindustry.com — Michael’s current project, new middle & high schools.

“Academia as the World's Leading Social Problem and What to Do About It” ••• by Michael Strong, first published by FLOW, and The Free Cities Institute, in 2012.

“Choosing a Non-Ideological President to Lead Shimer College” ••• by Strong, March 2012, to recount the negative effect of his 2010 essay “May Day: The Conspiracy of Silence Around the Romance of Evil” ••• on the college’s selection process. The essay concluded with this about Communism: “When will the culture of intellectuals, academia and the media, be morally mature enough to repudiate this evil, and end this conspiracy of silence. Romance is no excuse for evil.”

Michael has written a manifesto (still draft as of 15 June 2020) for Linda Sweeney’s startup project, Alumni Walk Away.

Michael’s blog of 2012 ••• (look for “The Creation of Conscious Culture” near the top)

Michael Strong’s email signature offers links to his work:

Creating a World in which All of Humanity Flourishes

Founding Director, The Academy of Thought and Industry (campuses in SF, NYC, and Austin, more coming soon)

Co-Founder and CEO, Radical Social Entrepreneurs

Lead Author, Be the Solution:  How Entrepreneurs and Conscious Capitalists Can Solve All the World's Problems

Author, The Habit of Thought:  From Socratic Seminars to Socratic Practice

Co-Founder Moreno Valley High School (ranked the 36th best public high school in 2006).

Co-Founder, Conscious Capitalism, Inc.

TEDx UChicago, "The Creation of Conscious Culture through Educational Innovation"

TEDx GrandRapids, "Innovate:  Experience"

TEDx UFM, "Socratic Practice as Disruptive Technology"

Voice & Exit, "Startup Cities"

Blog:  "The Purpose of Education is Happiness and Well-Being for All"

Freedom Lights Our World (FLOW) - text from 2006 or 2007

FLOW is a transpartisan initiative, founded by innovative educator Michael Strong and John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, dedicated to “liberating the entrepreneurial spirit for good” and focusing it on the goals of sustainable peace, prosperity, and happiness for all in our lifetime.

 

FLOW is dedicated to liberating the entrepreneurial spirit for good and directing it towards creating sustainable peace, prosperity, and happiness for all in our lifetime.

The FLOW Movement reflects a FLOW Vision, integrating appreciation for economic freedom, voluntary exchange, individual initiative, combined with social and environmental consciousness, and embodies FLOW Principles, which include commitments to human flourishing, non-violence, diversity, and radical tolerance.