Meet your speakers
Bayo Akomolafe
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Bayo Akomolafe (Ph.D.), rooted with the Yoruba people in a more-than-human world, is the father to Alethea and Kyah, the grateful life-partner to EJ, son and brother. He is a widely celebrated international speaker, posthumanist thinker, poet, teacher, self-styled âtrans-publicâ intellectual, essayist, and currently the Hubert Humphrey Distinguished Professor of American Studies in Macalester College, Saint Paul, Minnesota, USA (August 2025). Bayo is the host teacher at Dancing with Mountains, an educational consultation and the visionary founder of The Emergence Network, a planet-wide networking project and inquiry at the edges of the Anthropocene.
A.S.Neill Summerhill CICÂ
Summerhill School, and Freedom vs Licence
Acting as ambassadors of A.S.Neillâs world famous philosophies and Summerhill Schoolâs 100-years of practice in educating the whole child, the aim of A.S.Neill Summerhill CIC is to facilitate and support innovative initiatives around the world, working towards or already implementing the above values within childrearing, education and society. Henry Redhead, the grandson of A.S.Neill, has been part of the Summerhill School community for 41 years through many different capacities from student to Deputy Head. Anie Kallinikou has worked within education in several different roles including nursery and primary school teacher; outdoor environmental and sustainability education senior facilitator; care worker; theatre pedagogy facilitator; and educational programmes developer. James Coulter has a broad history of working within education including state and independent schools, sixth form colleges, home education as well as Summerhill School as a science and mathematics teacher.
Bria Bloom
Fireside Conversation: Partnership Parenting and Why it is so Important
Bria Bloom (she/her) grew up unschooled, is an unschooling parent of two, and loves to work and play as an SDE facilitator. She is the co-founder of Flying Squads; a partnership partnering coach; a facilitator and founder of PDX Flying Squads, a community for self-directed young people in Portland, OR;Â a writer; and the Organizational Manager for the international advocacy group, the Alliance for Self-Directed Education (ASDE). Bria is also a martial artist and a dancer, and a plant-based cooking enthusiast. She spends a lot of her time reading and discussing education and parenting ideas with anyone who is interested.Â
Leslie W. Bray
Fireside Conversation:Â Partnership Parenting and Why it is so Important
Leslie W. Bray is an Advisor & Guide at Mosaic and a community mentor who supports families in building connected, values-aligned relationships with their young people. A former classroom teacher turned unschooling mother of three, who are now continuing their own development through work, internships and higher education. Leslie works alongside parents, educators, and leaders to cultivate trust-centered, curiosity-led learning communities and spaces. She writes and speaks about connection, conscious parenting, and education rooted in relationship and liberation.
Anna Brown
Fireside Conversation: This Isn't How I Thought it Would Be
Anna Brown has a degree in Family and Child Development. She worked with families in crisis before turning her attention to helping parents build better relationships with their children and partners. She has been doing that very rewarding work for over 20 years. She works in private practice as a Relationship Specialist helping couples and families move through conflicts and create an environment of collaboration and growth. She also enjoys working with businesses to improve communication, increase employee satisfaction and increase productivity. Anna has two grown children who were always unschooled. She has written and spoken at conferences about relationships and unschooling for over 20 years. She currently co-hosts the Exploring Unschooling Podcast with Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis as well as co-hosting The Living Joyfully Network.
Iris Chen
Deschooling and Addressing the 'isms'
Iris Chen is an unschooling mother, certified parenting coach, and founder of the Untigering movement. When her authoritarian attempts to raise obedient and high-achieving children only led to years of tears, tantrums, and conflict, she knew something had to change⊠and it wasnât her children. Through her writing and speaking, Iris now shares her healing journey of shifting from power-over to power-with in her relationship with her children. Her mission is to inspire generational and cultural transformation through conscious parenting, self-directed learning, and decolonization. You can read more about her adventures in her book Untigering: Peaceful Parenting for the Deconstructing Tiger Parent and on her blog at untigering.com.
Ieishah Clelland-Lange
Fireside Conversation:Â Reclaiming Indigenous Learning
 FROM LAST YEAR Ieishah is a writer and unschooling mother of two, who has travelled to over 50 countries and lived in seven. Currently residing in Florida, her work has been published in Ebony and Tipping Points Magazine for ASDE and she co-produced a podcast series with Akilah S. Richards. In 2024 Ieishah completed her Master of Indigenous Studies in Aotearoa, New Zealand and you can read her Masters thesis âAll the Children are Indigenousâ here.
Sophie Cristophy
Why Consent is the Cornerstone of Self-directed Learning
Sophie Christophy (she/her) is the Director of The Cabin and the Lodge, consent-based, self-directed learning communities for home-educated young people aged 5-16, and the channel for their Guiding Principles. She provides guidance and support to people exploring themes of self-direction and consent-based living and learning, who seek to live in alignment and integrity with themselves and others, as well as being the mum of two unschooling young people aged 15 and 12.
Melissa Crockett-Joyoue
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Melissa lives in Aotearoa (New Zealand), is MÄori, AuDHD and the mama of two unschooled neurodivergent children. Her experience with understanding and meeting their needs deepened her commitment to helping others on a similar path. Melissa is the founder of Weave ND, an online membership community dedicated to neurodivergent unschooling families. She is especially passionate about working with neurodivergent parents and Indigenous families on their unschooling journeys.
Chévanni Davids
Fireside Conversation:Â Reclaiming Indigenous Learning
ChĂ©vanni Davids is a father, writer, and learning practitioner exploring regenerative approaches to education beyond schooling. Based between South Africa and global learning communities, his work weaves together unlearning, Ubuntu philosophy, land-based practice, and self-directed learning. He is the founder of Reimagined Learning Community, cultivating spaces where young people, families, and educators reconnect with curiosity, relational intelligence, and ecological belonging. ChĂ©vanniâs work centres Ceremonies of Remembering, which he curates as learning journeys, gatherings, festivals, and experimental spaces that invite participants into embodied, relational ways of learning. His current projects include What the Land Might Mean by Learning and The Great Unlearning. In collaboration with indigenous communities and wisdom keepers, he supports processes rooted in collective inquiry, grief work, and reconnection to land and ancestral ways of knowing. His facilitation invites a shift from compliance-driven education toward soul-directed and community-rooted learning as a living process. Â
Amanda Diekman
Letting Go of Perfectionism
Amanda Diekman is a late diagnosed autistic adult, parent coach, and author in the neurodiversity space. Amanda became a leading voice in the movement for low demand parenting practices, with her book Low Demand Parenting, published July 2023. Amanda runs a successful coaching practice for parents of neurodivergent children, offering a variety of online courses. She is the host of Low Demand Parenting podcast. She lives with her husband and three neurodivergent children in an intentional community in Durham, NC. Amanda holds two degrees from Duke University, including a Masters in Theology.
Pat Farenga
A Conversation About Ivan Illich, Author of Deschooling Society
Patrick Farenga is deeply connected to the legacy of the renowned educator John Holt, and his work is marked by his unwavering commitment to empowering learners. John Holt founded Growing Without Schooling magazine in 1977, a seminal publication that ushered in a radical shift in perceptions of education beyond the confines of traditional school settings. Pat joined GWS in 1981 and, following Holt's passing in 1985, assumed the mantle of leadership, shepherding the magazine through a transformative era until it ceased publication in 2001. A prolific writer and publisher, Pat's contributions span a diverse array of genres, from speeches and books to articles and videos, enriching the discourse on homeschooling and unschooling. Pat preserves and disseminates Holt's works, ensuring that his revolutionary ideas continue to shape the educational landscape for generations to come. Recent titles such as Teach Your Own (Hachette, 2021) and Growing Without Schooling, Vol. 5 (HoltGWS, 2023) exemplify his ongoing commitment to advancing self-directed and child-centered learning practices.
Ramin Farhangi
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Ramin Farhangi is a French unschooling advocate, educator, and community builder with over a decade of lived experience in self-directed education. He is the founder of Ăcole Dynamique in Paris, one of Franceâs first democratic schools, and has inspired hundreds of thousands via his TEDx conferences. A father to a 9-year-old unschooled child, Ramin combines personal parenting experience with extensive work supporting learning communities, eco-villages, and family collectives across France. His work explores the intersections of freedom, responsibility, emotional safety, and collective governanceâboth in families and in communities. Through his Enfance Libre initiative â a civil-disobedience movement defending the right to freedom of education in France â he mobilizes families to protect and expand the liberty of instruction, challenging restrictive norms and supporting families in claiming their rights to self-directed learning.
Naomi Fisher
When to Encourage and When to Hold Back
Dr Naomi Fisher is a clinical psychologist and author of two books on self-directed education. She has two children who are now teenagers and who did not go to conventional school. She lives in Devon with her family and two cats.
Kirsty Forbes
Why Compliance Isnât the Goal. What's Actually Important Instead?
Kristy Forbes is an Australian-based educator with a focus on Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA). Drawing on her lived experience as an autistic person with ADHD and a PDA profile, as well as being a school-avoidant individual who now home educates her own neurodivergent children, Kristy offers unique insight into the challenges faced by PDA individuals and their families. Combining her background in education, behavioural support, and family advocacy with personal experiences of trauma, burnout, addiction, homelessness, and systemic misunderstanding, she provides compassionate support through her programs, webinars, and public speaking, all aimed at empowering and understanding those with PDA and related trauma.
Eliza Fricker
Self-Directed Learning and Your PDAer
Eliza Fricker is an author & illustrator, and an advocate & consultant for PDA, autism and learning. She has published several books, including A Different Kind of Parenting, the Sunday Times Bestselling title Canât Not Wonât, and the acclaimed autobiographical Thumbsucker. Eliza offers a range of support for parents and educators on navigating autism and education, including one-to-one consultations, webinars, presentations, a podcast, and the enduring original Missing the Mark illustrations.
Makeba Garraway
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Makeba Garraway (she/her) is a mixed heritage Black British mother to two always-unschooled children aged 13 and 10. Her neurodivergent family moved to California in 2019 and now live on Ohlone land in the Bay Area. A former medical doctor and university mental health advisor, she is now being drawn towards death work. She trained as a death doula in 2025 and is a local hospice volunteer. Makeba enjoys singing in two choirs, composing choral music, dipping in and out of various crafty pursuits, and being outdoors in the sunshine with her family and two dogs.
M Gilbert
If I Hadn't Walked Out of That SchoolâAn Unschooling Journey
MÂ Gilbert is the parent of two unschooling young adults and the founder of Speak and Be Easy (formerly the Eclectic Learning Network), established in 2016 and closed in 2025. SBE was an Ubuntu-centered resource that connected parents, educators, and youth learning centers to discuss their intersections. M. is also a co-founder of the Philly Children's Movement, which advocates for racial justice, and "Deschooling is a Thing," a monthly meetup supporting parents in their deschooling journeys.
Over the past decade, M. has engaged with the home education community in Philadelphia and beyond, particularly in underserved communities, facilitating over 500 offerings. Additionally, M. has provided equity-centered professional development for self-directed learning spaces and various organizations, including colleges and museums.
Now that her unschooling children have transitioned into adulthood, M. is also beginning a new chapter in her journey as the Communications and Culture Director at Natural Creativity Center.
Peter Gray
A Vision for the Future of Education
Peter Gray, research professor of psychology and neuroscience at Boston College, has conducted and published research in neuroendocrinology, developmental psychology, anthropology, and education. He is author of an internationally acclaimed introductory psychology textbook, now in its eighth edition, which views all of psychology from an evolutionary perspective. Much of his research focuses on the role of play in human evolution and how children educate themselves, through play and exploration. He has expanded on these ideas in his book: âFree to Learn: Why Releasing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More Self-Reliant, and Better Students for Lifeâ. He also authors a Substack entitled Play Makes Us Human. You can find links to many of his research articles at his website.
Em Hammond
What is the Work of the Adults? Building Blocks and Capacity
Em is an AuDHD speech pathologist, and mum to three neurodivergent kiddos. She is also the mind behind the social media account NeuroWild. Widely known for her illustrations and resources about neurodiversity and supporting Autistic and ADHD kids, her ability to break down big ideas and tricky concepts into accessible language, frameworks, and practical tools has made her a highly sought-after voice in education, allied health, and advocacy. Em's work invites us to rethink what is actually the work of the adultsâreframing misconceptions around behaviour and communication, as well as bringing to light the less visible and often overlooked aspects of Autistic and ADHD experiences. Most simply, she invites us to be curious towards our kids, ourselves, and the world around usâoffering a window into what it can be like to navigate the world with a neurodivergent brain, and the permission to meet our kids where they're at.Â
Lou Hollis
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Luvenia Marie Wilkerson, also known professionally as Lou Hollis, is a parent, creative producer and community-based mentor working at the intersection of self-directed education, creativity and real-world skill development. A longtime homeschooling and unschooling parent, Lou supports teens, young adults and families through trust-based mentorship that centers presence, repair and relationship rather than urgency or performance.
Sheâs the founder of Lou Hollis Talent MGMT (LHTM), where education, entertainment, technology & business converge through hands-on mentoring, creative production and apprenticeship-style learning. Lou works with young people navigating media, entrepreneurship & workforce pathways, while honoring nervous-system awareness, lived experience & sustainable pacing.
Lou is also the producer of the âGrief, Growth & Goals podcast with Lou Hollisâ, which explores how people move through loss, reinvention and becoming, across family, creative and professional life. Her work reflects a holistic approach to learning and growthâŠ..one that unfolds through time, relationship & community.
Manish Jain
From Harvard to the Feet of My Grandmother. Returning to Roots
Manish Jain is deeply committed to regenerating our diverse local knowledge systems, cultural imaginations and inter-cultural dialogue. He is one of the leading planetary voices for unlearning, deschooling our lives and reimagining education. He has served Shikshantar: The Peoplesâ Institute for Rethinking Education and Development based in Udaipur, India, for 27 years. He is co-founder of some of the most innovative educational experiments in the worldâthe Swaraj University, Jail University, Complexity University, Tribal Farmversity, Sacredversities, the Learning Societies Unconference and numerous others. He co-launched the global Ecoversities Alliance with 500+ members in 50 countries. He is a senior advisor to the Economics of Happiness network for localisation. He has worked as a facilitator with Social Labs, Art of Hosting and World Cafe. Manish has been invited to give inspiring public keynote speeches on Reimagining Education all around the world. Prior to this, Manish worked as one of the principal team members of the UNESCO âLearning Without Frontiersâ global initiative. He has also been a consultant to UNICEF, World Bank, USAID in Africa, South Asia and the former Soviet Union. Manish worked as an investment banker with Morgan Stanley. He has been trying to unlearn his Master's degree in Education from Harvard University and a B.A. in Economics, International Development and Political Philosophy from Brown University. He and his wife Vidhi have been unschooling themselves with their 23 year old daughter, Kanku, in Udaipur, Rajasthan.
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Emma Johnston
Breathwork, Balance & Unschooling an Entrepreneurial Life
Emma Johnston, known online as @newearth.mama, is a Rebirthing Breathwork facilitator, conscious parenting educator, and co-founder of Reconnected Parenting. She is the unschooling mother of five children, with her lived experience of parenting forming the foundation of her work. Emma completed a mastery in Rebirthing Breathwork, a modality that profoundly shaped both her personal healing journey and her professional practice. Through breathwork, nervous system regulation, and embodied awareness, she supports parents to take responsibility for their inner world so they can show up with greater presence, safety, and connection for their children.
Emma integrates breathwork with attachment-based and play-centred approaches to parenting, creating practical tools that support emotional regulation, repair, and deep relational connection. Her work is dedicated to helping families build a new paradigm of conscious, connected living.
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Esther Jones
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Esther is a UK-based mindfulness teacher, deschooling coach and mother of three unschooled children. She is the author of the recently-published The Parent's Handbook to Unschooling Yourself and she hosts the bi-weekly podcast, The Unschool Space, in which she explores the joys and challenges of unschooling with other unschooling parents. Esther works with parents who want to unravel the beliefs and conditioning that hold them back from embracing life in partnership with their children.
Alexander Khost
Workshop:Â Setting Up a Flying Squad to Help Your Unschooled Teens Take Up Public Space
Alexander Khost (he/him) is the founder of SDE Youth Rights Accreditation, with a long history of working as a practitioner and advocate of youth rights. Alex lives part-time in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, where he volunteers at the self-directed Fearless School and part-time in Brooklyn, NY, USA. Alex co-founded Flying Squads, a youth liberation and anti-oppression collective that believes in the abolition of divided spaces between young people and their community. He is also a Board Member at the Alliance for Self-Directed Education. He has four children of his own that all are raised through trustful parenting.
Pam Laricchia
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Pam Laricchia has been living and exploring unschooling for more than 20 years. She is the author of five books on unschooling, the founding host of the Exploring Unschooling podcastâwhich recently celebrated its 10-year anniversaryâand co-host of the Living Joyfully Network, an online community for families around the world.
Through her books, podcast, and community work, Pam has helped thousands of parents rethink long-held cultural assumptions about relationships, learning, and school. Her work goes beyond educational choices to explore paradigm shifts around control, independence, relationships, and trust. She is passionate about helping families move from fear and societal expectations toward connection, curiosity, and lives grounded in respect.
Las Boconas
Living, Learning and Healing in Community
Colectiva Las Boconas are women/people from marginalized communities cultivating an intergenerational community of care and liberation in the Chicagoland area through mutual aid, raising free people, healthy gossip, joy, and rest. fanny is a formerly undocumented, Mexican immigrant womyn. As a co-founder of Las Boconas, she collaborates with her family and community to cultivate intergenerational spaces for community care, healing and liberation. As an unschooler, fanny learns alongside her kids and husband through play, curiosity and laughter. She nourishes her mind, body, and spirit by resting, reading, storytelling (healing gossip), dancing, gardening, and practicing ancestral healing. Mary Albarran is an immigrant woman from Mexico, and culturally, she is a hard-working woman but prefers to rest out of rebellion. Mary's passions are hiking, art, gardening, and walking with Pancho, her dog. Rogelia Lily Ibarra is the daughter of Mexican immigrants, a mother, writer, living at the intersection of healing, imagination, and liberation.
Lainie Liberti
Helping Your Teen Get Ready to Launch
Lainie Liberti is the founder and creator of the Transformative Mentoring for Teens program. She is an author, speaker, community leader, teen coach, adolescent behavioral specialist, and alternative education advocate, widely recognized as a pioneer in the worldschooling movement.
Lainie specializes in confidence-building and mental health support for teens and young people. In 2012, she co-founded Project World School alongside her son, helping to redefine education through experiential, self-directed learning. Through this work, Lainie designs and co-facilitates immersive, month-long teen retreats around the world that foster autonomy, emotional intelligence, and global perspective.
Over the past decade, Lainie has facilitated more than 20 international retreats for hundreds of teens, guiding participants through cultural immersion, values exploration, and deep personal growth. Her work centers on helping young people develop self-trust, emotional resilience, and a strong sense of identity in an increasingly complex world.
In 2022, Lainie released her first book, Seen, Heard & Understood: Parenting and Partnering with Teens for Greater Mental Health, which became a #1 Amazon Best Seller in Parenting New Releases. Her work continues to bridge mental health, education, and conscious parenting through a partnership-based approach.
Daniel T. Moeller M. S. Ed.
Fireside Conversation:Â Partnership Parenting and Why it is so Important
Dan Moeller is a teacher-turned-unschooling father, parenting coach, and advisor for self-directed education. He advocates consent, youth empowerment, and connection. He has an affinity for children, creativity, and organic play having spent much of his life as a teacher and around families. He partners with his son on their Unschooling With Kai podcast and their hilarious, in-progress book Bunny Stampede. He enjoys writing about all things unschooling, and can often be found reading, watching movies, skateboarding, wall-climbing, finding humor, making friends with local squirrels and crows, and spending time with his family.
Thea Monyée
Tending Grief & Centering Joy
Thea MonyeĂ©Â embodies, advocates for, and teaches humans how to embrace Joy & Change in their daily lives. From podcasting to diving, she uses diverse mediums to demonstrate the power of these two forces, and offers a hand to those willing to engage the journey! She defines JOY as every living thingâs innate and inextricable birthright, to choose at any moment, what brings them the maximum experience of aliveness they desire---without abusing or dehumanizing others. Her JOY mission seeks to ensure every human being understands their JOY is a birthright, and can be engaged using the following four pillars: Joy Curiosity, Joy Experiences, Joy Politics, and Joy Culture. This work is rooted in our belief that joy can be used as a powerful metric for aliveness.
Chemay Morales-James
Fireside Conversation:Â Reclaiming Indigenous Learning
Chemay Morales-James is a Boricua (Puerto Rican) mother of two vivacious kids who have been unschooled all their lives. She is the founder and space holder of My Reflection Matters Village and also a recovering school teacher and DEI (Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion) coach turned SDE organizer. In 2020, she launched a liberation-centered, digital co-learning community called My Reflection Matters Village (expanding from their physical co-learning community in Connecticut). MRM Village is a space to support socially conscious parents and educators navigating liberation-centered, self-directed education and parenting. As an independent consultant, she provides direct support for educational institutions and non-profits serving youth and families looking to create equitable and/or liberatory systems and practices. She supports people creating physical or digital co-learning BIPOC communities. Chemay is an experienced anti-racist educator and facilitator (20 years), who lives and breathes liberation work.
Danii Oliver
Fireside Conversation:Â This Isn't How I Thought it Would Be
Danii Oliver is an unschooling cognitive scientist and lifelong learner devoted to raising curious, capable humans. They are the founder of ChiâVa, a neuroscience-informed mental performance platform, and have worked across fields including natural earth building science, permaculture and beverage fermentation for holistic living.
Danii's storybook series, Unschool Discoveries, is the only collection of unschooler stories highlighting exploration and self-directed education. As author, illustrator, and animator, Danii creates entertainment that honors children as whole people.
For 15 years, Danii has been unschooling, using life itself as curriculum, navigating interest-based development, and real-world problem solving. Drawing from neuroscience and regenerative living, Danii approaches unschooling as an integrated system rooted in agency, and a perspective centered on trust in children.
Sue Patterson
What's My Role as an Unschooling Parent?
Sue Patterson is an unschooling coach, author, and the founder and voice behind Unschooling Mom2Mom. With 30 years of experienceâand three now-grown âkidsâ who thrived without traditional schoolingâSue helps families move away from educational systems that arenât working and embrace the principles of unschooling. She shows parents how real learning happens through lifeânot by recreating school at home, but by partnering with their children to create a truly individualized learning environment.
Through her podcast, courses, private mentoring, and Creating Confidence Membership community, Sue supports parents at every stage of the unschooling journey. She also offers weekly Unschooling Pep Talks on her Unschooling Mom2Mom podcast and YouTube channel, sharing reassurance, clarity, and real-life perspective during seasons of doubt, overwhelm or big mindset shifts.
Radical Learning: Sari Gonzalez & Becka Koritz
Workshop: But what if� Navigating fear, doubt, and trust
Becka Koritz and Sari GonzĂĄlez are long-time collaborators, co-founders of Radical Learning, and mamas of neurodivergent unschoolers. Their work is grounded in lived experience - parenting, facilitating, and unlearning fear-based ways of relating to young people under real-world pressure. They are the hosts of the Radical Learning Talks podcast, an ongoing conversation about learning, power, consent, and culture creation. Through dialogue rather than certainty, the podcast explores what it means to live trustâand relationship based values in a world shaped by control, urgency, and performance. Together, Becka and Sari bring over 30 years of experience working with children, parents, educators, and communities across the U.S., Mexico, and internationally. Their work centers on deconditioning - supporting adults in shedding internalized patterns shaped by school, fear, and dominant ideas about success. Their offerings include Parent Support Circles, Deeply Deschooling small group coaching, and The Shift 7 day in-person training - all designed to support parents and educators who are questioning fear-based ways of parenting and learning, and who want to live their values more fully in everyday life. Across all of their work, Becka and Sari donât offer formulas, fixes, or âright answers.â They work from inside the process - paying close attention to consent, group dynamics, nervous systems, and relational safety. Together, they bring a balance of depth and lightness, structure and play. Their spaces are held with care, clarity, and trust in peopleâs capacity to learn through relationshipâwithout being pushed, fixed, or rushed.
Akilah S. Richards
Tending Grief & Centering Joy
Akilah S. Richards is a grief educator, savor coach, and cultural strategist who supports people through lifeâs shifts and losses. Rooted in unschooling and community care, her work invites us to slow down, honor endings, and listen for what still wants to liveâtrading urgency and performance for presence and truth-telling. For over a decade, Akilah was a leading voice in the global unschooling movement, helping families reclaim autonomy, question hierarchy, and build consent-based relationships. That legacy of liberation now lives through her grief and joy work, where she invites us to trade performance for presence and urgency for rhythm. She is the creator of *What I Let Die*, a public service podcast on grief literacy, and co-creator of *Bringing Flowers*, a collaborative offering with Thea MonyeĂ© that explores the sacred interplay between grief and joy.
Ruth Rinaldi
Reframing Maths and Parents' Anxiety About It
Ruth Rinaldi is an unusual combination of unschooling mum and an ex Head of Maths who left after 11 years of teaching secondary school level, to unschool her own kids. She now runs Joyful Maths with Ruth, providing home educating families support through coaching sessions, small group problem solving sessions plus workshops and courses to support parents. She adores maths and knows beyond doubt that it can be accessible to everyone. She specialises in healing maths wounds, so parents (and kids) can rid themselves of pesky school assumptions about this beautiful subject. Ruth works with parents to guide them to a place of empowerment where they learn how to offer maths in a totally different way. She provides radical truths about what real maths learning looks like - where children retain their autonomy, passion and curiosity. Ruth refuses to allow testing, timing and memorising facts to ruin this!
Kate Robinson
Creativity, Unschooling, and Life With Sir Ken Robinson
Kate Robinson is Director of the Sir Ken Robinson Foundation and co-author of Out of Our Minds: The Power of Being Creative (Wiley 2026) and Imagine If⊠Creating a Future for Us All (Penguin, 2022), which serves as the manifesto of her father, Sir Ken Robinson. She also served as Creativity and Imagination Expert on Apple TV+âs childrenâs series Not a Box (2025). She is a patron of Action for Childrenâs Arts and the Forest of Imagination, and a Trustee of Sir Ken Robinsonâs intellectual property, held by his Estate.
An author, speaker, and podcast host, Kate works at the intersection of creativity, education, and cultural change. In the face of an increasingly uncertain future, she argues that imagination and creativity are not optional extras but essential human capacities. Through her writing and public work, she challenges individuals, institutions, and communities to rethink inherited systems and consider how new ones might be shaped.
Heidi Steel
Fireside Conversation: This Isn't How I Thought it Would BeÂ
Heidi Steel is the founder of Live Play Learn and the Unschooling Village Hub, and author of the book âSchool Isnât for Everyone and What You Can Do Instead: A Practical and Neuro-Affirming Guide to Unschoolingâ. She has over 14 years of hands-on experience as an unschooling parent of four always-unschooled children. Heidi shares a practical, down-to-earth approach that builds connection, trust, and a lifelong love of learning. Throughout the resources and community that she hosts for unschooling families, you can find support to step away from traditional education systems, and guidance and reassurance to create learning environments that truly work for their families. Heidiâs work is rooted in the belief that children learn best when they are trusted and given the space to follow their natural curiosity. Â
Meghan Suniga-Davies
Out in the World With Neurodivergent Teens
Meghan is a parent of grown and teen unschoolers, currently living in Austin, Texas. Sheâs been involved in Self-Directed Education (SDE) for many years, raising life-long unschoolers while living in Asia, Europe and USA. She works with various groups and organizations within alternative education but her passion is with teens and parents through emergent programming and her local Flying Squad.Â
Tina Talaic
The Natural Learning Journey of a MÄori MÄmÄ
Tina Talaic, also known as KĆkÄ T, is a Maori mÄmÄ, of NgÄti PÄhauwera, NgÄti Kahungunu ki te Wairoa, TĆ«hoe, Tainui, NgÄti Makerewai and NgÄti Kuri affiliations. Tina and her whÄnau (family) are natural learners, and her son Maioha is now 10 years old. They live in Tamaki Makaurau, Auckland, in Aotearoa. She is a musician, community organiser and traditional Kapa Haka and Te Reo (Maori performing arts and language) tutor and works to bring Waiata and Te Reo to many home education and preschool groups and festivals. Tina is one of the Pou Whenuaâfounding membersâof Mauri Kura, a national collective of MÄori whÄnau who are learning outside the mainstream schooling system.
Cyrielle Tignard
The Importance of Nurturing Your Own Creativity
Cyrielle Tignard is a former teacher and unschooling mom to a 9-year-old daughter who's never been to school. She travels part time with her family and is currently on Vancouver Island in Canada. She is passionate about helping unschooling moms live more fulfilling, aligned lives through what she calls soul care. After experiencing burnout herself, she began intentionally carving out regular creative time, which supported her wellbeing and positively impacted her unschooling life. This led to the creation of Unschooling & Thriving, where she encourages moms to reclaim time for themselves and weave creativity into daily life. Cyrielle publishes Pleine Joie, a seasonal wellbeing magazine for homeschooling and unschooling moms, and she also runs The Watercolor Nook, a monthly watercolor subscription offering gentle tutorials and creative connection.
Domari Wearen
Why Conscious Parenting and Unschooling are a Natural Fit
Domari Wearen is a magic-making, joy-bringing, cycle-breaking, love-filled, liberation-minded disruptor. Her four children experience this through their familyâs conscious parenting and unschooling adventures. Her coaching clients experience this through her specialized programs and services that invite them to identify their oppressive parenting practices while co-creating more liberatory, love-centered practices and spaces that center freedom, respect, and autonomy. Other people in the world experience this through the work she does as a board member for the Alliance for Self-Directed Education, through her fun-filled, high-energy math tutoring sessions, and her IG account thatâs a compilation of educational, entertaining, and inspirational content. Prior to becoming an unschooling parent, Domari had a long career in teaching and education. Her positions ranged from math teacher to director of mathematics, working as an instructional specialist providing professional development to teachers and leadership teams and as an educational consultant.
Upgrade to the UNSCHOOLING BONUS PACK
Access courses, trainings, books, memberships and discounts from our amazing Speakers and Panelists to inspire and support your family's unschooling journey. Plus access to all the Summit recordings for 12 months, along with downloadable workbook, transcripts and audio.
UPGRADE TO THE UNSCHOOLING BONUS PACK
