About Kent Lenci
“Kent was FABULOUS!!!!! Truly one of the best PD speakers I’ve heard in 29 years of hearing PD speakers! ”
“Amazing communication skills, deep knowledge of how to engage a specific audience”
Kent is the author of Learning To Depolarize: Helping Students and Teachers Reach Across Lines of Disagreement.
He has taught, coached, and occupied several leadership positions at the middle school level over the past twenty years. He is a recipient of various honors, including the Margot Stern Strom Teaching Award from Facing History and Ourselves and the NAIS Teacher of the Future designation. He earned his Ed.M. in Learning and Teaching from Harvard University.
In partnership with the Better Arguments Project, Kent created a curriculum to encourage civil discourse among middle- and high-school students. He has helped envision and execute programming for the K-12 sector of the National Week of Conversation, and he serves on the Education Advisory Team for Courageous Rhode Island. Kent has also worked with a number of schools to help educators navigate the complexities of political polarization. By virtue of temperament and experience, he is well suited to gently, purposefully, and humorously leading students and faculty members through difficult discussions.
““Kent has collaborated with our team on several occasions as an adviser and consultant. He has offered his expertise and experience in education to help us grow programs and create materials, bringing real meaning and action to our ideas. We look forward to working with him again.””
““Kent Lenci is a passionate educator who is focusing on one of the most important issues facing young people today, how to be able to take a stand while remaining in dialogue with others who have different opinions. He worked with our history teachers and gave us many helpful resources that have already allowed us to work more effectively with our students. We believe Kent’s work will continue to make our young people more effective citizens as they become adults.””
““Kent did a brave and revolutionary thing this year, as leader of Brookwood’s IDEA group. In our cozy independent school world where people smile and nod on the outside but gripe and groan in the dark corners, his efforts to bring important conversations into the light were unprecedented and powerful. The goal: to get us to listen to certain members of our community who have felt alienated or unheard, especially in a political context. These are people whose views differ, in one way or another, from the (liberal, among other descriptors) cultural norm. Kent gave one person each month a chance to speak openly about their views and their experiences, and we, the group, listened. Even when the experiences got difficult—and they did—with Kent’s steady support and meticulously thought-out guidelines, we all grew. The man has vision, and we were fortunate, this year, to be a part of his work. Like so many of us, Kent sees clearly the disunity and divisiveness plaguing our country these days. But unlike most of us, Kent is not going to sit and watch. In his classroom and with us, his colleagues, he has taken steps toward solving the problem.””