Agile in Education
Written by Michael Vizdos, co-founder of Edvizion
Edvizion works with schools and districts on the administrative side — records, attendance, enrollment. This is the other half of the same problem: how the work itself gets done, and how teachers, coaches and leaders change the way they run it.
Michael Vizdos has been bringing Scrum and other agile approaches into classrooms, schools and districts since 2012, with 35+ years in the practice overall. Not as theory — in real schools, alongside the people doing the job.
Where this has actually been done
Since 2014
Strategic Advisor to Blueprint Education, working with the Impact Team — the school district's leadership group.
2017–2025
Scrum Master in Residence at the VCU da Vinci Center, with its Master of Product Innovation program and other colleges in the university system.
2021–2023
Co-creator of the Scrum Alliance's Certified Agile Leader: K-12 certification. The pilot has since been retired by the Scrum Alliance; the work continues at district level.
Eleven engagements, 2012 to today, are written up in Scrum In School.
Three ways to work together
Every engagement so far has started as a conversation rather than a package. Nothing here is priced off a shelf — tell us the situation and we will say honestly whether we can help.
Consulting
For district and school leadership deciding how to run this: where agile actually fits, what to change first, and what not to touch. Usually starts at the leadership table, not in a classroom.
Ask about it below — choose “Education — Consulting”.
Mentoring
One-to-one, ongoing, for an Agile Coach, Scrum Master, instructional coach or administrator who is already doing the work and wants someone who has done it to think alongside them.
Ask about it below — choose “Education — Mentoring”.
Training
Workshops and sessions for teachers, coaches, support staff and administrators — in person or online, built around your school or district rather than a generic curriculum.
Ask about it below — choose “Education — Training”.
One form, and it reaches Michael directly. Choosing consulting, mentoring or training in the dropdown is what tells him which conversation to have.
How this actually works
- Remote or in person. The ongoing work above has run both ways.
- Virginia and Arizona are where the work has been. Elsewhere is handled case by case — ask rather than assume you are out of range.
- It starts with a conversation, not a proposal. If we are not the right fit we will say so; that has happened and it saved everyone a quarter.
Not ready to talk to anyone?
That is the normal case, and there is a real thing to take away today. The Agile Educator Guide is a Creative Commons guide to running an agile classroom — free, and it asks for no email address.
No form, no list, no follow-up. Read it, try one thing, come back if it works.
Start here
- Scrum In School: Lessons By Michael Vizdos — eleven case studies, 2012 to today, at district, school and classroom level.
- Agile Educator Guide (Free Edition) — the 2021 Creative Commons guide. Free, and no email address required.
What an agile classroom looks like
Imagine a student walking into a classroom where the lesson plan was something that they helped to craft. Where the whiteboards were cluttered with handwritten sticky notes of student ideas, theories, and questions. A space where students of diverse backgrounds could innovate, discover, even disagree, and reflect on the best possible ways to bring their very different worlds together.
How much more equipped would students be if their learning environment created agency, produced social challenge, and organically conjured opportunities to solve their own problems?
That is what this work builds toward: classrooms that curate discovery, learning that is transparent, and students who grow their agile capacity through choice and collaboration — designed with the teachers and leaders who have to live in them afterwards.
Listen first, if you would rather
Subscribe today and receive real-time updates when new episodes are released.
- For Agile Coaches and Scrum Masters: Agile in Education: Agile Coach & Scrum Master Edition
- For teachers and administrators: Agile In Education: Classroom Teacher Edition (End Your Burnout!)
- For cross-walking current skills to Scrum: Agile In Education: New Team Member Onboarding Edition
Further reading
Other people's work, kept because it is genuinely useful. Includes the Agile In Education Compass, which Michael co-facilitated in 2016 and which lives on the community's own site.
- How Eduscrum Works
- Agile in Education: How Hope HS Embraced the Journey and Learned to Fly (2022)
- 4 Pillars of Agile in Education (2021)
- Agile in the Classroom — Center for Teaching Excellence, Miami University
- Agile Based Learning: What is it? And How Can It Change Schools? (2014)
- Agile Schools: How Technology Saves Education (2011)
- Agile Education Compass — video (2016)
- Agile in the Classroom: A Project Management Methodology — video (2016)
- Agile in the Classroom Podcast: Student Interviews — Mile High Agile (2019)
- Agile and Lean Concepts for Teaching and Learning — paper (2018)
- Agile Manifesto in Higher Education — paper (2012)
- Agile Practices in Higher Education: A Case Study — paper (2012)
- Agile Methodologies in Education — paper
Also in print, with no stable link: “Pulling Agile into Education,” Spotlight Magazine (2019), and Paul Magnuson’s Agile Journey, Spotlight Magazine (2016–2017).
Want more of this?
We are publishing on agile and Scrum in education — for districts and for the people building software for them — on LinkedIn, where 300+ people already follow along.
No email address, no list. Unfollow whenever you like.