🎯 The Ruckus Report
Quick take: What happens when a leader ditches ego, prioritizes relationships, and treats students like real-world innovators? Jeremy Quals proves you can turn around struggling schools and create one of the most exciting entrepreneurial programs in the country.
🤝Meet Your Fellow Ruckus Maker
Dr. Jeremy Qualls is the Executive Director of the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center (EIC) and College, Career, and Technical Education (CCTE) with Williamson County Schools. A former coach, principal, and district athletic director, he now leads some of the most innovative programs in Tennessee, blending entrepreneurship, career readiness, and creative learning opportunities that make school worth showing up for.
In this episode, Jeremy challenges traditional education paradigms:
🧠 Key Insight #1: Leadership isn’t about ego — it’s about relationships.
- What's broken: Leaders who default to punishment and blame.
- The shift: Building trust first, simplifying discipline to “Be responsible, be respectful, be ready.”
- Impact: Transformed a school with 1,000+ discipline referrals into one with just 52 — and skyrocketed student growth.
🧠 Key Insight #2: Students need relevance, not busywork.
- What's broken: 42 definitions on a worksheet and other meaningless tasks.
- The shift: Replace rote work with entrepreneurial problem-solving, empathy-driven projects, and micro-internships.
- Impact: Students who once checked out now show up excited, engaged, and prepared for life beyond school.
🧠 Key Insight #3: Create spaces worth showing up for.
- What's broken: Schools that look the same as the 1950s— rows, lectures, and compliance.
- The shift: Entrepreneurial labs with open design, mentorship networks, and student-led startups.
- Impact: The Entrepreneurship & Innovation Center grew from 70 students to 280 with a 500+ waitlist — and is producing teen founders winning national competitions.
Quotable Ruckus
“Fail forward and fail often.”
– Jeremy Quals
📌 Your Do School Different Challenge
Ready to implement these ideas? Start here:
- Tomorrow: Swap one rote assignment for a real-world problem or entrepreneurial- style task.
- This Month: Map student relationships — find the “safety valves” so every kid has a trusted adult.
- This Semester: Audit your schoolwork and culture. Cut the irrelevant busywork, build in creative challenges, and create spaces students want to be in.
Get the full episode transcript: here
Follow Dr. Jeremy Qualls: Email
Follow Dr. Jeremy Qualls: LinkedIn
Follow Dr. Jeremy Qualls: Twitter
If education ain’t a bit disruptive, then what are your students really learning?
This show isn’t about doing school better.
It’s about Doing School Different — and joining a growing movement of bold, creative school leaders who reject legacy models and reimagine what’s possible.
Here are four ways we can help you on your Do School Different journey
Subscribe to the Free Newsletter
— An opportunity to Do School Different 3x a week. Tools, mindset shifts, and strategies that actually work: ruckusmakers.news
Read Ruckus Makers
— Exclusive content on Substack. Premium leadership insights, AI prompts and custom GPTs, new books before the bookshelf: ruckusmakers.media
Join The Ruckus Maker Club
Our private network + workshops, The Automatic School tools, AI Prompt Library, and more:
The Ruckus Maker
Apply to the Mastermind
— Weekly coaching, peer mentorship, and our proven leadership system (The Ruckus Maker Flywheel) to help you transform your campus:
Apply Now
The podcast is your starting point. The movement is just getting started.
Today’s RUCKUScast in Partnership with:
Over 1 million teachers rely on IXL because it is empowering, it helps them make better decisions with reliable data, and it adapts instruction based on student performance.
🔍 Learn more: ixl.com/leaders
For over 30 years, ODP Business Solutions® has helped schools transform from whiteboards to smartboards. Why? Because when you get the right tools, everyone wins.
🔍 Learn more: ODP Business Solutions® to revolutionize your school's learning spaces
