Episode 73: Turning Education into a Marketplace of Innovation

Michael Schaus

Free to Offend Episode 73 | Guests: Christina and Eric Threeton, Nevada School of Inquiry

There are massive changes occurring in education – and most of those changes are being driven by parents and educators, not politicians or bureaucratic school districts.

As former educators and school administrators, Christina and Eric Threeton realized there was a better way to approach education than what was being done by large institutionalized public-school systems. And so, a couple of years ago, they began the journey of opening their own micro-school in Las Vegas, The Nevada School of Inquiry.

They joined the program to talk about the challenges facing educational innovators and how important it is for there to be a marketplace where passionate people can pursue new ways of approaching education.

Read the Transcript

Eric Threeton: Unfortunately, if you’re just taking a couple of teachers who really want to do something like this, it’s almost impossible because of the capital investment up front.

Michael Schaus: This is Free to Offend. I’m your host, Michael Schaus. I’m very excited about today’s episode because yes, once again, we’re going to be talking about education. But it’s not the educational topic that we’ve been covering. And we’re not going to go into depth when it comes to opportunity scholarships or educational savings accounts, or, you know, what’s going on in the rest of the world, but not happening here in Nevada.

No, instead we are going to talk to a micro school that’s right here in Las Vegas. Christina and Eric Threeton are from the Nevada School of Inquiry. They just started up a micro school here in Nevada, which is a story that we’re hearing more and more.

I mean, every time we turn around and we’re talking about education, we seem to find somebody that either goes to a micro school or knows somebody that started a micro school, and it’s a dynamic that makes me pretty excited when I think about the education realm right now.

So Christina and Eric, thank you so much for joining us. We really appreciate it.

Christina Threeton: Yes. Thank you, Michael.

Michael Schaus: Tell me a little bit about, about the school itself, Nevada’s School of Inquiry. What, what’s kind of your driving philosophy for this micro school?

Christina Threeton: Yeah, so the Nevada School of Inquiry really is a product of wanting to be a smaller school where we would have the freedom to be able to teach inquiry-based education.

We believe in inquiry so that we’re teaching hands on, our kids experiencing what they’re learning and it’s more meaningful connecting to the world around them. And so that’s really kind of what got us into it.

Michael Schaus: So this is definitely like a departure from, you know, the teacher standing up there telling you the dates that Christopher Columbus sailed to Ocean Blue.

Christina Threeton: They have Google!

Michael Schaus: No. And well, and that’s, see that’s fantastic. And you’re already kind of speaking my language because you know, I had a very difficult time when I was younger in school and then ended up going to a very unique school called Denver School of the Arts in Denver, Colorado.

And they really drove home you’re kind of teaching yourself. You’re kind of learning things, you’re asking questions, and through that, you learn more and more.

So I love that philosophy. You guys just started this last year. What drove you to, to really take the leap as opposed to trying to work within, you know, any existing systems or existing private schools even?

Eric Threeton: Being administrators for the last about four or five years, we kind of realized as you get higher up the chain of command that you have little less and less power.

Kind of funny because when you’re in the classroom, you just kind of do what you want. You’re teaching however you want. And someone can yell at you, whatever, who cares? What are they going to do? Fire you? There’s a shortage of teachers. Give me a break.

So then you’re like, “I’m going to make a difference. I’m going to become an administrator and fight the good fight.”

And then when you get to that level, you almost feel like your hands are even more tied because you’re getting mandates from district. You’re having people coming in to tell you what to do that live in different states or you know, the experts from all around.

And it’s kind of disheartening because you know what you want to do to change that school, but, you know bureaucracy, higher ups, it’s not conducive to actually get that done.

So you know, in the Covid year, everything was different and not only, you know, parents being able to see inside the school, which happened a lot. And I think that’s kind of where the shift in education started because people were realizing, “Man you know, my school is maybe messed up. I got to figure this out.”

But also, as educators, we were able to see inside of kids’ homes and seeing what they’re dealing with. And so for us, that was a need we wanted to fill.

That’s why we chose middle school. We were both elementary educators for most of our career here in Las Vegas and Park County School District. And then moving to charter schools, we moved up to middle school to teach middle school. Absolutely loved that age range. Never really thought we would teach that age range, but, you know, fell in love with the middle school years. Eventually becoming administration for K-8 schools, both of us, but with over a thousand children.

So one thing as an administrator, you also realize is that when you have a thousand or more students, it’s just hard to get everything done. It’s impossible. There’s just not enough time. There’s not enough manpower, there’s not enough resources.

So we really decided we wanted to keep it small and we wanted to have a family feel. And we didn’t just want to be a place for you to drop your kids off and say goodbye. We wanted to have a lot of buy-in with families. We wanted to make sure that, you know, students felt safe and secure and were actually able to thrive in middle school instead of just surviving until the next step.

Because that’s kind of what middle school is, is right now. So, good luck in middle school. It’s going to get you ready for high school by giving you the exact same infrastructure as high school and crossing your fingers.

Christina Threeton: And earning your stripes at the same time.

Eric Threeton: Yeah. Right, right. And we felt like, you know, that’s not necessary.

You know, we know that there’s a lot of decent high schools here in Las Vegas. We want to make sure that students are ready for that. So we take, you know, the student in sixth grade and create a three year plan for them to be ready for high school.

Michael Schaus: How many students do you guys have right now?

Eric Threeton: So we have 11 students right now.

Michael Schaus: Excellent.

Eric Threeton: We have a capacity for 30. That’s kind of our sweet spot where we, you know, make a salary, which is always a good thing. But you know, yeah, it’s first year. We’re just getting our name out there trying to build this up.

You know, there’s a lot of the big players in the private school world that have their name out there and have the marketing funds to, you know, wash us over.

So it’s really just word of mouth, grassroots, what we’re doing. Trying to be at events, trying to get our name out there, explain to people who we are, what we do.

Michael Schaus: You know, you talked about the kind of the cultural problems with other schools. And you guys both come from Clark County School District, and we know anybody that reads the newspaper knows that there’s certainly a multitude of problems with the fifth largest school district in the nation.

And you know, with that size comes natural problems. But also there are bureaucratic and cultural problems.

But what’s interesting to me you know, my wife is a teacher at a private school, and what I realize is a lot of those things that 10 years ago I thought were just problems that existed in public school, kind of exist everywhere- in charter schools, even in a lot of private schools. That kind of administration being unable to do the things that they want to do and really kind of holding back the creativity of a lot of teachers.

I think that that is one of the reasons why we’re seeing more and more micro schools and kind of these innovations and education that we haven’t seen pre-Covid. It’s almost like Covid gave people a chance to kind of rethink how we approach this.

You know, what are your views on the culture of education right now with people doing what you guys are trying to do?

Christina Threeton: I think it’s super exciting. You know, for us, we have an educational background, so we look at things maybe with a different eye than somebody who isn’t, you know, formally trained.

But everybody I believe has the right to, you know, teach their children or get them the education that they believe is best for them. And so with this, you know, school choice movement really taking front and, you know, we love to be a part of that. And it’s been very exciting to collaborate with other micro schools and other smaller private schools and just kind of share best practices and learn from each other that way, too.

Eric Threeton: Yeah, I think in education, it’s kind of different. You know, the leaders in that the space, we’re just a little different. We’re not really looking at each other as competition. I mean, obviously, you know, there’s inherent competition in wanting to do good, but you know, we’re not, you know, posting ourselves against another school.

You know, we understand that there’s enough children here in Las Vegas that deserve a multitude of different things and every school can fulfill their specific needs. And when you just kind of group them all together and say, this is what it’s supposed to look like in a more traditional setting, we know that doesn’t work.

So it’s exciting to see, you know, how different our schools are, and the different types of leaders and the different types of lessons and how we desegregate that information. It’s just been amazing to be able to talk and collaborate. And we have a really good group here in Las Vegas of micro schools and small private schools and just people who are kind of thinking about alternate education.

Michael Schaus: And it’s a community that’s growing, too. I mean, I look at just kind of the world that we live in and everywhere you look in our life, we’ve got tons of customization. We’ve got things that are absolutely unique that you can go out and find whatever cell phone you want, for example, or you can find, you know, whatever service you’re looking for. It’s just endless options out there.

And to see that start that kind of dynamic environment start to take hold in education to me is really exciting. You talk a little bit about the Las Vegas area and everything. Regardless of what happens in Carson City, regardless of what happens with things like opportunity scholarships or what have you, where, where do you see the, the future of kind of the micro school movement going? Because I feel like no matter what happens, regulatorily people are going to be asking for more and more of this as they get little glimpses of it here and there.

Eric Threeton: Yeah, I mean, I’m hoping that, you know, through time we kind of as a collective society understand kind of the need for more individualized education. And I think that once we do that, we will start understanding maybe the money behind that.

You know, the reason that the large schools are doing what they’re doing is because there’s a price on every child’s head. So the more kids you have, the more money that school’s making. And then, so in most people’s eyes, money is what schools need, right?

Like, oh, they just need more money. Schools need more money. This needs more money. In reality it’s just that they need to kind of use their funds a little more effectively to produce the results. And you know, in a setting where it’s more like an institution, that’s never going to happen no matter how much money you pump into it.

So I think that, you know, if people come to that realization, they can take maybe the politics out of it. You know, schools like ours, we are a licensed private school. It’s something we wanted to make sure we weren’t operating in that gray area because we didn’t want to have to deal with one more level of that.

So we’re like, okay, we’ll play that game. We’ll be a licensed private school. We even looked at maybe the charter model, but the charter model is set up for large schools. You cannot sustain on having a small school because it’s one of those things, I’m going to get a dollar from the state, but I’m going to spend $2 here in my school to get that dollar.

So I think that the more people who maybe take that leap and kind of show what this could look like could open up a lot of people’s eyes. And they can maybe start saying, “Okay, maybe that money does belong to the children instead of just, you know, certain schools that we’re taking away from.”

And, and once that shift happens, I don’t think there’s anything to stop it. I think I think the movement will really gain traction as it is right now. We’re kind of on that upward swing.

Michael Schaus: So you guys went through the process to become a licensed private school. What was that process like? Was it something that was really frustrating, really difficult? How long did it take you guys to actually walk through that process? Because I imagine, you know, like everything else in in the world right now, it’s probably not the easiest thing.

Christina Threeton: Well, we started the October before last, so two years ago we started. Yeah, about two years ago.

And really looking at the application process and everything that needed to be done in order to meet the expectations for the application. And what we really ran into was facilities. That became our thorn in our side. Because we couldn’t submit our application until we had our facility.

So we had our health inspection. So then that becomes the stuck of all of your money, right? And so there went all of our funds. We had it like five months before we applied. So, it’s a lot of cash up front to keep your fingers crossed and hope that you get accepted.

And so it was a complete gamble. So yeah, the process itself wasn’t terrible, but making sure that you had all of your ducks in a row to get that application in. Even for us, just the fire inspection, we got approved the day before school started. So I mean, down to the wire, begging people for help along the way. And thankfully we have a really strong community around us that really supported our cause and we got it done.

Eric Threeton: Yeah, I think, unfortunately, if you’re just taking a couple of teachers who really want do something like this, it’s almost impossible because of the capital investment up front.

I mean, you know, like Christina was saying, we had to have this building for five months before we even changed our zoning. Why does it take five months to chain zoning? I don’t know. It’s just really the waiting game.

And of course, paying the right people. Because every couple of weeks you’ll get an email saying, “Hey, you need a traffic analysis.”

Christina Threeton: For $7,000.

Eric Threeton: Yeah, you need to pay, you know, for this or that. Or the HVAC system needs to be evaluated.

Christina Threeton: And again, we’re educators. We don’t have a business degree or anything along those lines. So this was all a learning curve.

Eric Threeton: Yeah, so zoning was a huge issue. And I don’t know how anyone starts a business to be honest in Clark County, just because of the amount of money it would take that really should be going into buying, you know, furniture. And you know, maybe if you’re opening a restaurant, it buys your first couple months of products. Not spending money on traffic analysis and things like this. So, yeah.

Michael Schaus: You know, you’re definitely talking to the right person. You know, I started a business in 2021 and that’s, you know, now my main full-time gig. It was ridiculous. Just the licensing fees just to get a business, you know. I come from Colorado where it’s like $50 to file an LLC and I came out here and they’re like, oh, 500 and some odd dollars. And I was like, excuse me.

So I imagine it is difficult. I was talking to some teachers in California during the pandemic. They created one of those little pods because they were a bunch of, you know, public school and private school teachers and they kind of got together and did that.

And they were talking about trying to create a school and they were saying that it was just exactly what you said, the capital needed to just get over that initial hump before you even are able to bring in students or anything else was prohibitive for them.

I’m hoping maybe that’s something that we can start talking a little bit more about with lawmakers as well. It’s not just the classic school choice issues, when it comes to opportunity scholarships or ESAs or whatever, or even charter schools. It’s how do you make it easier for people that are passionate about teaching to go out there and teach and create an impact?

What do you see high level as some of the biggest obstacles or risks associated with, you know, the growing micro school movement and people wanting to have this kind of alternative form of education?

Eric Threeton: Yeah, I think there’s a couple. I think the biggest is that there’s no real clear roadmap for anyone to do this. I mean, it’s almost like sacred information that you have to really dig deep to find out.

Even our building, you know. Like we said, we’re not business people. We know education. We’re already up and running for a few months and we get a call from the Clark County building department asking us where’s our building inspection. It’s like, oh, we didn’t even know we had to do this. We have to change our building. Not only do we change zoning, now we have to change our building code from you know, commercial to education.

And it’s just things like that. And then of course, you know, on the state, there’s, a checklist, but there’s all these unwritten things that once you start submitting these things, they’re like, “Well, what about this? What about this?” You’re like, “I don’t know. What about that? Why was that never, you know, explained?”

It’s almost like they just expect you to know those types of things, which, you know, the big management companies of charter schools and the public districts, they do because they probably are the ones who created the policy in the first place.

Christina Threeton: I think the roadmap and then also just liability because, you know, we were administrators, so we have dealt with anything that you can ever imagine as far as what’s happened with children or what’s happened with staff.

And so we’ve kind of lived through that. And so for us, we know the liability of running a program, running a school, using a facility and things like that. And so I think, you know, anybody just going into it needs to also have that wittiness about them to know that anything can be expected, right?

You might have a parent that is your wonderful best friend, best supportive person, but the second that their child gets hurt or breaks their arm, it can become a different story. And so just, you know having that liability and insurance and making sure that they’re covered personally.

Eric Threeton: Yeah, because what you know, I’d hate to see everything that’s gaining traction here, and maybe you do have a school that gets hit and now we’re all under scrutiny because somebody didn’t, you know, have the right insurance. But then, you know, it’s not entirely their fault because there’s no kind of guidance to that.

Even talking with the insurance agent when we’re setting things up, they were like, “I don’t really know. You tell me what you need because I don’t even know what you need”. Usually I call, you know I need car insurance. What do you think I need? It’s not like that. I need information from you.

So that’s me calling the state, calling, you know, friends who I know are in the space. What kind of insurance should I get? So there’s no clear “this is how you would do it.”

So it just takes the right people and it shouldn’t. It should be anyone passionate about teaching. Like you said, you know, we spent a long time saving money and cashed out our Roth IRAs to this because we’re crazy.

But I mean, that’s, you know, 10 years ago we wouldn’t have been able to do that because of that, you know, we wouldn’t have had that the same money to invest.

Christina Threeton: Because we’ve been talking about it for 10 years.

Eric Threeton: Yeah. Cause we’ve been talking about it. But we knew it would cost a ton.

Michael Schaus: Well, you know, it’s like any other entrepreneur. I mean, the, the amount of risk that you take when you go out and you decide to try to start something new. You know, I’ve done a couple of entrepreneurial things in the past, but obviously I’ve worked with and known a lot of people that have gone out and some of them have started, you know, what ended up becoming multi-billion dollar companies.

But you know, it started somewhere and it always starts with that initial risk and a whole sea of unknowns. You know, not knowing what’s required of you from the state, not knowing what’s required of you from the local county or, you know, your particular zoning authority or what have you. It’s a lot of question marks there. So you guys are definitely brave for doing it.

You’ve got 11 kids now. You guys are saying that you kind of want to build it up to 30, that’s kind of your sweet spot. As you’re talking to parents or as you’re talking to people in the community and kind of telling them what you do, you know, what are some of the things that set your micro school apart from some of the other private school or even charter options that folks might have in the immediate area?

Christina Threeton: So size definitely is our probably our biggest thing that surprises people. You know, when we’re saying we’re bringing the one room schoolhouse back to life. We do have sixth, seventh, and eighth graders all together. They’re not together all the time but we do have our program designed for a three-year program, and so they will leave having all the standards and, and expectations met by the time they leave eighth grade for high school with all their credits, and then even a few extras.

And then really about the experiential learning and really the hands-on. I think that there are some classrooms that do it throughout any school if that’s something that’s allowed, maybe a less traditional school.

But for us, our kids live and breathe every single day. And so really you know, some might think that it’s a maybe a less rigorous program. But we’d like to say that it definitely has depth. And so, yes, there might be less going on and our students don’t have eight hours of homework every single night. But when they’re working here, they’re working hard, they’re thinking hard.

Eric Threeton: And it’s easy, you know, with a small size, it’s easy to go off campus and apply what you’re learning, which is a huge for us. In fact, our, our tagline. Not just an education, an experience.

So being able to, you know, teaching in the district, it’s tough because, you know, you’re saying, “Oh, I have this wonderful opportunity, you know, to go to the Smith Center,” let’s say. And then you call up for the bus and they’re like, “oh, those are blackout dates.” You can’t get a bus. Like your hands are tied because that’s the only bus you can call to pick your kids up.

Christina Threeton: You get your one field trip a year. Yeah.

Eric Threeton: Or yeah, you, you submit a field trip request and they’re like, “I think you guys have been on enough field trips, no more field trips to the rest of the year.”

So, you know, being able to explain this to parents, like, “Hey, you know, we go on at least two field trips a month. We go on hiking once a month. We go on a field trip once a month,” that’s huge.

You know, because they know there’s things that have to take place beyond these four walls. We know that that’s life, right? You know, getting your hands into things is how you learn. So that’s one huge difference between everyone else and us because we have that flexibility.

I think another one is our grading system’s pretty straightforward. You know, we grade off a mastery. We don’t grade off if your assignments are in or not. And I think that’s kind of stuck in a lot of teacher’s minds like, “Well, you know, this is how I teach them a lesson. If they don’t get it in on time, then they get an F,” right?

And that’s going to teach them, because we all know that students who failed through middle and high school became doctors and lawyers with those Fs. They really learn those skills. So I think being able to kind of explain how we grade and it looks a little bit different on our end, on the parents’ end.

On our transcript end, it’s very, very simple for to transfer over with credits and everything. You know, it’s a basic AB grade grading system, but being able to just explain how we are actually taking grades is huge for parents.

Christina Threeton: I’d say along that, the last thing that really sets us apart would be our units of instruction.

And so we’ve designed these units of instruction throughout the year that are cross curricular. So Eric and I, we’re the teachers, administrators, counselors, janitors. We do everything. We’re the only two employees. And so we are able to really sit down and design that curriculum together and the pacing.

And so when we have our experiences, so right now our students are reading a book about monsoons in Asia and geography. We’re able to collect data in science with precipitation and wind currents and look at different air pressures. And then we’re going to do a culminating project and take the kids actually indoor rock climbing.

So it all kind of meshes together, and I think that just makes a really beautiful symphony when it comes to teaching.

Michael Schaus: I love that approach to education because, you know, I mean, again, drawing on personal experience, one of the schools that I went to that worked for me. It wouldn’t work for everybody.

But you know, we used to go out all the time. We’d actually do week long outings is what we called them, but backpacking trips and stuff like that, and obviously day hikes and everything. And it was always tied in with curriculum. And it’s such a great immersive way to learn. It’s not just, here’s your science and here’s your English. You’re kind of getting a full order picture.

I know for me growing up, it gives you a lot more ability to apply what you learn to the actual real world and, and everything that’s around you. So I’m loving that education model.

Eric Threeton: And I think that another big, the final kind of differentiation between us and bigger schools is that a lot of the times students who are either on the end – victims of other people, or maybe they’re the ones who are lashing out at others and more of a behavioral problem – it’s something that’s immediately fixed here. If they are a behavioral problem because of academics, they have enough support here where they don’t feel that way.

They don’t have to feel like they have to lash out to kind of cover their lack of understanding in other things. If you’re in a larger population and someone’s bothering you, the go-to is wait. Just stay away from that person. Ignore them. We don’t have that luxury here with, you know, 11 students especially.

You have to talk things out. You have to take responsibility when you do something wrong. You have to let somebody know if they’re hurting you in a specific way. And I think, you know, that’s building their character immensely. And I think parents appreciate that as well. And you know, as when the kids feel safe and also empowered, that’s kind of a beautiful thing.

Michael Schaus: You kind of answered this question, but I’m going to ask it anyway. You can just say that it’s the same answer. One of the things that you know, jumps out at me about micro schools, it’s kind of the same thing you hear a lot of the time about homeschooling, where people will say, “oh, but you know, they’re not getting the socialization that they need because, you know, they don’t have as big of a class or something.”

I always kind of laughed about that because I remember growing up not in a big high school, but I’d still only have, you know, five close friends. You know, what, what is your response when people say, well, they might be missing out on some of that socialization that comes from a more traditional, larger public school?

Eric Threeton: Yeah, it’s funny because we haven’t actually had that. No one’s really came at us with that. But I think we could explain that because of our size, we actually have a chance to do maybe a lot more of that, you know, social emotional learning and socialization. So that way when they are in a larger group, they have the skills to better navigate that type of environment.

Whereas before, it’s just throwing them into it and seeing how they do. And they all kind of, go separate paths and it’s never really addressed. So I think it’s even a better opportunity to build some skills in a smaller atmosphere. So you are ready for a larger population in my own mind.

Christina Threeton: Yeah, I think that, and then also really just watching the kids for the last, you know, three quarters just really become a unit. They’re more of a family than a classroom. And so they’re super supportive. I mean, they love each other on most days.

And you know, we do a lot of things outside of school, too. So not only are the kids getting together, but our families are eating together. Just Sunday we were at the park, we had a little potluck and some kickball and we do family camping trips together. So it’s really people that are seeking and looking for that as well.

Michael Schaus: Excellent. If people want to find out more about the Nevada School of Inquiry, where can they go to see what you guys are up to and maybe learn a little bit more about what you guys are doing?

Eric Threeton: Yeah, absolutely. So our website is www nvsi.school. We also are on all the social medias,  at Nevada School of Inquiry, and most of those are actually student ran. They know a lot more about TikTok than I do.

Michael Schaus: Way to delegate to the youth. I know this is how I feel in life.

Eric Threeton: But I think that kind of gives a good, you know, a window into what’s going on here because they’re pretty transparent what they post, things like that. It’s a good opportunity to learn about us.

Michael Schaus: One last question. Where, you know, where exactly in the valley are you guys?

Eric Threeton: Yeah, so we are located on Pecos and Warm Springs. We’re on the Green Valley line between Green Valley and Clark County, right by the airport. Right by Sunset Park.

Michael Schaus: Excellent. Well, you know, we really appreciate it. I wish you guys the best of luck. You know, what you guys are doing is obviously a passion project for you guys, because there’s no reason anybody else would ever do that if they didn’t love it.

So, you know, I certainly wish you guys the best and I’m really, really excited about what you guys are doing and we want to stay in contact.

Eric Threeton: Thanks, Michael. We look forward to it.

Michael Schaus: Again, Christina and Eric Threeton the Nevada School of Inquiry. Fantastic progress really in the educational realm. I mean, this is something I understand that it’s really easy to get disappointed here in Nevada because in 2015 we almost had universal education savings accounts, and then that got taken away. And then we expanded opportunity scholarships a little bit, but only temporarily. And now that is pretty much, almost completely taken away.

And here we are, six, seven years later, and we’re still fighting for some sort of educational choice in this state, while meanwhile, throughout the rest of the nation, it seems to be coming in waves. And so it’s really easy to look at that and get kind of depressed and kind of frustrated and think, wow, gosh, we’re never going to be able to, you know, open up the world of opportunity to a bunch of kids.

Don’t think that. Don’t be pessimistic. Look, it doesn’t really matter what happens in Carson City because as we’re seeing right now, people are finding ways to innovate. The micro school movement is amazing. I was talking to another micro school that was started as part of a church, and it’s something that pre-Covid, they never would’ve even thought about it.

But but Covid made it necessary for them in their parish, and they said, “all right, we are going to go and we are going to do this. We are going to create a school locally for our small, tiny, little community.”

And what you’re seeing with the Nevada School of Inquiry, what you’re seeing with micro schools all over, honestly, the nation, but certainly here in Nevada, is you are seeing that development of choice, that kind of dynamic range in the marketplace take shape even though all the powerful forces in politics are currently fighting against it in Carson City.

And that to me is such a great story of how you can’t stop the market. You can’t stop innovation. You might be able to stifle it a little bit. You might be able to, you know, tamp it down a little bit here and there through regulatory burdens or, you know, just the absurd cost that it takes to start a business or be entrepreneurial in general.

But ultimately it’s kind of part of the human spirit. This idea to innovate, this idea to try new ideas. This idea of a couple of people who happen to be really passionate about it go out there and do something new. And you’re seeing that type of energy enter into the educational realm and it is fantastic news for students, fantastic news for families, and ultimately fantastic news for Las Vegas and Nevada more generally.

So really happy to see it again, Nevada School of Inquiry. Hey, thank you so much for listening today. Be sure to go to Nevadapolicy.org/podcast. There you can sign up to not only receive these podcasts right in your inbox whenever they get published, but also you can send us some ideas. If there are any topics or any potential guests that you think we ought to have on the show, reach out to us there at Nevadapolicy.org/podcast.

Thank you so much for listening today. This has been Free to Offend.


Free to Offend can also be heard on Amazon and iTunes.

 Free to Offend:
A podcast that radically defends free speech by regularly practicing it.

Produced by Nevada Policy Research Institute,
featuring Nevada Policy’s Michael Schaus.