Jonathan G. Vander Els

Jonathan G. Vander Els is an education leader and author focused on competency-based and personalized learning. He is co-author, with Brian M. Stack, of Breaking With Tradition: The Shift to Competency-Based Learning in PLCs at Work (Why You Should Switch to Student-Centered Learning for All), a Solution Tree book that guides schools in moving from traditional, time-based structures to student-centered, competency-based systems within professional learning communities. He has also contributed to related work on competency-based classrooms and systems change through his writing, consulting, and presentations.

Vander Els serves as Director of Collaborative Learning (also described as Director of Innovative Projects) for the New Hampshire Learning Initiative, where he oversees personalized and competency-based learning projects across New Hampshire schools. Previously, he was principal of Memorial Elementary School in the Sanborn Regional School District, where the school became a nationally recognized model PLC and competency-based elementary environment. He consults, coaches, and presents nationwide on building effective PLCs, implementing competency-based and personalized learning, and developing balanced performance assessment systems, and he has been actively involved in New Hampshire’s Performance Assessment of Competency Education (PACE) initiative and the state’s work on integrating skills and dispositions into curriculum, instruction, and assessment. Vander Els holds an education specialist degree