This free, family-friendly event is for current microschool leaders and those looking to start one. Free lunch is provided. Connect with others in the field, share resources, and gain valuable insights to support your school’s success.

Guest speakers include:

Erica Smith Ewing is a senior attorney with the Institute for Justice, where she been working for 14 years defending the constitutional rights of ordinary Americans. One right that Erica defends is the right to educational choice. Erica has helped pass and defend educational choice programs across the nation. She was also co-lead counsel in U.S. Supreme Court case, Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, where the Court held that the government violates parents’ rights when it excludes religious schools from an educational choice program. As part of that case, Erica appeared in dozens of media outlets nationwide, including the Wall Street Journal and the NY Times. Now, Erica’s educational work focuses on protecting microschools, learning pods, and other alternative educational options from unjust and irrational government regulations.

Jane McEnaney is the Director of Education Policy Initiatives at State Policy Network (SPN), a national organization that catalyzes durable freedom movements across the country. In this role, Jane leads SPN’s K-12 education program, overseeing strategy and advocacy efforts to expand and defend education freedom. She supports state-based think tanks in ensuring that every family can access the values-aligned, best-fit learning environment their children deserve. Jane delights in supporting education entrepreneurs nationwide, connecting them with SPN affiliates (like the John Locke Foundation) and other allies seeking to remove regulatory barriers that can stand in the way of founders launching or scaling their dream learning spaces. Jane recently relocated from Chicago to Charlotte and is happy to call North Carolina home.

Kwan Graham has an extensive background serving parents and advocating for the educational needs of children. Kwan oversees Parent for Educational Freedom in NC (PEFNC)’s Parent Liaison Team and works diligently across the state to educate and empower parents to become better advocates for their children’s educational needs. As Director of Community Engagement, Kwan also supports and promotes both private school educational and public charter school options. She is a former Governor appointed member of the NC Public Charter School Advisory Board. Kwan is also Board Chair of RISE-Southeast Raleigh Charter School and serves on She serves on Board of Directors of the North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching (NCCAT) Foundation. Her passion for this work shines through as she leads PEFNC’s NC School Accelerator efforts. In addition, Kwan is a board member for Counter Culture Coffee. Kwan has a Bachelor’s degree from The University of South Carolina and lives in Charlotte with her husband and two sons.

Kerry McDonald works at the intersection of education and enterprise, spotlighting the entrepreneurs who are building creative schooling options across the United States. She is the Velinda Jonson Family Education Fellow at State Policy Network, working with partners to encourage the growth of choice-enabled, entrepreneur-driven education options. Kerry is also a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Economic Education, where she leads the Education Entrepreneurship Lab and hosts the LiberatED podcast. She is an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute and a regular contributor at Forbes.com and The 74. Kerry is the bestselling author of Unschooled: Raising Curious, Well-Educated Children Outside the Conventional Classroom (Chicago Review Press, 2019), and the author of the forthcoming book, Joyful Learning: How To Find Freedom, Happiness, and Success Beyond Conventional Schooling (Hachette, 2025). She has a BA in economics from Bowdoin College and a master’s degree in education policy from Harvard University. A mom of four, she lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Ron Matus is director of research and special projects at Step Up For Students, the nonprofit that administers Florida’s education choice programs. He joined Step Up in 2012 after more than 20 years as an award-winning journalist, including eight years as the state education reporter at The Tampa Bay Times. Ron leads collaborative teams on white paper projects that spotlight the historic change underway on Florida’s education landscape. Recent topics include the migration of black families to choice options beyond school districts; former public school teachers starting private schools; the steady but measured expansion of choice in rural Florida; and the rapid, ongoing rise of “a la carte learning.” Ron holds a bachelor’s degree in history and creative writing from Florida State University and is a graduate student in Florida Studies at the University of South Florida.

Susan Haws is the Founder and Executive Director of Insight Colearning. She began her career as a TFA Corps Member in the Rio Grande Valley in 1993. Six years in, she left the classroom to study systemic barriers to child wellbeing and achievement. She earned a Master of Public Health degree in the Department of Health Behavior at UNC-Chapel Hill in 2001 and a PhD from the same department in 2012. In between, Susan served as a project director with the Social Development Research Group at the University of Washington, where she led evaluation projects on positive youth development in Seattle Public Schools. After earning her PhD, Susan worked as an evaluator with Amplify (education) and collaborated with Dr. Jean Rhodes on youth mentoring research. Later, as a parent, Susan experienced first hand how children suffer when they are not seen by their school. The “health promoting schools” she had studied were needed in her community. Working with her daughter and other teens, Susan founded Insight. Susan became a District C Certified Coach in 2020 and earned certifications in Wayfinding Mentorship and Human-Centered Design for Coaches with One Stone/ Idea 51 in 2021-22. In her current role, Susan is the lead visionary, the lead program designer and implementer, head of admissions, the business manager, the college counselor, the registrar, a student advisor, and an instructor.