Meet the Founder of The Hive
Kate McAllister, FRSA, FCCT
Hi, I’m Kate, co-founder of The Human Hive and the founder and principal of The Hive School!
I have over 20 years' teaching experience and have spent much of that time training and developing teachers and educators all over the world. I worked as a French teacher for 14 years, and have over 10 years’ experience in school leadership roles. I first started work on a Year 7 Learning to Learn curriculum in 2005, with the aim of helping pupils develop the knowledge and skills needed to navigate the often-difficult transition from primary to secondary school. I then spent the next 10 years refining and improving both the methodology and the results, culminating in a whole-school approach to teaching and learning known as the Learning Skills curriculum.
Then came the Human Hive. For me, the Human Hive really began when I was watching stories on the news about the refugee crisis and said to myself “why isn’t anyone doing anything about that?” In answer to my own question, I had this crazy idea to buy a bus on E-Bay and turn it into a school. The idea was that this bus could be taken into the heart of the Jungle refugee camp in Calais and support the people there with an education project.
Fast forward four years to 2020, and we had trained over 600 volunteers using the same methodology that I created with my team on that bus. Over the years, each person that joined in brought their skills, their talents, and their enthusiasm… and we grew bigger – so, now we are The Human Hive!
Going into 2022, I am over in the Dominican Republic running our flagship Hive School!
The Hive school is for people like me, who ask
Why is it so hard to get education right?
Why is it so mediocre and impersonal in some places and so desperately ineffective in others?
Why can't it be marvellous AND transformative?
If you have also been asking these questions then come try The Hive. If you would like to learn a bit more about me and self-directed learning then check out my book ‘Fear Is The Mind Killer’
Kate is an Associate of the London Centre for Educational Leadership at the UCL Institute of Education, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. You can contact her at kate@thehumanhive.org or via @Rethinking_Kate on Twitter.