I feel that some makers can become innovators. However, makers are not always people. Makers can be test scores or devices that are used in education.

Innovators and Makers in education are very similar I believe. Innovators have a historical background with education while makers may or may not.

One innovator that influenced education today is Linda Brown Thompson. This is one little girl who pretty much single handedly changed the way that public schools were housed in America. She was not an educator, but simply a student who's family stood up for what they believed in. She was one of twelve who attempted to attend a segregated white school in Topeka, Kansas. She was the Brown in the 1954 Brown v The Board of Education decision to stop legalized school segregation. Linda Brown Thompson is the innovator that I chose because without this decision, I personally wouldn't have the same opportunities that I have today. I would be limited in the schools that I would be able to teach and I would only be able to teach children with the same skin color as mine.

The maker that I feel had an impact on public education is Erin Gruwell. Erin Gruwell was a teacher at an inner city school in California who was always given the bottom of the barrel. She fought for the students in her class were labeled as failures year after year. She started a writing class on student interests and allowed them to do things that they never thought they'd be able to do. Her class of students actually met a Holocaust survivor from a book they had read. She often chose literature for them that they could relate to. She especially chose war stories, because many of her students were fighting their own wars at home. I chose Erin Gruwell because she is a maker just as most educators are. She set out to make her children accomplish things that we all want for our students. She seems to be an out of the box thinker as well. I had the opportunity to read a book she authored titled Freedom Writers and I highly recommend it to any educator with a heart. It is also a motion picture, that I have yet to see.