- K-12
- Determining America's Role in the World
Join Ian Rowe, cofounder of Vertex Partnership Academies and Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and Hoover senior fellow H.R. McMaster as they discuss education reform and the importance of cultivating agency, character, and civic understanding in young people. Recorded at Vertex Partnership Academies in the Bronx, the conversation explores how education can help students develop responsibility, meaning, and moral discernment.
Author of Agency: The Four Point Plan (F.R.E.E.) for All Children to Overcome the Victimhood Narrative and Discover Their Pathway to Power, Rowe explains why he believes a deficit of agency lies at the heart of many educational challenges and describes how Vertex’s emphasis on the cardinal virtues, the nation’s founding principles, and a content-rich curriculum seeks to counter narratives of victimhood and resignation. McMaster and Rowe examine school choice, teachers’ union opposition to charter schools, and his “Distance to 100” framework, which evaluates student performance against 100 percent proficiency rather than race or class-based comparisons. As America approaches its 250th anniversary, Rowe reflects on the nation’s capacity for self-renewal and the importance of constitutional literacy and civics education in preparing students for responsible citizenship.
Recorded on February 9, 2026.
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Ian Rowe is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where his work centers on education, upward mobility, family formation, and adoption. Mr. Rowe holds degrees from Cornell University and Harvard Business School. He is the author of Agency: The Four Point Plan (F.R.E.E.) for All Children to Overcome the Victimhood Narrative and Discover their Pathway to Power. The FREE acronym stands for Family, Religion, Education and Entrepreneurship. Rowe is cofounder of Vertex Partnership Academies, a network of virtues-based International Baccalaureate public charter high schools launched in the Bronx in 2022.
H.R. McMaster is the Fouad and Michelle Ajami Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is also the Bernard and Susan Liautaud Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute and lecturer at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business. He was the 25th assistant to the president for National Security Affairs. Upon graduation from the United States Military Academy in 1984, McMaster served as a commissioned officer in the United States Army for thirty-four years before retiring as a Lieutenant General in June 2018.
