Overview

2023 Summer Institute

RICHARD GOLDMAN: A pioneer and edupreneur in innovative education

Dr. Richard Goldman, a regional and national leader in education for nearly 60 years, has made an impact at all levels of education, from preschool and K-12 to higher education. Embedded in the many educational innovations, he was a catalyst for the implementation of state-of-the-art technologies.

At the higher education level, while serving as Dean of Graduate Studies at Nova Southeastern University, Goldman led a team that created the nation’s first and largest distance and internet-based graduate program in the 1970s and 80s.

While Goldman continued his innovative, two-decade legacy at Nova Southeastern, he became known as one of the most prolific edupreneuers of our time.

In 1984, he supported the launch and growth of Another Generation Preschools, which went on to serve 1,500 students across seven locations in Florida, making it the 20th-largest preschool operation in the United States.

He then lent his expertise to the private school area of education, helping found The Sagemont School, a premier college preparatory school for preschool through grade 12 in 1996. The school grew to more than 800 students and sent graduates to universities such as Harvard, Princeton, Columbia and Vanderbilt.

Tapping his experience as an innovator in online education, in 2001, Goldman and his partners developed the nation’s first accredited online high school in partnership with the University of Miami, the University of Miami Online High School.

But, he didn’t stop there.

Recognizing a rapidly increasing need to serve the 40 million American adults who lack a high school education, Goldman’s team designed Smart Horizons Career Online High School (SHCOE) in 2009. Over the years, SHCOE partnered with McDonald’s, Amazon and Papa John’s, supporting more than 15,000 of these corporate employees in earning their accredited high school diploma.

Most recently, Goldman helped found Xceed Preparatory Academy, a network of micro-hybrid schools for 6th through 12th grade students in non-traditional settings, such Class A office buildings and sports academies. Students work in a hybrid, flipped model of education, typically only seen in higher education, which allows accommodations for elite athletes, performers, traveling families, accelerated and gifted students and students with learning differences. With record enrollment year-over-year, Xceed has attracted national attention from the likes of U.S News & World Report, NBC News, Parents Magazine and Good Housekeeping.

Finally, although his work has impacted hundreds of thousands of students, Goldman still seeks out ways to support innovation in education. In 2014, Goldman and his wife, Renée, endowed the Dean’s Chair in the School of Education at the University of Pittsburgh, supporting the salary, professional development, recruitment, expenses and other scholarly activities of the dean of the School of Education. Prior to that, in 2013, the Goldmans made a substantial gift to create the Richard M. and Renée K. Goldman Educational Entrepreneurial Fund, which supports the development of online programming in the area of educational entrepreneurship.

“Giving back to educational causes is important to us,” shared Goldman. “We hope it also encourages others to give to education as well. Looking back over the course of our careers, we feel we’re not just business entrepreneurs, but social entrepreneurs, and this continues that legacy.”

Goldman earned his bachelor’s, master's and doctoral degrees in Education from the University of Pittsburgh. In addition to his tenure as Dean at Nova Southeastern University, Goldman served on the faculty of the University of Haifa and Kent State University.