Blue Planet Skool was born from a simple belief: that education can heal ecosystems — and that when children learn to care for the planet, they grow into adults who rebuild it. Every classroom can be a restoration site. Every child, a future ecologist.

TL;DR: Once a restorative economy takes root, it grows naturally. Education is the seed — and in Indonesia’s coastal communities, every restored hectare can yield $36,000 a year through eco-tourism and sustainable livelihoods.

This Week’s (and last weeks!) Field Notes — Lessons from the Jungle

The jungle was alive — green light pouring through vines, the scent of wet earth and buzzing insects filling the air.

We returned to Tangkahan, a small rainforest village on Sumatra’s edge, where locals have quietly built one of Indonesia’s most remarkable examples of restorative tourism.

There motto is: Sell the forest, without cutting a tree.

Tangkahan is a secondary forest, where locals once logged for their survival. Now they welcome over 400,000 visitors a year to play in the river, trek in Leuser National Park and of course wash the elephants.

To accommodate the growing numbers, locals have innovated and created new programs that lead three-day treks through wild elephant corridors. Half a day’s hike brings you to Goat Cave, a limestone hideaway where your shower is a waterfall and your toilet — humorously — a porcelain bowl perched on a wooden platform: western comfort in the middle of Eden! And they dug out an additional hot-spring pool to lessen the queue for guest who do not venture so far into the National Park.

Everywhere, there are signs of grassroots innovation:

• Locals collecting trash after the tourist have gone home

• Table and chairs in the river for your IG photo spots,

• New adventures that keep tourists excited to return and revenue local.

No NGO funds it. No foreign consultant designed it.
It’s the young guides who decided: “The forest is home. Prosperity depends on keeping it alive.”

It’s the same spirit we aim to nurture at Blue Planet Skool — initiative, ownership, and hope that acts without waiting for permission.

While Tangkahan protects the forest, our focus is the ocean. This week, I had the privilege of producing a film for our sister organization, Yayasan Biru Nusantara (a partnership between the Grand Blue Project and BPS). The data is clear: when education meets community innovation, real change becomes inevitable.

On-the-Ground Reality

Across Indonesia, conservation isn’t charity — it’s smart economics.

• $36,000 per hectare per year — the return from restored coral reefs through fisheries and dive tourism.

• $2,800 per hectare per year — value of mangrove restoration in flood protection and fisheries.

• +64% sustainable behavior — the increase seen when environmental education enters schools, leading to eco-enterprises and local jobs.

What I saw in Tangkahan wasn’t just a village preserving its forest — it was a living model of a regenerative economy.

Field-Notes to Founders — Doing, Not Just Learning

A new study from Yogyakarta by Fitrianto & Farisi (2025) argues that the most effective education blends 21st-century skills — Critical Thinking, Creativity, Collaboration, and Communication — with local wisdom: farming rituals, folktales, and traditional problem-solving.

Here’s how we can bring that into Blue Planet Skool:

1. Local Wisdom Labs — Students document their village’s sustainable practices (like water rituals or fishing ethics) and use AI tools to analyze or reimagine them.

2. Ancestry × AI Badges — Reward projects that modernize ancestral knowledge. A compost system based on traditional farming? That’s mastery.

3. Elders as Mentors — Invite parents and grandparents into workshops. Let students see their own culture reflected in the curriculum.

   When children learn that their stories and their land matter — they don’t just study sustainability. They practice it.

🪶 “Local wisdom isn’t folklore. It’s a renewable resource for the future of education.”

Closing Logbook Entry

Tangkahan reminded me that progress doesn’t always look futuristic.
Sometimes it’s a compost bin, a new path, and a child watching their father build something that lasts.

🌏 See you next week,
Lauren

This week I feel the magic of connection — with readers, with vice-ministers, with future co-founders, and with the Universe. But first: a quick note. Next week I’ll be off the grid, deep in the jungle with no internet — connecting with myself. So no newsletter on October 10. Back on the 17th.

Where It Began
They call it the butterfly effect. Mine came during a very ordinary math lesson.

I was teaching long division — a subject I happily abandoned in 5th grade — to a group of international 10–12 year-olds. Half the class got it, half didn’t. Out of desperation, I asked ChatGPT for help, memorized its steps, and re-taught. Some more got it, others didn’t. I even tried the “No Tears” method and the old acronym trick (remember Dirty Monkeys Smell Bad — divide, multiply, subtract, bring down?). Still, the room was split.

That’s when it hit me: what if every child had their own AI tutor, in their own language, at their own pace? No wasted time. No stress. Just mastery. Later I discovered Alpha School was already experimenting with this, and I knew I wasn’t crazy.

So here we are: building Blue Planet Skool. AI covers the academics; kids win back their time for what matters — critical thinking, problem-solving, skill-building, real-world projects. As Eric Schmidt once said:

“Why do we not have every human being on the planet have their own AI tutor in their own language, starting with Kindergarten? The technology works. Teach them in their language. Gamify the learning. Bring people to the best natural lengths.”

If the tech exists, why are we still producing disengaged students? With the Ministry of Education the best-funded in Indonesia, the missing piece isn’t money — it’s vision.

This Week’s Highlights: Bring on the vision!
Two big meetings, the first with Irene Umar, Vice Minister of Creative Economy. Picture this: a hip record-spinning café in Bali, tables cluttered with laptops and strong coffee. Irene leaned in, and with just a few words, cut through the noise like a laser.

• Grand Blue Project: She urged Ryan to make his marine database speak economics, not just science. Governments fund what they can measure.

  

• Shambalah’s Widi Islands: She suggested fractional ownership — $100,000 buys you a week a year on a private island. Silence, then sparks of interest. We all want in!

• Blue Planet Skool: Her words hit me hardest: “Make it plug-and-play. A model that scales nationwide.” Exactly the vision.
  

Her clarity made the chaos feel purposeful.

People Who Will Shape the Journey

• Will Richardson from Future Serious — we connected on Substack, and we’re meeting on the 13th. His work makes me hopeful we are taking the future seriously.

• Don Lamison, greening schools in Jakarta — proof this newsletter is already stitching new bridges.

On-the-Ground Reality
A post from a local female-founder in Indonesia stopped me cold:

“School shouldn’t make you abandon your passion, right? Every child has the right to grow at their own pace.”

Exactly. Micro-schools are the way forward — places where kids master fundamentals 10x faster, then chase what lights them up. The AI tutor is just a tool. The real job is building a scalable model that lets passion drive learning. dinayuniarini IG Post

Field-Notes to Founders
What if 1 in 50 people started a school? Not an institution — a place built around what you, the founder love. Kids who share that love will find you. The Math:

And when someone says, “Your idea is doable, but a lot of work”? Smile. Butterflies means it’s worth it.

Closing Logbook Entry
I’m grateful, buzzing, and a little terrified — which feels about right. Off to the jungle now. See you October 17.

— Lauren

I'll be in Rumah Ati, Tangkahan

This week has felt like standing in my kitchen with every spice jar and vegetable laid out on the counter — ideas everywhere and no clear recipe yet. The stew is still simmering, but the flavors are starting to come together…

Where It Began / The Big Dream
What does it take to create Alpha School + Ocean X = public education??? The obvious answer: money!!! But maybe it also takes a new reality — one where success isn’t measured by ROI, but by regenerating the planet quietly in your own community. That’s the future Blue Planet Skool is trying to write into existence.

Highlights from the Week

On Saturday, I sat across from Indonesia’s Vice Minister of Tourism in a sunlit Bali restaurant owned by a religious scholar who can still read 5th–13th century Sanskrit and Old Javanese — perhaps the last of his kind, and he’s not even old yet. The conversation wandered, as they do here, full of “what ifs” and long pauses, punctuated by the slow slip of kopi tubruk (cowboy coffee). Out of that meandering came clarity: their home village in Bali will host our pre-pilot for Blue Planet Skool, with Labuan Bajo still set for the first full campus.

The dream timeline:
Pre-pilot in Bali → Pilot in Labuan Bajo → A plug-and-play blueprint for schools across Indonesia.

At the heart of it: AI tutors for math, science, and literacy; human “facilitators” — mentors chosen because they love kids — guiding empathy, storytelling, and well-being. Parents commit 15 volunteer hours each month, binding family and school as one community.

And one non-negotiable: no smartphones until graduation. Hello land-line :)

Even my six-year-old proves why this matters: he came home saying a friend “broke off their wedding” because another kid “knows all the games in the world.” If gaming dictates love at six, what happens at sixteen? I want a school — and a community — that makes sure our children’s imaginations, not their addictions, shape their futures.

People Who Shaped the Journey
Jessica, my loyal friend and commenter here, reminded me: “If it’s your dream, you can dream it any way you like.” She also took her SEO red pen to our NGO one-pager with the Grand Blue Project, forcing me to edit it down to “third-grade language.” Harder than it sounds — but the truth should be, and always is, simple.

Pictured: Jessica + my six year old + friends and family on Pulau Padar, Komodo National Park, Flores, Indonesia

On-the-Ground Reality
Pulau Padar may look like paradise from above, but beneath the water the story is different. Though not published, I’ve heard on good authority that the reef here is struggling. Water pH tests showed high levels of detergent, inside a national park!

And yet, as a foreigner, what I say doesn’t carry much weight. That truth hit home this week when I learned about Tim, a two-meter-tall, German, geothermal researcher who has lived in Indonesia for years and speaks fluent Bahasa Indonesia. Even he struggles to gain the trust of local communities. Only when he brought his Indonesian girlfriend along did villagers begin to share what they really thought about alternative energy sources on the island of Flores. The good, the bad and the ugly… I digress. However, the lesson is humbling and clear: locals must lead. My role is to create a model others can adapt — and then, eventually, let it go.

Field-Notes to Founders
This week I had the privilege of speaking with someone who has trained thousands of students in HIV education across South Africa — and who has also launched multiple start-ups. His advice applies far beyond health or business:

• Choose your first pilot participants carefully. They set the tone for everything that follows.

• Hire for short bursts in demanding roles. It prevents burnout and keeps energy fresh.

• Always move at the speed of trust. It’s the only pace that lasts.

Facts to Casually Drop Later

• Bali collects only ~30% of its tourist levy; the rest disappears :0 shhhhh…

• East Indonesia is being branded as a “marine tourism zone” — niche travelers, not mass tourism. What do you think about that?

• Komodo National Park is famous for dragons (hello!), but most visitors come for the reefs. Hence the urgency of ocean-first education in Labuan Bajo.

  

  Closing Logbook Entry
  This week was a stew of marketers, HIV experts, geothermal researchers, politicians, and priests. The broth is still thin, but maybe next week the flavors will deepen — and I’ll have a story worth serving.

  See you next week,
  Lauren
  
  

Dear readers,

They say the first step is the hardest. But for me, it was the second.
Publishing Entry #1 felt exhilarating, like leaping into cold water. Entry #2? It loomed all week like homework. A short week, too: Jakarta pulled me in on Monday and Bali has me in a conference by Friday. Still, in between airports, twin-momming, dinners and meetings, this skool-in-the-making kept right on teaching me…

The Big Dream
Blue Planet Skool is still just framework documents and sketches, but the vision hasn’t wavered. In fact, it’s grown thanks to a “pairship” with The Grand Blue Project. Together we’re building more than a school: we’re building a movement where education, conservation, culture and innovation merge. For BPS, this collaboration means scaling our philosophy: that learning must be deeply connected to action, agency, and the well-being of our planet.

Threads We’re Weaving: A Billboard in Jakarta
Somewhere between traffic jams and skyscrapers, a massive billboard shouted:

One-hundred-percent cliché! But is it…? It hit differently after two potential funders pressed me on our progress (!!!) and a governance meeting forced me to face blunt, AI-generated questions — the kind a lawyer would ask, except my “lawyer” isn’t really a lawyer at all.

Enter Anna G, my lawyer-who’s-not-a-lawyer, but an excepional modern dancer, pole dancer, Bodymind movement faciliator. With a Swedish passport in her pocket, a full-bright scholar in Jogja, and former New Yorker who once helped someone incorporate a company. Her credentials are a bit unorthodox, but she’s sharp, curious, and, most importantly, in my corner. Our shared goal: establish a California-based 501(c)(3) by December 2025, and seat for her on the board built from our very own network of misfits.

Paying her now starts our working relationship. Inviting her in slowly, until one day (I hope) she’s full-time. Because this isn’t just about legal paperwork. It’s about building with people who bring energy, shared values and wild perspectives. My network may look like misfits, but maybe that’s the point.

(Learn more abour Anna Here: Bodymind Movement Faciliator )

People Who Are Shaping the Journey
A Gang of Misfits

Edi Frommenwiler (next to Monica, who is always wearing black), is a renegade boat builder and pioneer of liveaboard diving in Indonesia. He put Raja Ampat on the global map back in the 1980s. He’s logged over 15,000 dives, amassed a private archive of 50,000 underwater videos, and even has a mountain named after him: Mount Pindito. His philosophy is simple: “The ocean has given me everything — now it is my duty to give back.” His life’s work now underpins The Grand Blue Project platform, which Blue Planet Skool is proud to weave into our classrooms and beyond.

Ryan Humphrey (next to me), our technology director, has spent 15 years in Indonesia translating his 26 years of IT expertise into ocean-focused solutions. He’s built scalable platforms for governments, NGOs, and the dive industry — but what makes him a misfit in our crew is that he avoids caffeine like the plague, while raising a dirt-bike racing nine-year-old. He brings the tech and the tats: building tools that bridge data, reefs, and future generations.

This is our tribe: a pole dancer, a boat-builder, and a caffeine-dodging coder. If that’s not a recipe for change, I don’t know what is.

Field-Notes to Founders
Meetings run long. Coffee cups clatter, classical music wafts overhead, and the questions cut to the bone: governance, exit strategy, accountability. Hard stuff, and all drafted by AI. When you come prepared with the hard-hitting questions and you don’t have the stomach to hurl the fast ball at your would-be ally, at least you can admit you let the machine draft the blunt questions. Then you get to decide which ones reveal cracks worth patching and move on. But thank goodness for AI.

Lesson of the week: Always record the meeting. In the age of AI, there’s no excuse not to capture, transcribe, and sift later. One meeting, I didn’t, and kicked myself. If you’re building something abroad, memory is too fragile to carry the load alone. Especially when you are having a laugh.

And yet, AI can never replace the energy of the people you choose to stand beside. People say, “Good people are hard to find.” I don’t buy it. Good people aren’t hard to find. You just have to know your mission well enough to attract them, especially the misfits.

See you next week,
Lauren

P.S. The idea of teaming up with misfits comes straight from Dav Pilkey’s Dog Man graphic novels — some of the greatest children’s literature of our time. One day, I’d love to write a Substack just on the life lessons hidden in Dog Man!

Thanks for dropping in. This is the first of what I hope will become a weekly practice. My logbook of building a “skool” (yes, spelled differently because I want to flip traditional education on its head) in one of the most complicated, beautiful, and downright maddening places to do anything: Indonesia.

Why I’m Writing

A few selfish reasons:

• To document this wild ride.

• To keep myself honest.

• To celebrate the small wins and own the big mistakes.

• To leave behind a trail — a framework, even — for anyone else wild enough to try building something worthy abroad.

• And maybe one day turn it all into a book!!

Where It Began

The idea for Blue Planet Skool struck me one hot morning under a bamboo roof in Labuan Bajo, looking out at the Flores Sea from a place known as The Hills of the Gods. Komodo dragons just a boat ride away. A single rickety dock stretched across a turquoise reef. A billion-dollar view. I said to my wife, who plants bamboo across the region, “Build me a school here.” She replied, “Yes, a Blue School!”.

But the town — the whole island — feels decades behind. The internet will freeze mid-Zoom and the government offices look like they’d crumble in a strong gust. Five-star resorts are sprouting up beside leaning homes built of scrap corrugated metal, perched on stilts above chicken coops, drying laundry, and trash piles.

The mayor once said, “My people still live in a cave.” He was only half joking.

So, why wait for slow, painful “development”? Why not leapfrog into the future? For me, that leap always starts with education.

This is the dream:

• AI tutors for the mastery subjects — math, literacy, social studies (PPKn, since we’re in Indonesia).

• A Mountain Journey of milestones: Explore, Create, Lead — inspired by Theories of Change and the LiD (Learning in Depth) method.

• Daily rhythms of yoga, fitness, gardening, and mindfulness.

And a philosophy stitched together from Ricardo Semler’s autonomy, Dan Pink’s intrinsic motivation, and my own refusal to let school become the place where imagination goes to die.

Threads We’re Weaving

A “Pairship,” Not a Partnership

I met with The Grand Blue Project — a group of misfits cataloging 5,000+ undersea creatures. They aren’t quite a partner. More like a pairship.

They bring:

• Ocean passion.

• Developers who might actually help me build the AI tutor (because, confession: I have no clue how to do it).

• An actual structure.

Me? I’ve got… a logo. And a broken website.

But what I really bring is Monica.

Monica Walks on Water

Monica is my wife. Once my yoga student. Now the reason I believe this project can stand. My mom once accused me of thinking Monica walks on water. Guilty. She has a way of moving mountains with a single conversation.

This week, she met with government officials and came back with news: a two-hectare land concession in Labuan Bajo. Sounds dreamy, right? Except it’s tied to a massive tourism development that makes my stomach twist.

Tourism Trouble

Tourism in Komodo has exploded 1,600% in the last decade. There are fancy resorts rising on the cliffs, while the education office looks like the Big Bad Wolf could blow it down. Trash is piling up. Water systems are stretched thin. Will paradise buckle under the weight of its own beauty? Eco-tourism is not alive and well here.

That’s the backdrop for Blue Planet Skool: raising kids into ocean guardians while the reef itself risks drowning in plastic — and tourist zodiacs drop anchors directly into her heart. No exaggeration.

Field-Notes to Founders

This week reminded me of a principle I keep forgetting to remember: share everything.

Even when my ego hates it. Even when it feels like giving away the crown jewels.

The truth? I wouldn’t have found this “pairship” if I’d kept my ideas locked up. And honestly, the ideas aren’t the hard part. Doing the work is.

So here we are. Week one.
Me. Monica. Two six-year-old twins. One busted website. A logo I kind of like. And a dream of building a school that flips education upside-down in Indonesia.

If nothing else, you’ll get the honest version of how this unfolds — mud, mess, missteps, and all.

See you next week,
Lauren