The Idea Odyssey grew out of a simple but persistent concern: that we spend enormous amounts of time teaching children what to think, and very little time teaching them how. How to reason through a problem they've never seen before. How to tell a compelling story. How to recognise when they're being misled. How to sit with uncertainty without panicking. These are the skills that will matter most in their lives; but they're almost entirely absent from conventional schooling.

The Odyssey is my attempt to do something about that.

I came to this work through an unusual path. My background is in science (I have a Master's in Biochemistry and spent several years working in research) but I've always been drawn to questions that don't fit neatly into any one discipline. Why do we find some arguments convincing and others not? How did humans remember things before they could write? What does it actually mean to understand something?

I first discovered I loved working with children when I helped set up a science centre and began teaching workshops there. The best feedback I ever received was from a student who looked up mid-session and said, "Wow, you can make even Civics interesting?" I've been trying to live up to that ever since.

The Idea Odyssey is small by design: a maximum of twelve students per cohort, discussion- and project-based, no lectures. I want every child who comes through to leave feeling that the world is bigger than they thought, and that they are entirely capable of understanding it.