Dean Fusto: Youth Leadership, Scholarship, and Service

by Jeff Bond

I'm the Co-Founder of Chat With Leaders Media and People First Elevation Team, where my team and I help values-driven businesses create content that strengthens relationships, fuels engagement, and drives high-performing cultures. We partner with communications, marketing, and people teams to produce thought-leadership podcasts, executive messaging, and event content. My team and I also work with leaders to transform company meetings into culture-defining moments—ensuring they align teams, elevate key voices, and inspire action. As a board member of Conscious Capitalism Atlanta, I advocate for business as a force for good. Outside of work, I’m passionate about faith, family, and using influence to create lasting impact.

Dean J. Fusto is a 2020 recipient of the Klingenstein Fellowship at Teachers College, Columbia University, and the President and Head of Brandon Hall School, an international boarding and day school serving students in grades 6-12. His career spans nearly three decades as an educational leader. He founded the teachlearnlead.net community in 2014 as a tribute to his heroes and heroines: teachers. This comprehensive site is an online edu-library that has grown in reach and built a global audience of teachers and school leaders seeking professional development and access to the latest educational research. Dean is a past recipient of a National Endowment of the Humanities Fellowship and an EE Ford Fellowship. As a thought leader and influencer, he has published 5 books, dozens of articles and holds a M.A.T. from the SIT Graduate Institute, an M.A. from Columbia University, and Proactive Leadership certification from Cornell University. He has founded and designed numerous experiential, service-learning trips for thousands of students and teachers. In 2017, out of his passion for inspiring youth leadership, he founded the Center for Global Youth Leadership and Social Entrepreneurial Studies at Brandon Hall School. In 2020, he established the Therese A. Fusto microgrants to fund social and community impact projects.

Discussion Topics

Why did becoming an educational leader resonate with you when first started this career journey nearly three decades ago?
As you progressed in your experience, what were some of the greatest problems you saw as an area of opportunity for change in youth education?
How did you arrive at Leadership, Scholarship, and Service as the three-pronged focus of your mission at Brandon Hall School?
Given all the complicated societal + environmental issues we’ve been facing, what’s been your greatest area of focus when it comes to shepherding your team to equip and prepare students for these “real world” challenges?
Fast forward to retirement, what do you most hope to have accomplished?

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