Professor Yong Zhao is a Foundation Distinguished Professor in the School of Education at the University of Kansas and one of the most widely recognized voices in contemporary debates on education, creativity, globalization, and learning systems.

Across decades of research, institutional leadership, and international collaboration, his work has consistently examined how modern education systems shape human potential in an age of technological acceleration and global uncertainty. His writing challenges standardized models of schooling that reward replication over individuality, while advocating for forms of education that cultivate autonomy, creativity, and self-determined learning.

Dr. Zhao has authored nearly forty books, including World Class Learners, Learners without Borders, What Works May Hurt, and Never Send a Human to Do a Machine’s Job. His work explores not only what education produces, but also what kinds of thinking, imagination, and human capacities institutions quietly suppress in the process.

At The Dignity Negotiation, the conversation will examine a growing contradiction within modern systems: why institutions publicly celebrate creativity while often rewarding conformity, readability, and controlled forms of innovation.

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