Christopher HabetlerEducation systems builder · Brooklyn, NY
Get the time back to lead.
Low-risk AI takes the busywork. Then the systems that use the time. Then the hard part, which stays yours.
We built an organization culture that aligned to our mission by working with Chris. He built the capacity of our leadership team, created the systems and tools, and showed us what REAL change management looks like.
I was there for version one. Excel trackers, DeansList, the manuals, the playbooks, the audits. Systems were a revolution in schools, and they worked. They also asked more of people than people had hours for, which is why the binder ends up on a shelf by October. Not because the system was wrong. Because nobody had the Tuesday.
We are not outsourcing the hard work. We are taking the grunt work off it, so the systems you already believe in finally run the way they were designed to.
A chief operating officer at a large charter network once said to me, more or less:
“I don’t understand how you can tell a school everything they’re doing wrong and somehow everyone still loves you.”
That is the job. Say the true thing, and leave the team stronger than you found them. It is also why the AI never touches the part that requires a person.
03
First the grunt work. Then the systems. Then the hard part.
Low-risk AI pointed at the work that never needed a person. The pulls, the formatting, the first drafts, the weekly report nobody wants to build, the data that has to be reshaped before anyone can look at it.
First because nothing else is possible until the time exists. Every leadership team already knows what it should be doing differently. They do not have an hour on Tuesday to do it.
The risk: nothing student-facing, nothing that makes a decision, nothing that leaves systems you already control. If it breaks, somebody does it the old way for a week. That is the whole downside.
Rung two
Systems
The manuals, the operating guides, the review cycles. The things that turn a decision made in August into what actually happens on a Tuesday in February.
Second because a system with no time to run it is a binder. I have watched this happen for fifteen years. The plan was never the problem.
The risk: they are yours. Written down, handed off, running without me. The failure mode of a system is that people stop using it, and you will see that long before it costs you anything.
Rung three
Thought partnership
The part only a person can do. What to do next. Which of these three problems is actually one problem. Whether the leader in front of you is struggling or in the wrong seat.
Last not because it matters least, but because it is the most expensive thing you buy from me, and I would rather you spend it on judgment than on things a machine should have handled.
The risk: it is a conversation. The lowest-risk thing in the building.
At KIPP, the data systems my team built turned network data into the answers leaders actually acted on. That year 46% of ninth graders across all 48 KIPP high schools finished Q3 at a 3.0 GPA or better, up 6 points year over year.
Ten custom tools built so far, for school leaders, ops directors, principal managers, and academic teams. Together they hand back 100+ hours a week. A few of them:
Academic health, a work sampleeight pages, seven real exhibits
The ninth-grade on-track initiative I led at KIPP Foundation, told through the actual weekly artifacts it produced: the regional memo, the cusp-student tracker, the meeting agenda, the teacher digest. De-identified, figures unchanged.
An ops leader at a mid-sized NY charter had a teammate burning 6am to 9am every day building the day’s coverage by hand. Not a crisis, a paper cut she got every morning, and it was begging for simple logic instead of a person. She was wary of AI. I built her the tool anyway, and now she has three hours of her week back and is asking what else can work this way.
In her hands now, a couple of iterations short of running itself.
Academic Health Coachlive on Playlab
An AI that walks a school leader through their own data and the next move to make. Coaching judgment, encoded, so the read a principal needs sits one conversation away instead of buried in a spreadsheet.
A weekly agent that plans Brooklyn weekends for my daughters, and a Star Wars galaxy app I built for them and could not stop improving. I build the thing and put it in front of real users, even when the users are five and seven.
The work with Chris deeply accelerated the trajectory of my school, and ultimately the network at large. It was nothing short of transformational, and I do not use that word lightly.
Jerel Bryant · CEO, Collegiate Academies · Louisiana State Principal of the Year
Our school leaders name his coaching and support as having very high impact, and they push hard to get as many ‘Chris days’ at their schools as possible. I would highly recommend Chris to any school, CMO, or district looking to make dramatic improvements.
Doug McCurry · Co-Founder, Achievement First
Chris spent two days with us, but his impression has left a mark for years. In minutes he could identify the root causes of culture breakdowns, and equally important, tools and strategies to dramatically and immediately change them. He is always there for us, to talk, share, empathize and then help me make tough decisions.
Rachel Yanof · Founder, ASU Prep South Phoenix
Chris’s monthly visits were a catalyst for dramatic growth. On our network’s evaluation system, we went from the lowest-performing middle school to the highest-performing in the history of our network. Truly, Chris was no small part of that.
Tom Kaiser · Founder, Authentic Leaders · former Principal, Achievement First Endeavor MS
Fifteen-plus years inside schools, on the side of the table that has to make things run. I coach the people who run schools and build the systems they run on. The AI is the newest tool in that job, not a new job.
The record
100+ engagements across 15+ states. 91% of clients came back year after year. 200+ leaders coached; one earned Louisiana Principal of the Year, then became a network CEO.
Most recently
Senior Director, High School Advancement, KIPP Foundation, 2024 to 2026.
Before that
Habetler Consulting, since 2010. Achievement First, Explore Schools, DREAM, NYC Public Schools, LA Unified, Collegiate Academies, Harvard GSE, UVA Darden.
On the build side
Advisor and board member at Ople. Educational advisor at QWZRD. Founder of the NYC EducAItion Lab.
Don’t have time to figure out AI, but know you don’t have time to not figure it out?
Call me. I’ve built ten custom tools for school leaders, ops directors, principal managers, and academic teams, and together they hand back 100+ hours every week. I can do that for you.
Point me at a problem. You get a solution that pays for itself in days, sometimes hours, of your time back. (And some of your life back.)
If you are heading into a launch, a leadership transition, or a stretch that has to go right, the first conversation is free and useful either way. Tell me what you are up against. I will tell you honestly whether I can help, and what I would do first.
