About Us

Our Mission

Erase the Space is committed to transforming education by fostering meaningful public discourse across differences. Through collaborative exchanges connecting classrooms across segregated school districts, we bridge boundaries and systemic barriers, empowering elementary, middle, and high school students to share narratives, build community, and cultivate a shared purpose. By connecting classrooms and inspiring open dialogue, we aim to create a future where understanding and connection thrive across difference.

Our Vision

Our vision is a world where education transcends barriers and empowers students to collaborate across differences, fostering a shared sense of purpose and community.

What we do

Erase the Space connects students from racially and socioeconomically segregated school districts through yearlong classroom exchanges. What sets our model apart is the shared learning component: students don’t just share personal stories—they engage in collective inquiry around a real-world social issue to collaboratively imagine and create solutions.

This shared purpose anchors a cycle of relationship-building, learning, and collaborative problem-solving, culminating in an in-person collaboration day. Together, students practice democratic discourse and civic imagination—skills essential to navigating an increasingly divided world.

We equip young people to listen, question, empathize, and act—building bridges across classrooms and communities that have been disconnected through historic policy decisions.

Our Story

In the summer of 2016, Derek Burtch and Amelia Gordon met in Vermont at the Bread Loaf School of English. They didn't know that they lived three miles away or that they taught less than 20 miles away from each other, but when Derek showed up wearing a Cleveland Cavaliers shirt, Amelia said to him, "Well, you're from Ohio." 

They struck up a friendship throughout the summer and decided to partner on a classroom exchange project as part of their Bread Loaf Teacher Network fellowship. Many of the exchanges other grad students were doing happened to be long-distance (California to New York, Ghana to Massachusetts), and they realized if they partnered, they could craft an exchange in which students could eventually meet in person. Planning in the summer and fall, they eventually launched their learning exchange in January 2017 focused on narrative exchange, shared learning, and in-person collaboration. Their students met in late May, and 100% of them responded in their reflections that Mr. Burtch and Mrs. Gordon should try the exchange again.

Since then, Erase the Space has facilitated 42 classroom exchanges involving over 80 teachers, and reached over 2000 students. The program has evolved from one that focused on high school to adapting to middle school and elementary classrooms and have even hosted adult learning exchanges. Local history summer projects in which students are paid to become historians of their community and the NExT Hub teacher networks in partnership with Otterbein are among the other work we have done in Central Ohio.  With seven facilitators, seven board members, and over 20 community partners, Erase the Space continues to support students and teachers connecting across segregated school boundaries to build meaningful connections and enlarge their idea of community.