Forty years ago this year, Geoff Comber, Nick Maistrellis, and Howard Zeiderman envisioned a different kind of discussion than most of us experience in school or work—one that is inclusive, balanced, humanizing, rich, and energizing. At that time, they were each senior faculty members at St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, where most teaching and learning is conducted through seminar and tutorial classes. As they considered their successes and failures in teaching, they began experimenting with different forms of discussion-based approaches in public schools and districts. In those school sites, they implemented various pilots that explored what supports dialog and what inhibits it, and why. Initially known as the Touchstones Project, their investigations became a laboratory for researching, developing, testing, and refining discussion-based instruction to engage all students—regardless of background or circumstance.